2016 will be the year of video!
I heard that in 2005 I think. And then 2006. And then in almost every following year.
I used to work in a video conferencing company. So it really mattered.
When video did happen… it happened outside of the domain of enterprise video conferencing systems. And it continues to grow predominantly there.
But the thing is – video still is minuscule. Voice isn’t that interesting or important as it used to be either.
If I had to chart the use of our basic communications options these days, it would probably look like this:
I’d also say that the only reason video is almost as big as voice is due to WebRTC and the passing of time – It is easier today than ever before to implement and add video chat capabilities anywhere. And there are people who tend to do video calls instead of voice ones – because they can, but not because video is that critical, mystical part we’re often led to believe.
Video definitely has its place in the world and is extremely useful. I do most of my own business through video calling with clients all over the world. Most of them have never met me in person and are still happy to work with me. With voice, it would be slightly harder to achieve.
What ticked me to this topic was a piece on Ars Technica about the adoption percentage of IPv6 in 20 years (hint: the smallest 2 digit number). While the two things are different, video hasn’t fared much better and has been around for even longer.
Video will be a slow process, but the end result will never be the pervasiveness of voice or the current ubiquity and growth of messaging in all of its forms.
You still waiting for video to happen?
I think the adoption of video communication comes down to basic human characteristics.
People understand that body language is making communication much more friendly, effective and human but mostly dislike being captured by a camera.
People understand that synchronous communication is important and effective in many circumstances but underutilize it.
Go figure 🙂 .