Video chat. It's been available in asia for ~5 years? yet no one uses it. Will it be different in North America?
Actually since these phones were around before youtube and real mobile browsing, the main marketed reason to get a 3G phone originally was video chat.
Still, don't you think that video chat at no extra cost will be a rather huge innovation? If part of the reason it isn't used is because of the cost, wouldn't make it free help that? I know that video calling isn't necessarily better in plenty of cases, so I don't think it will completely replace voice calls (at least not for a long, long time if at all), but the facts that it's
1) free and
2) has Apple behind it and
3) therefore tons of media hype behind it
will help usage (edit: changed from adoption make my meaning clearer) by a large margin?
Why? People are really good at perceiving presence even if we can't see someone. It's just not necessary.
Think about this: What fraction of time do you spend looking at a person's face in a casual conversation?
The 'mobile' in 'mobile phone' seems directly at odds with the whole concept.
Most people like being able to get away with all those little things that the other person can't hear over a phone. Being on camera would seem more stifling/restrictive than freeing in many situations.
And as for it being at normal data rates on 3G, I'll believe it when I see it. (It can't be free.)
Wouldn't that be awesome? Wouldn't you use this free feature if it came at no cost? I know I'd LOVE it.
Other than the points highlighted above (and cost of video call), the big question is how are video calls done in Asia. Does it require the user to spend more than 3-4 secs to set up a video call (check if the other person has video call support, is he on the same network, do some prior WiFi settings, etc.). If so then that is a big barrier. And Apple definitely has the usability smarts to break that down.
Look at the iPod and the iPad. Who the hell had an MP3 player or a tablet before they came out? Not many people. Apple is good at creating needs and good products where products already existed. I'm not saying their design isn't part of that, I'm saying that their image can certainly help. We don't know enough about this new FaceTime to say it's instantly better than previous products other than the fact that it's free, and gong to be an open standard. Since we can't speak about the design of it, I chose to speak about another factor that could cause it to succeed.
Edit: "Reality distortion field" was a horrible choice of words on my part by the way. I meant that Apple's success at marketing would help this product succeed, no matter how the implementation was, not that their implementation will be or has been poor.
The reasons a lot of things don't happen sooner are often "smoke and mirrors," so it's a fitting remedy.
I have the ability to video chat with many of my contacts through Skype or Google Talk yet I pretty much never take advantage of it. Not sure adding that feature to my phone changes anything.