ABSTRACT
To people born in the western world after World War II, television is not a marvel of technology but practically a birthright. It is an object of fascination only when we see ourselves on it and, when we do, our experience with the technology causes us to want the best possible quality. This provides a challenge since we grant video communication systems only a fraction o f the bandwidth we provide for television. First demonstrated in the 1920s, television is the predecessor of video. As is true with most technology, it is nearly impossible to establish the precise time at which TV was invented. Centuries o f experiments combined successively to produce the telegraph, the radio, the television, room-based interactive video communication and, now, virtual anywhere-to-anywhere interactive video communication.
