
Facebook Is Working on a Video Chat Device - coloneltcb
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-01/facebook-is-said-to-work-on-video-chat-device-in-hardware-push
======
dragonwriter
So,I've got a cellphone with front and back cameras, a tablet with front and
back cameras, and a laptop with a front camera, and a desktop device for which
I could easily get a front camera for a far less than anything with it's own
dedicated screen will cost, all of which have (or have available) both native
and web-based video chat software (including versions specialized for group
and one-on-one use.)

Whyever would I want or need a dedicated video chat device? Why would anyone?

Also, a laptop-sized (so, I guess, somewhere between 10” and 19”) isn't going
to make people feel like they are in the same room.

I suppose if you wedded a 3D camera to a HoloLens-like AR system, with some
clever software, that might make people feel like they are in the same room.

~~~
mertd
This reminds me of that infamous "Show HN: Dropbox" thread.

It is 2017 and I don't know of any video conference system or software that
"just works" everywhere, all the time, under all bandwidth conditions. If
Facebook thinks they can pull this off by tight control on hardware, they will
sell like hotcakes.

~~~
swiley
I feel like if I had to video conference with one of my friends running Linux
we would just use ffmpeg and ffplay.

It probably wouldn't be anymore reliable than all the other conference
software but at least it doesn't drag a mountain of bullshit and lockin with
it.

We just use email and in person meetings though, I still don't quite get the
point behind video conferencing.

------
BinaryIdiot
I'm all for this. We recently purchased some Echo Shows, one for us and one
for my grandparents and the Amazon experience to setup communication between
the two was absolutely painful.

First both need an Amazon account which, okay that's not so bad. But now both
Amazon accounts need to log into the Amazon Alexa mobile app which my
grandparents can not do as they do not have a mobile phone with apps on it so,
instead, I have to use their login on my phone. Then I had to register their
cell phone with their account on my mobile phone because they can't do the
text message verification via their landline that they've had for 30 years and
to top it all off now their Echo has all of the contacts from my phone because
it doesn't let you manually manage contacts per Amazon account, no they have
to be copied directly from your phone.

So if they can make it so all they need is a Facebook account and now they can
video chat with us or any of their friends and family? That would be perfect
for my grandparents.

~~~
hellbanner
Right, and for those of us who don't want to use a Facebook account? The world
is lacking good, adopted implementations of open networking.

~~~
jjaredsimpson
What's wrong with just making a disposable single use facebook account.

~~~
hobarrera
They generally ask for a phone number nowadays for new accounts, so you'd need
a new number for each one (or reuse the same one, which defeats the purpose of
the disposable accounts).

------
Zenst
I worked in Videoconferencing in the 90's and the advent of better CPU and
processing power come the turn of the century with netmeeting, many in the
industry thought the days of dedicated hardware and expensive MCU (Multipoint
control units) was soon to be usurped. Nearly 20 years on and yet to see that
killer video conferencing feature.

Of note was also privy to early testing of Three (UK 3G mobile network) tests
for video and whilst managed to stream the Matrix in the early days as a test,
that never took of either and that was more due to the costs of data
connections, an issue very much moot these days (least in the UK).

One area that often lets down videoconferencing at the consumer level are the
camera's and the environment the user uses them in and gets down to lighting.
But again, no killer, easy to use consumer solution has come and taken the
market by storm.

Sure many point to point video solutions on offer and used but no universal
standard multipoint as easy as sending an email to multiple people is jumping
out.

With that, I wish Facebook good luck and they do have the user base to drive
this, but I'm not sure it is a feature as high in demand for consumer users as
many wish or feel it is.

I can only put this down again to the environments such consumer systems (your
mobile say) are used in and whilst the processing power is there to alleviate
much of this, that has still to come to fruition as a user friendly reliable
experience.

~~~
stevenwoo
Wow, I haven't run into refugee from that videoconferencing era in a while, I
worked at VTel in the 90's in Austin.

~~~
Zenst
I worked for a company called TopTel, managed the VC networks for ICL, DOH and
few others, dealt with many Telco's and bridge companies who's names escape me
at the time. international VC and dialing the extra 0 for ISDN lines to make
sure they didn't route over satellite and then the fun of switched ISDN (North
American ISDN standard with it's bit stealing 56k lines over the dedicated D
channel 64k lines). Fun times.

One aspect of VC was you could tell if a network link (leased lines) was not
upto scratch as you would see bit error, unlike network data, which would
happily gloss over such odd bit errors. Other fun and games was ISDN circuits
being stolen due to engineers repatching lines of little used circuits and
then when the ISDN would lock up and that would often be that the bit error
count hit a limit. You would call up, get the telco to test the line/circuit
and low and behold it would be working again, this was due to the test
resetting the error count. Had a neat way of testing lines using my 2G mobile
on the Orange network, in that if I called an ISDN line the way it terminated
the call would indicate if it was up or was errored, or busy.

But my funniest story would be spending 30 minutes trying to resolve an issue
with a PicturTel setup with some French chap and why the audio from his end
was not working, turned out he was sat upon the microphone.

~~~
stevenwoo
My company and I could have used your knowledge! Got sent to Europe to debug
some problems where we had an ISDN card from a third party installed in our
systems and got to visit UK, Germany, Belgium, and France to look at different
issues.

------
nobleach
We've had the prospect of video chat for decades. 2001 A Space Odyssey showed
us that it would be the de facto way to talk to our families. Tom Selleck
promised us in the early 1990s
([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZb0avfQme8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZb0avfQme8))
that AT&T would bring it to us. And when we finally got it, most people said,
"meh". Almost all chat platforms have some sort of video integration, and for
the most part, its acceptance is lukewarm. Perhaps it's because it doesn't
work amazingly well? Perhaps its because people really don't want to have to
get dressed to have a conversation? Perhaps I'm just not in the right crowd?

~~~
xphilter
FaceTime seems to be way more popular than most realize. Anecdotally, my
children use it daily to talk with grandparents and cousins and I see people
on public transportation using it in place of telephone calls (makes more
sense there because they're not driving). And, I use it when traveling to talk
to my family.

The issue going forward is the lack of standardization across protocols.
Despite Apple's mention in the keynote when FaceTime was announced that it
would be open, FaceTime is iOS/Mac only for now. And, I don't see Facebook's
playing nice with Amazon's, etc.

~~~
vermontdevil
It's iOS/Mac only because it has to go through Apple server. This is because
of this lawsuit:

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20236114](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20236114)

~~~
opportune
Interestingly, it seems the company they lost to is effectively a publicly
traded patent troll

~~~
smnrchrds
And it has a market cap of just over 200 million dollars [1]. Makes me wonder
why Apple wouldn't simply buy the company. They can more than easily afford
it.

[1] [https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/VHC](https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/VHC)

~~~
eutropia
If I were feeling vindictive I wouldn't want to reward a patent troll by
making them multimillionaires. I'd rather sue them out of existence...

------
dhanainme
I must say the Video chat in Amazon Echo Show is very interesting from my
experience using it over the past few weeks when talking to my family in other
side of the world. The Mics are so good that they can hear them from pretty
much anywhere in my 800 sqft home.

It would be very interesting to see how this device competes. The features i
would love to have is a 360 Camera attached to a large screen. with Multiple
Mics / Good Speakers. Ability to seamlessly which to multiple screens based on
where I am.

~~~
dhimes
_The Mics are so good that they can hear them from pretty much anywhere in my
800 sqft home._

So can The Others.

------
wonder_bread
Do you trust a Facebook camera on your kitchen counter/night stand/living room
table? I feel like they haven't done much for themselves(in terms of branding)
as a privacy-friendly company to the point where technophobes are going to be
comfortable setting these up in their homes.

~~~
MBCook
No kidding.

My twitter feed is full of people pointing out their CEO (Zuckerberg) tapes
over his webcams, but now wants users to put this in their homes.

------
AceJohnny2
Remember when we had a unified communication network?

I can use my phone for video chat over Facetime. Or Facebook Messenger. Or
Skype. Or Whatsapp. Or Google Hangouts (haven't installed Duo. yet)

Signal and Line can both do audio calls but not video. Yet.

I _think_ with the union of all those networks I should be able to do a video
chat with 95% of my contacts.

When's SIP taking over the world again?

~~~
digi_owl
The only way we get big dogs to play along to everyone's benefit is by force,
sadly. If not then they will always attempt to carve up fiefs.

------
honestoHeminway
Oh sweat progress, now we can leave all the text based internet and chat-apps
behind us, finally able to identify people again not by there words, but by
there colour, there pattern of speach and the wealth of there surroundings.

If there ever was progress that should move humanity backwards this is how it
looks.

------
raghavtoshniwal
This move (along with the smart speaker), might help put 'M' at an equal
footing with Alexa, Cortana, Siri, Google Assistant and the likes in terms of
media recognition. Somehow, M is not brought up as often when AI assistants
are mentioned.

------
pgeorgep
Instead of articles about what Facebook is working on, I'd be more interested
in what they're not working on at this point. I can't think of an area they
aren't trying to disrupt.

~~~
mtgx
> I can't think of an area they aren't trying to disrupt.

Disrupt is a strange way of putting it when they are an incumbent copying and
implementing exactly what others have been doing for a long time. To me
disruption means a significant change from how things are currently done in a
given market -- a change that also changes the paradigm for how things are
done in the market.

------
fiatpandas
My guess: it's something like a chrome stick with a connected webcam you place
at the top of your tv.

------
shusson
Hmm anyone else thinking of Pied Piper?

