The arrival of broadband and personal computers in our homes has profoundly changed the way we communicate.
Videoconferencing means we can be more productive and exchange ideas visually from one end of the planet to the other.
From Alexander Graham Bell in 1876 to videos on Snapchat, audio and video exchanges belong to two worlds:
- In addition to telephony, initially analogue then digital with ISDN, it offers videoconferencing (H323 / SIP protocols).
- IT, with workstations connected to the Internet offering web-conferencing (IP / H264 / WebRTC protocols)
Comparing them means answering the question: "Why buy a pay-as-you-go video solution when others offer this service at a lower cost or even for free?
Videoconferencing is designed for high-quality, secure business communication.
Mainly used in meeting rooms, this system is expensive and requires a specific hardware investment called "codecs".
Its major assets are compatibility with all solutions on the market and a multipoint connection that can handle two screens.
In terms of security, the solution is reliable but 'cumbersome' if you don't have a centralised directory. For example, a salesperson in a hotel will need assistance to authorise his or her public IP to join a conference.
Web-conferencing is much more accessible because it is available to a wide audience of millions of PCs.
These file-sharing features make it a high-performance, albeit point-to-point, collaborative tool.
Its low cost and "practical" nature make it easy to use and make people forget its visual, auditory and safety shortcomings.
It should be noted that unlike videoconferencing, web-conferencing cannot communicate in H323 with legacy videoconferencing systems such as Lifesize or Polycom.
These two worlds, where everything comes together, have recently been converging to offer Cloud solutions that meet most needs.
These include a shared internal company directory, meeting scheduling in Outlook, one-click calling, presence status checking, instant connection or connection during scheduled calls, single or group calls, presentation sharing, interactive whiteboarding and video recording.
So many functions and players that testify to a separate IT business requiring solid software and hardware expertise.
With holographic videoconferencing, this competitive sector has not finished surprising us.
The user experience is being enriched and is sure to fuel the debate on teleworking in the workplace.
Who knows... maybe tomorrow we'll be having our coffee with a virtual projection of an unshaven colleague!
Author: Cyrille CarmonaIS Manager at Cloud Temple