Yahoo Offers New Mobile Chat Service Featuring Silent Video

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/07/29/yahoo-offers-new-mobile-chat-service-featuring-silent-video/

by walterbell • 11 years ago

30 14 11 years ago

bits.blogs.nytimes.com

obilgic• 11 years ago

This is a great idea!

Here is their official product demo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-3Mw4Ilvl4

eyalkaspi• 11 years ago

reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_Labs

adrianb• 11 years ago

To me it sounds like it combines the disadvantages of video calls (the attention required, transparency - no lying about your whereabouts, the intrusiveness - no video call at the office because you might reveal something confidential...) with the disadvantages of texting (typing is more difficult than speaking and it's a more difficult way to convey ideas and emotions).

GuiA• 11 years ago

This is a setup that works really well, amongst other things, for communication between people in long distance relationships (ie it is a form of telepresence). You get the visceral satisfaction of permanent visual feedback with the advantages of asynchronous communication.

dingaling• 11 years ago

This is a setup that works really well, amongst other things, for communication between people in long distance relationships

Having had a job that involved distant communication I don't think I'd have used this approach. It requires high data usage for the video, so why not just add the audio stream and be done with it?

My wife and I recoded little video snippets through the day and synced them each evening. Hearing all the background noise and clatter was part of experiencing 'home' for me.

razwall• 11 years ago

This app fills a much needed gap in the mobile messaging landscape.

thescrewdriver• 11 years ago

Quite a neat idea. It's a while since I've seen something from Yahoo that I would consider different or original. They also have a new Flickr app now which lets you back your phone's photos up to Flickr with 1TB free storage which is also pretty neat.

vinceyuan• 11 years ago

It's weird. When people are texting, most of the faces remain wooden. Nobody wants to look at a wooden face.

Students wouldn't like to use it in the classroom because video is data-consuming.

coob• 11 years ago

Any deaf HNers here? Would this work well for the deaf community?

joshstrange• 11 years ago

Just as well as snapchat works...

bwb• 11 years ago

This sounds like just another sign of how Yahoo has lost their minds :)

Grue3• 11 years ago

Seems like the features and misfeatures were chosen completely at random. I don't care about video, but having access to chatlogs seems really important. So this app seems like a complete miss to me.

jbob2000• 11 years ago

Uhh, sorry Yahoo, Snapchat has been able to do video with text on it for a while now. Their video even has audio!

Yahoo Offers New Mobile Chat Service Featuring Silent Video

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