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Telepresence for the Teleworkplace:

Living-in versus visiting Cyberspace…

Making Telepresence a Reality

Gordon Bell (gbell@microsoft.com)

Bay Area Research Center

Microsoft Researchhttp://www.research.microsoft.com/barc/gbell

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Outline Telepresence and Telework

– Teleworking environment– Overhead: Support & Administrivia– The “work”

Telepresence dimensions Telepresentations: the 2nd killer app! Telecollaboration: killer app to come? “The work” Is it for everyone?

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“Therapy from long distance debated”

- SJ Mercury 5 April 1998

http://www.sjmercury.com/breaking/headline1/056580.htm

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What is Telepresence?

Injecting your presence

Being immersed in the tele-space

Being there without really being there or then

into tele-space

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Telepresence Components

Video Audio Slides, images, web pages Text chat Shared applications Whiteboards Voting, question taking

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Time-shifting beats Space-shifting

Gets around scheduling problems– World’s time zones!

Time-shifting requires STORAGE !!!

Lets me pause, rewind, browse, play at faster speeds

Immortality

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Today’s killer app : Telepresentations

Presenter and/or audience telepresent

Practical and low cost now

One-way mostly – Not meeting or

collaboration settings– forget the network

latencies and messy social issues

Slides and audio get you 99% and are bandwidth cheap

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Telework = (cyber) work + telepresence … being there while being here, and at some other time.

Goal: teleoffice/teleworkplace = workplace office The teleworkplace is ideally just a “remote office” W/O

– Communication, computer, and network support!– Team interactions for work! CSCW is a “rat hole”!– Interaction at coffee, meeting rooms, … in offices– Administrative support for phones, information (especially

paper) management, keeping track of Always on & always connected to intranet/intranet ...! Telecommunication aka phone & email -- the first, “killer apps” Telepresentations -- the 2nd “killer app” Tele-collaboration -- the “killer app” to come

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Videotaped Lectures convert to Video On Demand for Telepresentations

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Telecommuting versus time

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Teleworking CW 9/1/97 15% 2 yr increase, 11 Mpeople, avg. 19 Hr/wk 42% of US Co’s; 22% have policies (screening, worker

expectations, liability, IP protection, etc. Are telecommuters more productive?

– 30% yes– 50% same– 4% no– 16% don’t know

Are telecommuters more accessible?– 13% yes– 40% same– 40% no– 7% don’t know

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Living in Cyberspace: the environment for

telepresence / telework

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SOHO (small office, home office)network computing environment

NT Server for: comm/network, POTS/IP

gateway, file, print, compute

IP Dial tone (Internet, phone, videophone) >1.5 Mbps

Phone

POTS (legacy services)

*NC, NetPC, Xterm, etc.

...

LAN

PC NC*PC...

PhonePhone

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Intrastructure

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Tecra & Libretto Replacement… at 3#

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A Teleworkplace

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A Whiteboard

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SOHO AKA COMOHO Teleworking Environment or is it?

Guardian Angel:intercom,records what we read, see, and hear… protects us fromourselves and others

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Libretto, .5mm

PCS; Pilot

Libretto PS, Ricoh Camera; Swiss Army Knife

Compass; altimeter

Not shown: ECG; GPS;

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Audio, pix, T, P, ECG, location, physiological parameters…1 GB

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Conference Rooms with Teleconferencing

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Telemeeting clone

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Telework clones… being in more than one place at the same time

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Animatron...

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Telework & communications dimensions

•Who and how many are interacting?

•What is the nature of the interaction?

•Which professions?

•Mechanisms: How are they interacting?

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email

Formal presentations sans video

...

Voice & Videomail

Video lectures & courses

ICQ, Internet phone & phone conf.

RealAudio & simple graphics

Workspace for remote program control

Whiteboard (groups)...

Videophone

Remote Rover (Robot Videophone)

person-computer

1:1 personal

comm

unication

2 site-site

conferencing;

n site conferencing

1:p broadcasts

computer

managem

ent

distributed groups

with >2, 10, <100,

view

(tro

ll) h

allw

ays

with

“info

rmal

” inte

ract

ion

1: 1

vid

eophone

calls

for

(pro

blem

solv

ing, a

uthorin

g)

inte

rvie

ws

clas

ses

form

al m

eetin

gs (le

cture

s,

confe

rence

s, s

tock

holder

mee

tings,

town h

alls

, etc

..)

Mechanisms(how)

Synchronous

Asynchronous

GroupInteraction

(Who)

Type

of

Work

(What

)

The Space of Telepresencefor work

Profession

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Telepresence: who and whatWHO

1:1 person-person communication

n:m 2-site-site video conference

1:n-site broadcasting or Mbone narrowcasting

distributed group. >2 - 5 - 10 - 100

----

person-computer

computer management (no persons)

What

view (troll) hallways, “seeking interaction”

1:1 interview, status report, etc.

1-6 videophone calls for (design, problem solving, authoring)

hold staff meetings with 1 or more members distributed

attend classes

formal meetings (lectures, conferences, stockholder meetings, town halls, etc..)

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Synchronous

Internet phone & phone conferencing

Internet Videophone

RealAudio & Overhead graphics

Shared applications

Whiteboards

CU SeeMe on POTS… IP Videophone

Mbone Video conferencing

Room Video conferencing

Remote Rover (Robot Videophone)

Asynchronous

voice mail…STT

email ... TTS

Home pages replace bulletin boards, file transport, and document distribution

Schedule & “Notes”

Voice and Video “email”

Telepresentations (meetings, presentations, & courses)

Telepresence Mechanisms (for Work)

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Voice and Visual Alternatives (in order of increasing B/W)

Voice* TTS (synthetic or

speaker driven) 4 Kb-64 Kb codec of

real voice Stereo of real voice Stereo with sound

source identification Projection into arbitrary

virtual world environment

*variable speed

Visual AKA Video* Text avatar (simple… photo) Avatar with voice sync Avatar of real person Video codec based projection

– “Postage stamp” … POTS– “Mailing label” … ISDN or 2x POTS– Compressed VHS (200 Kbps)– MPEG 2 (1- 4 Mbps)

Speaker tracking, 1-n cameras VR image of a large space 3d images “holodeck” Animatron e.g. Barney Mobile Animatron*Meeting in real or virtual world

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Telepresentations: The 2nd killer app?

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Telepresentations “Being There (e.g. meeting, lecture, confererene) Without Really Being There (or Then)”

Presenter or audience need not be physically present Reach a wider audience

“I have a schedule conflict.” Anybody with a web connection can participate

Reduce costs No need to travel to attend or participate in a presentation

Education & training, corporate communication

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Motivation:Telepresentations

• Presenter and/or audience telepresent

NOT: meeting or collaboration settings

Forget the nasty social issues!

Mostly one-way

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TelepresentationElements

Slides Audio Video Script,

text comments, hyperlinks,etc.

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Telepresentations:The Essentials

Slide and audio a must Add some video

(low quality) to make us feel good

Storage and transmission costs low

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Telepresentations:The Killer App

Increased attendance & lower travel costs Practical and low-cost NOW e.g. ACM97 - 2,000 visitors in real space,

20,000 visitors on Internethttp://research.microsoft.com/acm97

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This talk

Would you like to pause, rewind, browse? Do you wish you could have seen this

– At home?– At another time?

How much does a present speaker add? How much would you pay for real presence?

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About storage: one CD holds four, “near VHS quality” hours of video

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Telepresentation Structure

AAuuddiieennccee

AAuuddiieennccee

TTrraannssppoorrtt

RReennddeezzvvoouuss

SSeerrvveerr

PPrreesseenntteerr

AAuuddiioo

VViiddeeoo

SSlliiddeess

ootthheerr......On-demandPlayback

CaptureCapture

Back channel of audio, chat text, video, etc. from audience to presenter

Presentation content: slides (presentation graphics), audio, video, etc.

NOTES:Delivery: Live delivery direct from presenter. Delayed delivery from “server”. Thiscould be a computer network, or a courier.Audience: telepresent - either remote from presenter and/or viewing at a later time.Server: HTTP, FTP, fax, email, etc.

DDeelliivveerryy

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Telecollaboration: The next “killer app”

interacting to achieve a common objective … basically, its communications enabling or disabling people

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Tools for telecollaboration Powerpoint: conference & record,

Precept: mbone multicasting NetShow: On demand viewing of video 28.8 - 100

Kb CuSeeMe: audio, video, whiteboard NetMeeting: audio, 2 way video, chat, whiteboard,

program sharing Placeware for large scale meetings, presentations,

and collaborations Latitude MeetingPlace phone & data conference Active Touch web-based phone & data conference

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Active Touch Live Collaboration Architecture

DataCollaboration

Server

DataCollaboration

Server

DataCollaboration

Server

CTIServer

CTIServer

CollaborationCollaborationClusteringClustering

ServerServer

CollaborationCollaborationClusteringClustering

ServerServer

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Active Touch Data Collaboration Services

Web Server

Multipoint Comm. Service

Chat

Presentation

Doc Review

Web Tour

InteractiveForms

ApplicationViewing

ApplicationSharing

LaunchNetMeeting

DesktopSharing

Conf. Control

TCP/IP

HTTP

ToCTI

Servers

DataDataCollaborationCollaboration

ServerServer

DataDataCollaborationCollaboration

ServerServer

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Active Touch Administration and Enterprise Integration

DirectoryService Module

Billing &Accounting

Database Database

ActiveDirectoryService(LDAP)

ObjectStorage

EnterpriseData

Repository

SecurityModule

ArchiveModule

PublicKey

InfrastructureDatabase

ThirdParty

Repository

Admin and EI

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Collaboration Application Server: Criteria

Robust, scalable Data & Telephony Tight Integration Web Integration Easy-To-Use Security Open Standards (HTTP, TSAPI, LDAP, T.120, Encryption) Enterprise Application Integration Performance High Availability

Customizable

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Telecollaboration Low latency, high bandwidth for interactivity, feeling,

nuances Channels:

– speech (including spatialization)– the “work” I.e. document, diagram, program,

presentation, etc.– video output: forces attendance and

holds attention– video input: “state” of the receiver cues– whiteboard– chat channels

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Telework: It takes screens, sound, and bandwidth, stupid

http://research.microsoft.com/barc/GBell/http://research.microsoft.com/barc/GBell/

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““

””

By April 1, 2001 By April 1, 2001 videophones will ship in videophones will ship in 50% of the PCs 50% of the PCs and be in use.and be in use.

Gordon Bell vs Jim Gray1996 (one paper,

loser gets fed)

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How to fail at video-telephony

Have just a few video-telephones… defy Metcalfe’s Law

Have audio latency Make calling more difficult and time-

consuming than placing a phone call Eliminate gaze awareness and eye

contact

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How to fail at video-conferencing

Break the video-telephony rules Stick with poor mono audio and don’t

provide stereo Make the images very small so that

users can’t see the other participants Destroy any sense of spatial

positioning

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Four steps to video-telephony enabling telemeetings

Very low cost IP telephony becomes ubiquitous

Evolve audio to provide spatial awareness aka stereo, quad, etc.

Make recording easy to do Add multi-party

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Limits of Computer Supported Collaborative Work -- CSCW

We don’t understand collaboration We do it for design of chips, software, 777s “One person has the mouse” problem Camera is important NOT for comm. channel,

but for signals from attendees (did they “get it”),and to keep & force attendee attention

Parallel processing and single threading of tasks Limited parallelism for the job Brook’s Law matters!

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Attending Several Simultaneous Meetings

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Alternative Computing Futures

Photos courtesy of Microsoft Cinemania

• Forbidden Planet (1956)

• Metropolis (1926)

• 2001 (1968)

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But does anyone want telework?

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A People Model: Who wants to telework?

Spock

formal(in writing)

Self-control

informal(verbal)

Sally Field

Souter Evangelism Swaggert

Analyticals.. being right, detailed

analretentives

Drivers…results oriented

megalomaniacs

Amiables…consensusbuilders

spinelesswimps

Expressives...want recognition, need contact

psychotics

Managing Interpersonal Relationships(MIR)

2D Model

--------------chat----------------

emailbroadcast- push

Intensity

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Problems: socio vs technical

Isolation & loneliness– need for communication/stimulation– chance meetings -- serendipity of ideas– loss of group/teamwork skills– danger of becoming “terminal”

interruptions & focus lack of support staff to help, answer ?s supervision and ability to have 1:1 unclear that many people want it…

they simply need the contact with people

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Good News

Bandwidth will come Audio and video compression is

improving to live within POTS limit Videophones will be built-into all PCs

within 5 years at 0 cost Telepresentations are here for “live”

and “on demand” useThis will change education!

Telecollaboration tools work for simple apps… and will improve

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Telepresence: 5, 10, … 50 year goals

hold a meeting of type, m

university or technical course

interview, staff meeting, co-ordination, board meeting, annual meeting, “town hall”,

with p, distributed persons

with as much interactivity, I, and feeling, f

such that people prefer being telepresent; and

meetings are provably more productive

meetings will evolve to be asynchronous versus traditional synchronous enabling full time-shifting so that people can be in two places at the same time

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The End

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Time and Motion Study

Where does all the time go? Can anything be parallelized? Is there an app to help?

– Will the gain be worth the pain? What is likely to be a fruitless and/or over-

worked area e.g. tele-collaboration?

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Time and motion of teleworker (me)context & “doing”

* building, deciding, interacting, presenting, problem-solving, testing, thinking, writing…

Context Microsoft Families

– Wife– Friend– Children &

grandchildren– TCM

GB Corp– Startup– Consultant-at-

large

Doing sleeping, feeding,

traveling goofing-off, social

interacting, vacationing supporting infrastructure administriving grazing, learning communicating WORKING?*

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Group Structure of Interaction

solo pair small productive group of 3-6 group gropes, edutainment, formal

meetings 10-100 whole organization or organization-at-

large world

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Administrivia: paper and phones

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Administrivia, paper and phone coexistence

With no administrative support, we are our own administrative assistants, secretaries, and gofers.

Forms and travel arrangements Calendar management Paper handling and its database

– Identification, input, indexing, and interface– Interface to message management database

Message management database

– email, voicemail, fax, contacts, calendar– phone and videophone must be “on line”

Personal databaseSS management are a major time sink

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Coexisting with Paper Paper disappears as transmission & storage media, but not for

portability & screen dump Goals of “automating” paper:

– No more time-consuming than discarding it– Input, Identify, OCR, Index, save, and retrieve in

every possible context– Biz cards, fax, reports, brochures, ...photos– Give things back in context– Totally eliminate the need for copiers– Interface: unobtrusive and humane

Success is measured by elimination of FILING Cabinets!!

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What paper must we handle? letters (diminishing, given email) forms that require signatures, often via fax clipped articles e.g. graphs, journals, misc. book pages technical reports that need to be OCR'd with figs copies of documents e.g. stocks, signature pages, and licenses.

Originals are stored elsewhere. small, non-critical document e.g. insurance policies, receipts,

warrantees large documents that are OCR’d e.g. contracts.

Original storage may be kept somewhere else. scraps of paper e.g. receipts, checks, bills …must be legal images business cards that go into an electronic address book photographs and slides. legacy acetate presentations? 700 page text image requires 50 Mbytes, at a cost of $5.

A 5 GB disk holds 100 books., or 1000 bbif encoded!

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Coexisting with the telephone

Overall integration with the computer Answering machine, recorder, and transcriber And database with transcription, keywords, and

voice “Wildfire” it … finds me ICQ capability for both computer and phone

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Capturing, storing and retreiving everything we’ve ever: heard (said), seen (presented), and read (written)

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Memex

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Storing all we’ve read, heard, & seen

Human data-types /hr /day (/4yr) /lifetimeread text, few pictures 200 K 2 -10 M/G 60-300 G

speech text @120wpm 43 K 0.5 M/G 15 Gspeech @1KBps 3.6 M 40 M/G 1.2 T

stills w/voice @100KB 200 K 2 M/G 60 G

video-like 50Kb/s POTS 22 M .25 G/T 25 Tvideo 200Kb/s VHS-lite 90 M 1 G/T 100 T

video 4.3Mb/s HDTV/DVD 1.8 G 20 G/T 1 P

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Storage and data-rate requirements for common office data-types

Documents image compressed #/GBpage or fax 100 K 4K 10K;250Kbusiness card 5 K 500 200K;2Msnapshot 3 M 100 K 10,000350 page book 25 M 1-2 M 40;750

Human data-types /hr /day /lifetimeread text, few pictures 200 K 2 -10 M 60-300 Gspeech text @120wpm 43 K 0.5 M 15 Gspeech @1KBps 3.6 M 40 M 1.2 TVideo comp. 50KbPOTS 22 M .25 G 25 Tvideo comp. 200Kb VHS 90 M 1 G 100 T video comp. 4.3Mb DVD 1.8 G 20 G 1 P

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Telepresence for work: requirements

Telepresence = space and time shifting Goal: teleoffice/teleworkplace = workplace office Limited space, bandwidth, administrative and computer support

infrastructure, AND interaction Need: run all office and professional apps, support computing

environment, and be always connected New app opportunities: telepresentations (e.g. NetShow, Powerpoint

conferencing); Web is the greatest library ever created Create “presence” for collaboration by apps sharing (e.g. NetMeeting,

Placeware) Administrative support including paper handling! Short term bets: large disks (e.g 20GB), more displays, videophones,

cameras, scanners, bandwidth limits

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Telework & telepresence: a forcing function into several areas... Home Network Network connection is always on

… and at high speed Support (at reasonable cost) for all apps…

-- the teleworker = system admin Office work… e.g. paperlessness, message mgm’t

“recording all we read, write, hear, and see”-- the teleworker = admin. assistant aka secretary

Telepresence… attending meetings and lectures, taking courses, etc. without travel

Collaboration on a work project without travel

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Why telepresence now?

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It’s the near-term platforms, stupid!(multimedia is finally happening)

Text & 2D graphics >> images, voice, & video The WEB: being anywhere and doing anything Disk sizes and cost c1998

– $50-100 / GB– 4 GB standard; CD-R; and 20-40 GB MO R/W

The videophone will emerge for distributed conferences Document, picture, and video capture and compression

– 10,000 to 250,000 pages / GB; 10,000 pictures / GB– 40-400 books / GB or $0.25-2.50 / book– Plethora of … CAMERAS EVERYWHERE!– More Screens. We need at least two!

Voice and video compression*– 250 hours / GB voice– Stamp size-VHS: 12-50 hours / GB;

Audio: Surround sound that is part of V-places

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Telework: Summary The web is the enabler. We still lack B/W. Technology is coming, research lags in handling

– Storage of all text, audio, and useful video– Videophones, cameras, netPCs, WebTV, etc. – More pixels we require to increase “presence”– Adequate audio… the “killer” component

A big part of telework is just office productivity– Coexistence with computer, paper, telephone,– Data-types require a multimedia database– Computer and network management is a real “time killer”

CSCW is a rathole. We don’t understand CW– The killer apps are simple: telepresentations and shared

apps Being connected all the time is essential