Jamie's Random Musings
Various thoughts and adventures, including but not limited to Linux, Windows XP and Widows Vista, and assorted bits of hardware new and old.
Wednesday 29 October 2008, 7:30 AM
SightSpeed Acquired By Logitech
One has to wonder what this says about Skype. There was obviously a very large cooperation arrangement made between Logitech and Skype about a year ago, when Skype brought out their vastly over-hyped "High Quality Video" which was tied exclusively to three specific Logitech cameras (and still is, as far as I know). I heard unofficially that Logitech even sent an engineer to Estonia for quite some time, to help Skype work out the HQ VIdeo code. Logitech started a fairly large promotional effort for their cameras with Skype. However, I noticed that promotion was changed to include MS Live Messenger about six months ago, and I wondered then if Logitech was falling out of love with Skype... Now this comes along, and I would be reasonably sure that Logitech looked pretty hard at Skype, and from all that has been said recently I'm equally sure that eBay would love to unload Skype. But as I have said before, their problem is going to be finding someone foolish enough to buy Skype from them.
There is one other potentially interesting side effect of this deal. Until now, in the Logitech User Forums, anyone who posted about a video IM problem was basically told, if the camera works with the Logitech QuickCam software, it's not our problem, go talk to the IM software provider. I suppose that becomes a lot more difficult to say, in the case where they actually own the IM provider as well. Of course, now that I think about it, I can't recall anyone ever posting there about a problem with SightSpeed, virtually all of the problems are with Skype or MS Live.
In any case, I am pleased for the people at SightSpeed, and I hope that this will lead to even better things from them in the future.
jw 29/10/2008
PreviousComments on this post
I've been reading your blog for a while and am very conversant with your feelings about Skype. I don't disagree, but the one thing Skype has going for it is an enormous (relatively) user base. And the biggest problem for desktop video communications is a small and very fragmented user base. I'm in university where we have something under 20 h.323 facilities, with a handful more in the Far East. The most FAQ I get by far is, "can I call in with Skype?". Logitech is a pretty good company (I think the quality of their products varies greatly) but they are not big enough to push SightSpeed to the front of the pack, ahead of Skype. So this is really a question: You appear to believe that desktop video communications has a future as more than a niche market. How do you see it getting there, and how does the Logitech acquisition of SightSpeed help?
Hi, thanks for reading, and commenting... with an excellent question.
You are absolutely correct, and I have said since my first post in this blog about video IM that Skype is the 800-pound gorilla in the room with all of the other video IM programs. I, too, am constantly asked "how can I install Skype to communicate with my child/spouse/parent/friend", and although I always encourage people to use one of the alternative programs, and thus avoid a LOT of difficulty in the future, sometimes there is just no way around it.
I can see this market progressing in several ways. First, Logitech is a large company, and they sell a LOT of webcams. If those start coming with a product light SightSpeed bundled, and it is easy to install and use, that could make a huge difference. People have a strong tendency to use what they are able to get easily, and get working easily, which was one of the big advantages Skype had in the early days, when they were more or less "the only game in town", and text IM and audio chat worked pretty well - things didn't start to really go south until they started trying to add video chat. So there is a good chance that Logitech's acquisition will give SightSpeed a huge boost in user base. Add to that the fact that SightSpeed now comes pre-loaded on Dell laptops (as Dell Video Chat Powered by SightSpeed), and they have the potential to build a pretty good sized user base.
Second, the other programs are getting to be so much better than Skype, and so much easier to use and more reliable. At the same time, people are getting tired of being treated like dirt by Skype "customer support", and having their accounts blocked, or hacked, and money stolen, and resentment of this is spreading through the user community. Programs like ooVoo, for those who want a full-featured video IM client, or TokBox and SnapYap for those who want a no-download browser-based video chat, when I show them to people who have come to me asking about Skype, or especially to those who are asking why they can't get Skype working, they always end up saying "wow, this is great, why the heck did I waste so much time fighting with Skype".
Yes, Skype has a very large installed base. But of those users, a vast majority have one, two or three contacts - immediate family and friends. They want to use video IM to chat with immediate family or very close friends, and getting a small number of contacts to switch programs is really not all that difficult.
Last, but certainly not least, I think Skype is being left behind in the advancement of features. SightSpeed and ooVoo both have multi-party video chat that works quite well, and Skype still has nothing but a lot of empty promises that they are "working hard" on it. SightSpeed, ooVoo, TokBox and SnapYap all have browser/java-based clients, so they can easily be used spontaneously, without requiring a lot of download and installation to get started. Skype still has nothing of the sort. It looks to me like Skype has been wasting a lot of time porting to a lot of devices that very few people are actually interested in, and creating a "radical new user interface" that the vast majority of their users hate, while not producing any of the features that their users have been begging for. Eventually, that is likely to catch up with them.
Thanks again for reading, and commenting.
jw 30/10/2008
It's presumptuous of me to ask a follow up after your long and very well thought out reply to my first question, but I will anyway. I'd like to hear your opinion on the question of standards. While having all of these players, ooVoo, SightSpeed, TokBox (and I'd add in Adobe Connect, even though it's largely in a different product category), accelerates the development of the technology, the Balkanization of the market serves to slow adoption. Even for my own use, I don't want to have to think about which program I need to use to contact which person. If I do, I won't bother to use video, unless I've got some extra time and I'm in the mood to play with it for its own sake. How do we get to the point where videoconferencing works like email, so that it absolutely doesn't matter that I'm using Thunderbird and my friends are using Gmail, Outlook, or pine. Is the way to get ubiquitous videoconferencing to fall back on the universality of the Web browser and make that the common denominator client?
@PeterH - it's certainly not presumptuous, it's a very good question, it goes right to the heart of what is happening in the video IM market today, and I'm always happy to engage in an interesting discussion.
You're right, the lack of interoperability is definitely impeding the overall progress of video chat in the market. Obviously over time this will be worked out, as it has been for example with the SIP standards, but it will take time - probably quite a lot more time in my opinion, because there is not much political will to get it done right now.
As you say, the problems this presents for users are significant, and if you, or I for that matter, are typical examples, it is discouraging use of video communication. The majority of my online communication is done using Gizmo5, because it has multi-system text chat, which I use most often, so I don't have to worry if my friends are on Gizmo, MSN, AOL or whatever, and it has SIP-standard calling, so I can also make audio calls to a wider range of VoIP and SIP-standard contacts. Like you, I don't use video very much, especially spontaneously, because I don't want to have to worry about whether someone has Skype, SightSpeed, ooVoo, Gizmo or whatever. For those whom I want to have video contact regularly, we just have to work out in advance what we are going to use.
For the short term, the browser/java based clients are probably going to be the solution. I think this is particularly likely to happen because they can be easily integrated with the popular social networking sites right now, and you can then just send a link to a friend to start a video conversation. Not only to TokBox and SnapYap work this way, but both ooVoo and SightSpeed have browser-based clients which can be used this way. But over the long term, there are almost certainly going to be standards developed and adopted, and things will get a lot cleaner - but don't hold your breath waiting for it to happen!
jw 30/10/2008
This comment has been deleted at the users request
Thanks for your response. What you suggest makes a lot of sense, and I'm going keep it for reference in case anyone ever asks me a similar question, so that I can appear to be the source of an intelligent answer. I really enjoy your blog and look forward to reading your comments in the future.
