What does Quality mean in Enterprise Video Conferencing?

Telepresence, HD, 4K and managed video networks - where's the customer in all this?

We're now into 2014. I am sure that this is going to be the year of video.

When I joined RADVISION some 15 years ago, it was the year of video.

The next year? That was the year of video.

It continues until today with no real uptake of video conferencing in the enterprise.

By now I think it is safe to say that video conferencing in the enterprise will never really be here. There is no year for that in our calendar.

At the same time, video in the consumer market (or in enterprise, but the type that isn't counted in a UC bucket) is thriving.

We, as an industry, have tried everything: High definition video. Then HD voice. We're now going into the 4K craze (as the TV industry is). We've gone for managed networks and tried to bring everything under control - even the percentage of possible packet loss. Nothing really worked to get the damn customers buy more of our products.

And I don't think the next set of suggested roadmap items will make a difference.

I'd like to give an explanation for that; one taken from the Seth Godin book. Or, more accurately, his blog. A specific post from August of last year that discusses the issue of quality:

Kodak, of course, ruled their world. [...]

Along the way, though, the company made the mistake of misdefining quality. They thought that what would ensure their future was better fidelity film. And without a doubt, they delivered on the promise of ever better film stock, with all the things a professional photographer could hope for.[...]

It turns out that what people actually wanted was the ability to take and share billions of photos at vanishingly small cost. The 'quality' that most of the customer base wanted was cheap and easy, not museum quality.

Skype. FaceTime. Hangouts. They are all redefining 'quality' - or more accurately aligning it with what people actually want. They are all not "museum quality". They cannot compete with that 100K USD telepresence system you have lying in your enterprise in some forgotten room that nobody really uses besides the CEO. But guess what - they get used a lot more.

Is it time for enterprise video conferencing vendors to think hard at what 'quality' really means and align accordingly?

Is it time for UC vendors to see if federation really is key to what is necessary? (hint: Whatsapp, LINE, Facebook, WeChat are not federated and each has well over 200 million active users).

Should we rethink UC?