The First "Skype"

This machine in not part of a sci-fi movie from the 60’s, it was actually a great invention by Bell Labs, but probably too well-ahead for its generation. The name of this piece from the past is Picturephone and it was developed by AT&T in 1964 as an experimental system. It was realized at the New York World’s Fair allowing the public make video-calls to Disneyland even before the parents of “Skype” were born.

The system was able to transmit an image only once every two seconds, but this was not a problem for an enthusiastic team neither was that it turned out people didn’t like it, so AT&T continued working on the developing of the system, totally convinced that it was viable. Six years later, they realized the final product hoping that a million Picturephones would be used by 1980. 

It is said that we also learn from our failures, and I am sure they learnt from this one. Do you want to know why not many know about this? The equipment was too bulky, the controls too unfriendly, and the picture too small, and after 6 years improving the system, it continued being the same. Other fact to be aware of was the excessive price of the video-calls, it could cost around $16-$27 just for 3 minutes.

Anyway, we just had to wait to decades to see how communications could change. Nowadays internet is everywhere and we have a “Picturephone” in our pocket, and this is just one of the many things we can do with our smartphone! What years ago looked useless for many people is today an essential tool for others, thanks to the developments in different fields working together. In this case, it was not that crazy to think about what we enjoy today some decades ago, it is just that the idea needed more time to be working better and more science to make it viable.

Sources and interesting links: 
The First 'Picturephone' for Video Chatting Was a Colossal Failure
Video Conferencing History
The History of Videocalling  
 Wikipedia LINK

 by Carlos Durango, 2015