Telepresence: the next killer app (Cringely)

Sure. And we'll have cold fusion by 2010, and a man on Mars by 2012.

Fiber-to-the-home has been promised for over 10 years. It may be getting closer, but widespread availability by next year? I doubt it.

But the biggest problem is that no one actually WANTS a videoconferencing unit in their home. The technology's been around for decades; ok, maybe not a high-res large screen TV, but a 5" screen over POTS. To put it simply, people don't want to have to dress up and do their hair just to place a phone call (and what do you do if someone calls when you're in your PJs?)

The only real application at home are long-distance calls with family members or friends who live far. This works okay with webcams, and I can't see enough demand to buy large-screen video-conferencing units for this purpose to make it a killer app.

The economist just had a story on this:

http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=...

Doesn't really look like startup territory to me.

Video conference units are awesome in work from home developer scenarios. When collaborating on code, the ability to see the guy at the other end coding away, is soooo much better than wondering if he hung up or got disconnected when he stops talking to think or type. It really must be tried to be believed. (And understanding Indians is a lot easier when you can see as well as hear them:)). Also, with these things available, there is even less reason for developers not to work out of private offices.

YC should convince Tandberg or Polycom to provide them some samples for a lower cost. I'm sure some founders could find ways to put them to good use, and the manufacturers could get some exposure in markets where they're not well represented.

He's not talking about video-conferencing with a dinky webcam which yes, has failed. He's talking about a system where it really feels like the person is there. The attributes of life size-ness (sp) and eye contact make the difference.

I don't think people will want this to replace telephone calls, rather to hold business meetings. A Thanksgiving dinner would be pretty cool too. So it feels like everyone is at the same table.

The article mentioned Apple as the company who might sell these systems, but I wonder if a start-up devoted exclusively to this business model might do it better? One could use off-the-shelf hardware (to a large extent) and be almost purely a software company.