How immersive does a video meeting really need to be?

It is a strange kind of legacy that we don’t talk about the pandemic anymore, but continue to develop the technologies that got us through it. It’s five years later and we are still trying to make video calls more immersive, lifelike, and engaging. Why?

We have, of course, held on tightly to remote work for its benefits; better work-life balance, access to global talent, more flexible work practices, and more simplified onboarding. While we can go outside and into the office now, we also have more reasons not to do so. What is more confusing, however, is that most of the larger tech companies are demanding their workers return to the office, while simultaneously working on improvements to video conferencing software.

This leads us to Project Starline, which has finally made it out into the world, albeit with a more Star Trek-friendly name: ‘Google Beam’. The change seems frankly pointless as it's not directly being launched by Google. Instead, hardware partners will incorporate the technology into their own products and, you guessed it, use a different name. So ‘Beam’, ‘Starline’, whatever, it’s largely a waste of marketing.

HP is the first company to preview new hardware that incorporates Beam and has gone its own way on the naming with the rather forgettable moniker, ‘HP Dimension’. HP’s model will cost enterprise businesses (or extravagant startups) a whopping $24,000 and that price does not include the software you need to actually hold any calls. Businesses will have to fork out for a separate Google Beam license to use Google Meet or Zoom on the device and there aren’t any details on how much that costs, as yet.

What you get, for $24,999, is a 65in light field display with six high-speed cameras inside a thin frame, which work to create a lifelike 3D video of the person you’re video calling. Not your standard video call, not digital tiles of your work colleagues and bosses, but a “truly immersive” experience, according to HP.

It is a phenomenal piece of science and engineering and whole teams of technicians and programmers should be pleased with themselves. But like the guys that brought dinosaurs back to life in Jurassic Park, they were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, that they didn’t stop to think if they should.

Why are we spending so much time on this? There is nothing in the business world worth meeting over that will be made more enjoyable or more inclusive with super high-definition visuals and crystal-clear audio.

I mean, how detailed do I need my boss’ face to be when all the meeting is for is to tell me about the monthly strategy? A weekly catch-up with my line manager is not made more enjoyable by seeing her in 3D. She’s not a summer blockbuster. I don’t come prepared with popcorn. I don’t need the guilt of turning my camera off when the company installs a $25k monitor.

And this is the problem with Google Beam, or whatever it eventually gets known as: it’s not a serious way to conduct business. Similar to Facebook/Meta and its Metaverse nonsense that made everything look like Wii Sports – thank god that never caught on.

We don’t need more immersive meetings or more reasons to have virtual ones. No amount of visual clarity will improve productivity – sometimes it literally can be an email.