US doesn’t understand video calling on 3G phones?

by Alex Zaharov-Reutt

Wednesday, 11 June 2008

Page 2 of 3 In the New York Times article, David Pogue rightly relayed some of the disappointments of those who were wanting more from the iPhone 3G. Pogue said that users bemoaned the fact ”there’s still no user-swappable battery, physical keyboard, copy-and-paste function, memory card slot, video recording, Bluetooth stereo audio or MMS (the ability to send photos to other cellphones).” Pogue also says that “the weirdest complaints [were that] the new iPhone would be able to do hand-held cellular video chats, à la Dick Tracy’s watch” thanks to the 3G capability. Possibly because the US cellular market is only just getting 3G now, Pogue admits he was “kind of psyched by the possibility”, even though it is old news almost everywhere else on the planet. Indeed, video calling on phones has been around for years now, and the biggest gripe we have with it is that it’s still perceived as expensive, because video calls initially cost a lot more than voice calls, and can still cost more today. But even though many 3G phones now have 3.5G HSDPA high speed connections, today’s video calls are still conducted using a pathetic 64Kbps video stream, meaning herky-jerky-ish video that is the opposite of smooth TV video. Thinking about it, that’s probably one of the reasons why Jobs didn’t bother with videoconferencing on the iPhone 3G right now – the picture quality sucks, and it would actually make the iPhone look bad. Of course, if Jobs had introduced videoconferencing via iChat and Wi-Fi, picture quality could have been tremendously better, but he’s clearly saving it for the iPhone due in 2009, when Jobs will likely come on stage to say how the iPhone will ‘revolutionise video calling and video conferencing”. Still, here’s the odd thing Pogue said about video calling: “But all weekend long, one thing kept bothering me about this rumor [around 3G iPhone videocalling]: If you want to do video chats, you’d need a camera above the screen. That would mean putting the iPhone’s camera on the front instead of the back — and that would mean you couldn’t use it for regular picture-taking. At least, not without some extremely awkward body contortion, as you watch the front screen to frame the shot and yet try to avoid being in the shot.”   The odd statement continues: “The only way to make this happen would be to put either a second screen or a second camera on the back, either of which would add cost, complexity and ugliness, and I knew Apple would never go there.” So, why is it odd?! Please read on. << First page <   1 2 3 Next page > Last page - Post your comment >>

 

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