picturephone

Rare AT&T Videophones From the 1970s Go Up for Auction This Month

Two videophones from the early 1970s that were produced by AT&T/Bell Labs and the now-defunct Western Electric will go up for auction this month. And while they might not seem very special to kids of the 21st century, these videophones were the most futuristic things around for people who grew up watching movies like 2001:…

Tech News Matt Novak Mar 1

The Price For A Videophone in 1955 Was $44,000 Adjusted for Inflation

We’ve been imagining a future of ubiquitous videophones for over a century. And today it’s considered no big deal that we’re able to make video calls with devices that we carry around in our pockets. But it took a while to get to that point. One reason? It was incredibly expensive. Above we have a…

Tech News Matt Novak Jun 22

This 1993 AT&T Concept Video Predicted Skype’s New Translator App

You can keep your flying cars and jetpacks. The real sign that we’re living in the future? Easy: real-time language translation. Skype just put its version into wide release. But effortless translation is something we’ve been waiting on for quite some time, as you can see from this 1993 clip of an AT&T concept video…

Tech News Matt Novak May 12

Here’s What Skype Was Like In 1947

Thanks to tech like Skype, the ability to both see and hear someone across thousands of miles is a mundane exercise for most of us here in the early 21st century. But back in 1947, signing a contract over videophone was like looking into the future. Even if that future turned out a bit different…

Tech News Matt Novak Feb 13

What’s the Generic Word For Skype? Videophone? Video Chat?

As technologies evolve, so does the language we use to describe them. Radio used to be called wireless telephone. Some people used to call the internet the catenet. But what do we call it when you’re talking with a person via video link? Is it videophone? Video chat? Skype? Skype is, of course, a trademarked…

Tech News Matt Novak Jul 31

“The device he would use is called a Picturephone…”

“By this month it should be possible for a New Yorker, a Chicagoan or a Washingtonian to communicate with someone in one of the other cities by televised telephoning. The device he would use is called a Picturephone and is described by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, which developed it, as ‘the first dialable…

Tech News Matt Novak Jul 24

How Bell Labs Almost Put a Videophone in Every Home

From the 1950s until the 1970s Bell Labs spent over $500 million developing the videophone. But the technology failed to achieve mainstream success. Why? Bill Hammack from the University of Illinois has a great video explaining the tremendous promise and eventual demise of the videophone as a standalone appliance in the mid-20th century. Below is…

Tech News Matt Novak Jun 17

A Brief History of the Videophone That Almost Was

The videophone is one of those technologies that more or less snuck up on us. Promises that one day you’d not only be able to hear but see a person through your telephone are nearly as old as the telephone itself. The videophone spent nearly a century as every bit as much a “technology of…

Tech News Matt Novak Aug 28

Crossing a telephone with a TV set in 1968

In this most gloriously futuristic year of 2011 we somehow find ourselves awash in videophones. In a way, they snuck up on us. And they most certainly didn’t show up in the ways that people had been predicting them for decades. The videophone was to change the way we looked at home schooling, job interviews,…

Tech News Matt Novak Aug 11

Our Drunken Videophonic Future (1943)

The 2002 Taschen book Future Perfect is kind of like a dead-tree Tumblr; no credits for illustrators, no dates, and no context. I even tried to reblog a page from the book by nailing it to a tree, but my neighbors tore it down. What a bunch of jerks. With a little old fashioned detective…

Tech News Matt Novak Jul 7

Talking of Tomorrow (1962)

Talking of Tomorrow is a short animated film that was produced for Bell Labs and released in either 1960 or 1962. Directed by Jetsons writer Chuck Couch, the film tells the story of a business executive from the future who works for an “interspace engineering company.” This executive works in a soundproof room attached to…

Tech News Matt Novak Apr 18

Face to Face Phone Calls (1957)

In this ad from the March, 1957 issue of Scientific American we see John Q. Businessman making a “face to face” telephone call. The ad declares that thanks to the Hughes Tonotron and other products from the Hughes Aircraft Company people will soon see “on the wall television, electronic control of factory production, and countless…

Tech News Matt Novak Jan 30

Watching Television With My Robot Butler (1932)

The December 4, 1932 San Antonio Light (San Antonio, TX) ran this illustration accompanying a piece titled, “Looking Ahead Another 50 Years.” TELEVISION — The husband at home in bed is able to sweep the mechanical eye through the shopping district and see what his wife is doing. He also has all sorts of appliances…

Tech News Matt Novak Jan 28

Telephones of Tomorrow (1962)

Brian Horrigan, co-author of the retrofuturism bible Yesterday’s Tomorrows, pointed me to this amazing advertisement from Bell Telephone System which appeared in the November, 1962 issue of Boys’ Life. The comic follows “Chip Martin, college reporter” as he learns about the future of the telephone. Shut-in kids of the year 2000 are learning from home…

Tech News Matt Novak Jan 24

Bell Telephone Labs Picture-Phone (1956)

This image was lost some time after publication. This story about the Bell Telephone Laboratories picturephone appeared in the August 24, 1956 Hutchinson News-Herald (Hutchinson, KS). The entire article appears below. Who’s calling will be no secret, with help of Picture-Phone demonstrated at electronics convention by Bell Telephone Laboratories. Man using phone sees caller on…

Tech News Matt Novak Jan 25

Gernsback Imagines Life 50 Years Hence (1925)

This image was lost some time after publication. Hugo Gernsback wrote a syndicated piece in 1925 that imagined the world of 1975. It appeared in the February 8th edition of the San Antonio Light (San Antonio, TX) and has an interesting mix of hits and misses. Highlights from the article are excerpted below. You can…

Tech News Matt Novak Sep 19

One-World Job Market (1959)

The November 29, 1959 edition of Arthur Radebaugh’s Closer Than We Think features a job interview of the future. And what job interview of the (paleo)future would be complete without a man from Philadelphia and his entire family chatting via videophone with a potential employer in Buenos Aires? Until recently, a man limited his job…

Tech News Matt Novak Jun 30

Videophone “Progress” Newspaper Ad (1976)

The June 30, 1976 Blue Earth Post (Blue Earth, MN) ran this ad for the Blue Earth Valley Telephone Company, in which the videophone is presented as the inevitable next step in telephone technology. Previously on Paleo-Future: The Future is Now (1955) Discovering the Videophone (1970) Picturephone as the perpetual technology of the future A…

Tech News Matt Novak May 21

The Electronic Home (circa 1988)

Ameritech’s (late 1980s) concept video The Electronic Home envisions the futuristic world of HDTV and videophone, as well as internet-like services that allow you to make restaurant reservations (at a cartoonishly stereotypical Italian restaurant), shop for kimonos (because your shirt is made of giant playing cards), or buy a house (with your Atari joystick). The…

Tech News Matt Novak Feb 26

Is This a Real Picturephone? (1939)

This (most likely doctored) photo of a picturephone in 1939 or 1940 is featured in the book Exit to Tomorrow: World’s Fair Architecture, Design, Fashion 1933-2005. The weird thing is that I haven’t been able to verify the authenticity of this photo outside of this book. In fact, it is rare to find mention of…

Tech News Matt Novak Jun 10

picturephone

Rare AT&T Videophones From the 1970s Go Up for Auction This Month

The Price For A Videophone in 1955 Was $44,000 Adjusted for Inflation

This 1993 AT&T Concept Video Predicted Skype’s New Translator App

Here’s What Skype Was Like In 1947

What’s the Generic Word For Skype? Videophone? Video Chat?

“The device he would use is called a Picturephone…”

How Bell Labs Almost Put a Videophone in Every Home

A Brief History of the Videophone That Almost Was

Crossing a telephone with a TV set in 1968

Our Drunken Videophonic Future (1943)

Talking of Tomorrow (1962)

Face to Face Phone Calls (1957)

Watching Television With My Robot Butler (1932)

Telephones of Tomorrow (1962)

Bell Telephone Labs Picture-Phone (1956)

Gernsback Imagines Life 50 Years Hence (1925)

One-World Job Market (1959)

Videophone “Progress” Newspaper Ad (1976)

The Electronic Home (circa 1988)

Is This a Real Picturephone? (1939)

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