Mobile Blog: Video, Media, Augmented Reality, Rich Media, IVVR

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In desktop video conferencing, the video conferencing application is normally bundled to an Instant Messaging software that includes text chat capabilities. Users can appoint or prearrange a video conference using textual chat. In contrast, the current evolution of video telephony in UMTS (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System) networks based on the circuit-switched 3G-324M service does not seamlessly combine video conferencing with other communication channels. The notion of video telephony in the mobile environment is nearer to standard voice calling than in the stationary world. Therefore, it is more likely that somebody will place a video call without prior announcement. This leads to privacy and inconvenience concerns. The callee might not want to be seen during a conversation for a variety reasons: A video call “turns you ugly” (Harlow) because the build-in cameras are usually not placed just above the user’s line of sight but in the suboptimal position below the nose. Further, the video quality is meagre, and lightning conditions are poor. People might feel that exposing their face over a video call invades their privacy and, most times, callees do not want callers to see how he or she looks. Furthermore, the use of video telephony can depend on social factors. Societies in South East Asian countries—for example, Malaysia—are considered non-confrontational. This can be seen when people make decisions on which channel they use for communication. The author’s experiences in South East Asia revealed that most people prefer non-confrontational communication such as SMS (Short Message Service), instant messaging or e-mail, even in the business environment or with good friends. Voice calling is avoided as much as possible for a first or unexpected contact. It is obvious that P2P (Peer-to-peer) video calling is considered even more intrusive—and therefore unlikely to succeed in these societies.

According to an informal research of Sachendra Yadav (Yadav), opinion leaders and technology experts feel that video calling does not add much to a conversation compared to voice calling. In comparison to desktop video conferencing, which is mostly free nowadays, the cost-benefit analysis leads to resistance for using mobile video telephony.

For many reasons, 3G video telephony as a person-to-person conversational service is not as successful as projected. The existing technical foundation for video calling can be used to deliver IVVR (Interactive Voice & Video Response) services. A wide range of IVVR applications is imaginable, and some service providers and network operators already deploy them. Furthermore, special IVVR applications such as P2P Video Avatar can even compensate the drawbacks of classic P2P video telephony, making P2P-alike video telephony successful after all.

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Even with a great deal of marketing, early attempts to convert users to the video telephony technology flopped (Jones and Marsden). In contrast, desktop video conferencing is incredibly popular for private person-to-person conversations and widely used for video conferencing in business environments such as telepresence for computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW).

In desktop video conferencing scenarios, typically a stationary computer is used. Camera and microphone are fixed and usually maintain the same distance from the person participating during the conversation. Moreover, lighting conditions are generally better than “on-the-go”, as a desktop is easier to illuminate correctly than a scene in the mobile environment. When performing mobile video telephony, lighting conditions change over time when the caller moves or the environment changes; moreover, the camera is usually not fixed. During mobile video telephony, the caller is likely to hold the handset in front of his face by extending his arm, making the video wiggly. In combination with the meagre bandwidth and low-resolution video, this can considerably degrade the video quality shown on the callee’s side. These considerations about the video quality problems in the mobile environment also play a major role in IVVR (Interactive Voice & Video Response) applications that take advantage of the instant video streaming capabilities that 3G-324M video telephony offers. Bad video quality negatively influences camera-based games, gesture recognition, or P2P (Peer-to-peer) services that intentionally change the video for dynamic video overlays such as for the P2P Avatar, because motion analysis algorithms perform better with a sharp and clear video signal.