In 1964, AT&T unveiled its picturephone (Bell's Mod I (Model I) —a telephone
with video as well as audio—at the New York World’s Fair and at Disneyland.
It was an iconic moment for personal technology.
Lady Bird Johnson talks into newly invented Picturephone, Washington, DC.
IMAGE: GEORGE F. MOBLEY/NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC/GETTY IMAGES
Two months later, on June 24, AT&T's commercial Picturephone service began,
kicked off by a phone call from First Lady Lady Bird Johnson from the nation's
capital to a Picturephone booth at Grand Central Station in New York.At $16 for
three minutes, your up-to-15-minute video call could cost as much as $80.
— the equivalent of $610 in 2014 dollars.
Stanley Kubrick, via2001: A Space Odyssey, predicted that not only would there be
a Howard Johnson's on a space station, but an AT&T picturephone call from the orbit
would cost just $1.70 for a minute and a half.
Picturephone service didn't take off in any of its variations because of cost. On February 5, 1969, AT&T started selling the Mod II — which offered a 251-line, 30fps black & white image displayed on a 5 x 5.5-inch screen to corporate clients.
Failure of Picturephone:
AT&T's 2001 post mortem, reported by Schnaars and Wymbs, reasoned that
Picturephone was still too big, expensive, and uncomfortably intrusive and people did not want to be seen on the telephone... To be successful, AT&T hypothesized that it needed to have improvements in speed, resolution, miniaturization, ease of use, price performance and incorporation into a desktop piece of equipment.
In the course of time, after 20 years, What changed the equation, of course, was the Internet and the ubiquity of devices — laptops, smartphones — with webcams built in. Since we already had the devices, all we needed was software: Skype,microsoft teams , zoom, apple facetime etc.
How do Microsoft Teams decide which users will *remain*
onscreen during a video call?
from Microsoft article
we have three ways of seeing a Microsoft teams video call interface.
1. Someone starts speaking, we show them
2. When someone shares content, we show that.
3. To focus on a particular video, right-click and select Pin.
credit: https://www.computerworld.com
It's quite thoughtful, to allow the user to switch and remove the person
speaking and pin someone's video with whom you can talk in sign language
while avoiding the content of the meeting.
What I am really interested in understanding and uncover the mystic algorithm
used by the system to fill the 2x2 grid, what if only one person is sharing and
speaking among 50 other attendees, who are the rest 3 people
to be shown on the 2x2 grid. considering the fact, one person has shared and
spoken since the beginning...
Is it based on who might speak? Probable speaker? The tendency of speaking?
Spoken a lot in the past few meetings?
Will it be based on your rank in the organisation?
Do I have to select my video faces for the 2x2 grid, everything I attend the meeting?
Doesn't feel much comfortable!
These remote working have the tendency to make us think on a few lines of human to
human interaction on the computer interface. A clear example of sailing on the
boat of technological sails, where we have few ways to steer the boat, the intelligent
The boat keeps most of it to itself.
What will be the politics of such 2x2 grid displays, is it going to affect our behaviour offline ?
is it going to motivate few?
what does the algorithm know to put us in the 2x2?
I might be wrong throughout, maybe not.
drawing by designer/educator Anab Jain.
she writes
" where everybody is looking at everybody else and
nobody is looking at each other ."
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