5 Different Ways of Using WebRTC

WebRTC isn’t just disrupting UC. It has a lot more to it that wasn’t apparent in the beginning.

A confession.

When I started out looking at WebRTC, it was from my own narrow worldview – that of video conferencing. The premise of my whole way of thinking was around how WebRTC can be used to bring video conferencing to the browser and removing the necessity of an application installation. It seemed like achieving the impossible back then. I even had a larger notion. One of replacing the whole concept of what a room system is.

Today? I cringe when the only business model presented by a company is to connect a web browser to today’s video conferencing systems.

Having the opportunity to talk to companes, listen to their pitch, understanding their service and business model and interviewing them; gives me a different perspective of things. It always amazes me of the things people achieve with WebRTC.

The latest Google demo of ponging with a bear?

Quaint. Interesting. Gaming with video calling. Nothing really new. Maybe besides showing off that this thing can actually be done in a browser.

Here is the current list of different ways in which companies are using WebRTC today:

1. Gaining access to the microphone and camera

Yap. There’s this. Most will say “this isn’t communication”, but I think people have been showing off some darn good stuff with it.

Be it a photo booth, speech to text or different kinds of video recognition capabilities – this thing has merit on its own.

2. Web voice and video calling

This one is easy. Most WebRTC startup companies can be found here – each with its own set of use cases to deal with. Dating, gaming, experts market, telemedicine – the list goes on.

3. Legacy web channel

Legacy is where the boring stuff is. It is IMS, VoIP and UC companies with products, where for them WebRTC is just another channel into their legacy system. I don’t have faith in this approach, as in the long run, my guess is that the web companies will eat their legacy counterparts alive.

4. P2P streaming / CDN’ing

This is where the whoa happens. That things about data connection and the ability to send whatever you want from one browser to another? There are companies exploiting it, and I am planning on having an interview with such a company in the near future.

The most comment use in this case is file sharing, P2P streaming or as an “add-on” to a CDN type of capability.

5. Plundering

That’s the classic one. WebRTC has a pretty permissive open source license, and it has good quality. So there are companies that plunder it for their own needs – take its echo canceler, the whole shebang, the codec – whatever they need, port it and plug it into their own solutions.

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There’s more than one way to use WebRTC. And UC? A blip in the radar of WebRTC – nothing more.