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115-453: Videotelephony as a concept began to materialize shortly after the telephone was patented in 1876, and its history is closely connected to that of the telephone . Barely two years after the telephone was first patented in the United States in 1876 by Alexander Graham Bell , an early concept of a combined videophone and wide-screen television called a telephonoscope was conceptualized in

230-514: A ringer or a visual indicator, to announce an incoming telephone call. Telephone calls are initiated most commonly with a keypad or dial, affixed to the telephone, to enter a telephone number , which is the address of the call recipient's telephone in the telecommunications system, but other methods existed in the early history of the telephone. The first telephones were directly connected to each other from one customer's office or residence to another customer's location. Being impractical beyond just

345-408: A speaking tube . In the U.S., a somewhat dated slang term refers to the telephone as "the horn," as in "I couldn't get him on the horn," or "I'll be off the horn in a moment." Early telephones were technically diverse. Some used a water microphone , some had a metal diaphragm that induced current in an electromagnet wound around a permanent magnet, and some were dynamic – their diaphragm vibrated

460-489: A telephone switchboard . The system eventually operated with more than 1,000 km (620 miles) of coaxial cable transmission lines. The videophones were integrated within large public videophone booths, with two booths provided per city. Calls between Berlin and Leipzig cost RM 3½, approximately one sixth of a British pound sterling , or about one-fifteenth of the average weekly wage. The video telephone equipment used in Berlin

575-666: A trademark on the term "AP Wirephoto" from 1963 to 2004. The first AP photo sent by wire depicted the December 1934 crash of a small plane in New York's Adirondack Mountains . When the U.S. Navy airship USS  ZRS-5 crashed into the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California , the AP Wirephoto transmitted its first drawing — a conceptual sketch by staff artist Noel Sickles of the crash and search for survivors. According to Sickles,

690-522: A "concept looking for a market". AT&T would later market its VideoPhone 2500 to the general public from 1992 to 1995 with prices starting at US$ 1,500 (approximately $ 3,260 in current dollars) and later dropping to $ 1,000 ($ 2,110 in current dollars), marketed by its Global VideoPhone Systems unit. The VideoPhone 2500 was designed to provide low-frame rate compressed color video on ordinary Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS) lines, circumventing

805-490: A coil of wire in the field of a permanent magnet or the coil vibrated the diaphragm. The sound-powered dynamic variants survived in small numbers through the 20th century in military and maritime applications, where its ability to create its own electrical power was crucial. Most, however, used the Edison/Berliner carbon transmitter , which was much louder than the other kinds, even though it required an induction coil which

920-422: A common battery exchange had a magneto hand-cranked generator to produce a high voltage alternating signal to ring the bells of other telephones on the line and to alert the operator. Some local farming communities that were not connected to the main networks set up barbed wire telephone lines that exploited the existing system of field fences to transmit the signal. In the 1890s a new smaller style of telephone

1035-431: A continuation of its many years of prior research during the 1920s, 1930s, late 1940s and 1950s. Both Picturephone programs, like their experimental AT&T predecessors, were researched principally at its Bell Labs , formally spanned some 15 years and consumed more than US$ 500 million, eventually meeting with commercial failure. At the time of its first launch, AT&T foresaw a hundred thousand Picturephones in use across

1150-523: A cup-like receiver which can fit over the eye ... Then, when the first selenium speck is presented to an illuminated object, it may be possible that the eye in the darkened receiver, should perceive, not merely light, but an image of the object ... Bell went on to later predict that: "...the day would come when the man at the telephone would be able to see the distant person to whom he was speaking." The discoveries in physics, chemistry and materials science underlying video technology would not be in place until

1265-413: A device whereby objects or people anywhere in the world "....could be seen anywhere by anybody". The device, among other functions, would allow merchants to transmit pictures of their wares to their customers, and the contents of museum collections to be made available to scholars in distant cities...." In the era prior to the advent of broadcasting , electrical "seeing" devices were conceived as adjuncts to

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1380-485: A few customers, these systems were quickly replaced by manually operated centrally located switchboards . These exchanges were soon connected together, eventually forming an automated, worldwide public switched telephone network . For greater mobility, various radio systems were developed in the mid-20th century for transmission between mobile stations on ships and in automobiles. Hand-held mobile phones were introduced for personal service starting in 1973. In later decades,

1495-486: A full page in approximately one minute. In the 1930s, wirephoto machines of any reasonable speed were very large and expensive and required a dedicated phone line. News media firms like Associated Press used expensive leased telephone lines to transmit wirephotos. In the mid-1930s a technology battle began for less expensive portable wirephoto equipment that could transmit photos over standard phone lines. The Associated Press began its Wirephoto service in 1935 and held

1610-509: A highly impractical and expensive method unsuitable for commercial use. During the mid-1950s, its laboratory work had produced another early test prototype capable of transmitting still images every two seconds over regular analog PSTN telephone lines. The images were captured by the Picturephone's compact Vidicon camera and then transferred to a storage tube or magnetic drum for transmission over regular phone lines at two-second intervals to

1725-479: A home and a shop. Users who wanted the ability to speak to several different locations would need to obtain and set up three or four pairs of telephones. Western Union , already using telegraph exchanges, quickly extended the principle to its telephones in New York City and San Francisco , and Bell was not slow in appreciating the potential. Signalling began in an appropriately primitive manner. The user alerted

1840-552: A mile apart (1.6 kilometres) with built-in six-band adjustable equalization filters. For distances of more than a few miles, the signal was digitized at 2 MHz and 3 bits per sample DPCM , and transmitted on a T-2 carrier . Color on AT&T's Picturephone was not employed with their early models. These Picturephone units packaged Plumbicon cameras and small cathode-ray tube displays within their housings. The cameras were located atop their screens to help users see eye to eye. Later generation display screens were larger than in

1955-576: A new industry comprising many VoIP companies that offer services to consumers and businesses . The reported global VoIP market in October 2021 was $ 85.2 billion with a projection of $ 102.5 billion by 2026. IP telephony uses high-bandwidth Internet connections and specialized customer premises equipment to transmit telephone calls via the Internet, or any modern private data network. The customer equipment may be an analog telephone adapter (ATA) which translates

2070-473: A nominal rate of 8 video frames per second, which could be depressed to 3-4 frames per second if the PSTN bandwidth was limited. In the era prior to low-cost, high-speed broadband service, its video quality was found to be generally poor by the public with images shifting jerkily between frames, due to British phone lines that generally provided less than 3.4 kHz of bandwidth. British Telecom had initially expected

2185-400: A numeric keypad for dialing, and a display for caller ID . In addition, answering machine function may be built in. The cordless handset contains a rechargeable battery , which the base station recharges when the handset rests in its cradle. Muilt-handset systems generally also have additional charging stands. A cordless telephone typically requires a constant electricity supply to power

2300-526: A product would improve Kyocera's brand image." Their research showed that a "cell phone with a camera and color display provided a completely new value for users, It could be used as a phone, a camera and a photo album". Technical challenges handled by about a dozen engineers at Kyocera over the two year development period included the camera module's placement within the phone at a time when electronic components had not been fully reduced in size, as well as increasing its data transmission rate. After its release

2415-471: A room full of equipment cabinets. An early U.S. test in 1927 had their then-Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover address an audience in New York City from Washington, D.C. ; although the audio portion was two-way, the video portion was one-way with only those in New York being able to see Hoover. By 1930, AT&T's "two-way television-telephone" system was in full-scale experimental use. The Bell Labs' Manhattan facility devoted years of research to it during

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2530-591: A satellite phone is that it can be used in such regions where local terrestrial communication infrastructures, such as landline and cellular networks, are not available. Satellite phones are popular on expeditions into remote locations, hunting, fishing, maritime sector, humanitarian missions, business trips, and mining in hard-to-reach areas, where there is no reliable cellular service. Satellite telephones rarely get disrupted by natural disasters on Earth or human actions such as war, so they have proven to be dependable communication tools in emergency situations, when

2645-431: A separate enclosure, called the subscriber set. The dial switch in the base interrupted the line current by repeatedly but very briefly disconnecting the line one to ten times for each digit, and the hook switch (in the center of the circuit diagram) disconnected the line and the transmitter battery while the handset was on the cradle. In the 1930s, telephone sets were developed that combined the bell and induction coil with

2760-481: A simple idea hit us - 'What if we were able to enjoy talking with the intended person watching his/her face on the display?' We were certain that such a device would make cell phone communications much more convenient and enjoyable." Saburi also stated that their R&D section had "nourished [the idea] for several years before" they received project approval from their top management which had encourage such forward-thinking research, because they "also believed that such

2875-456: A three-minute call at the public videophone booths greatly limited their appeal resulting in their closure by 1968. AT&T developed a refined Picturephone throughout the late 1960s, resulting in the "Mod II" (Model No. 2), which served as the basis for AT&T's launch of the first true video conferencing service. Unlike earlier systems, in which people had to visit public videophone booths, any company or individual could pay to be connected to

2990-461: A two-year development campaign from 1997 to 1999 that resulted in the release of the VP-210 VisualPhone, the world's first mobile colour videophone that also doubled as a camera phone for still photos. The camera phone was the same size as similar contemporary mobile phones , but sported a large camera lens and a 5 cm (2 inch) colour TFT display capable of displaying 65,000 colors, and

3105-508: A video camera adjacent to the display which could be blocked with a sliding door for privacy. Although promoted as a "videophone", it operated similar to Bell Labs ' early experimental image transfer phone of 1956, transmitting still images every 3–5 seconds over analog POTS lines. It could also be hooked up to a printer or connected to a regular TV or monitor for improved teleconferencing . Mitsubishi also marketed its lower-cost VisiTel LU-500 image phone in 1988 costing about US$ 400, aimed at

3220-514: A wired interface, such as USB or Lightning connectors. Smartphones, being able to run apps , have vastly expanded functionality compared to previous mobile phones. Having internet access and built in cameras, smartphones have made video calling readily accessible via IP connections. Smartphones also have access to a large number of web services and web apps, giving them functionality similar to traditional computers, although smartphones are often limited by their relatively small screen size and

3335-485: Is derived from the Greek : τῆλε , tēle , "far" and φωνή, phōnē , "voice", together meaning "distant voice". Credit for the invention of the electric telephone is frequently disputed. As with other influential inventions such as radio , television , the light bulb , and the computer , several inventors pioneered experimental work on voice transmission over a wire and improved on each other's ideas. New controversies over

3450-428: Is limited, usually to within the same building or within a short distance from the base station. Base stations include a radio transceiver which enables full-duplex, outgoing and incoming signals and speech with the handsets. The base station often includes a microphone, audio amplifier , and a loudspeaker to enable hands-free speakerphone conversations, without needing to use a handset. The base station may also have

3565-517: Is the discrete cosine transform (DCT), developed by Nasir Ahmed , T. Natarajan and K. R. Rao in 1973. The DCT algorithm was the basis for the first practical video coding standard that was useful for online videoconferencing, H.261 , standardised by the ITU-T in 1988, and subsequent H.26x video coding standards . In Japan the Lumaphone was developed and marketed by Mitsubishi in 1985. The project

History of videotelephony - Misplaced Pages Continue

3680-591: The Philadelphia Inquirer . Édouard Belin 's Bélinographe of 1913, which scanned using a photocell and transmitted over ordinary phone lines, formed the basis for the Wirephoto service. In Europe, services similar to a wirephoto were called a Belino. The Bartlane system , invented by Harry G. Bartholomew and Maynard D. McFarlane, was a technique invented in 1920 to transmit digitized newspaper images over submarine cable lines between London and New York. and

3795-655: The Earth instead of terrestrial cell sites , as cellphones do. Therefore, they can work in most geographic locations on the Earth's surface, as long as open sky and the line-of-sight between the phone and the satellite is provided. Depending on the architecture of a particular system, coverage may include the entire Earth or only specific regions. Satellite phones provide similar functionality to terrestrial mobile telephones; voice calling , text messaging , and low-bandwidth Internet access are supported through most systems. The advantage of

3910-603: The Internet , giving rise to the field of Internet Protocol (IP) telephony, also known as voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). VoIP has proven to be a disruptive technology that is rapidly replacing traditional telephone network infrastructure. By January 2005, up to 10% of telephone subscribers in Japan and South Korea had switched to this digital telephone service. A January 2005 Newsweek article suggested that Internet telephony may be "the next big thing." The technology has spawned

4025-573: The Telephone Pavilion (also called the "Bell Telephone Pavilion") at Expo 67 , an International World's Fair held in Montreal , Canada in 1967. Demonstration units were available at the fairs for the public to test, with fairgoers permitted to make videophone calls to volunteer recipients at other locations. The United States would not see its first public videophone booths until 1964, when AT&T installed their earliest commercial videophone units,

4140-402: The human voice , into electronic signals that are transmitted via cables and other communication channels to another telephone which reproduces the sound to the receiving user. The term is derived from Ancient Greek : τῆλε , romanized :  tēle , lit.   'far' and φωνή ( phōnē , voice ), together meaning distant voice . In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell

4255-518: The printing press on Saipan to produce. After World War II at haute couture shows in Paris, Frederick L. Milton would sketch runway designs and transmit his sketches via Bélinographe to his subscribers, who could then copy Parisian fashions. In 1955, four major French couturiers ( Lanvin , Dior , Patou , and Jacques Fath ) sued Milton for piracy, and the case went to the Appellate Division of

4370-431: The transistor was invented at Bell Labs in 1948, an AT&T electrical engineer predicted: ... whenever a baby is born anywhere in the world, he is given at birth a ... telephone number for life [and] ... a watch-like device with ten little buttons on one side and a screen on the other ... when he wishes to talk with anyone in the world, he will pull out the device and [call] his friend. Then turning

4485-478: The wirephoto used by Western Union , and the teleostereograph developed by AT&T's Bell Labs , which were forerunners of today's fax (facsimile) machines . Such early image transmitters were themselves based on previous work by Ernest Hummel and others in the 19th century. By 1927 AT&T had created its earliest electromechanical television-videophone called the ikonophone (from Greek: "image-sound"), which operated at 18 frames per second and occupied half

4600-423: The 1930s, led by Dr. Herbert Ives along with his team of more than 200 scientists, engineers and technicians, intending to develop it for both telecommunication and broadcast entertainment purposes. There were also other public demonstrations of "two-way television-telephone" systems during this period by inventors and entrepreneurs who sought to compete with AT&T, although none appeared capable of dealing with

4715-655: The 1990s, mobile phones have gained other features which are not directly related to their primary function as telephones. These include text messaging, calendars, alarm clocks, personal schedulers, cameras, music players, games and later, internet access and smartphone functionality. Nearly all mobile phones have the ability to send text messages to other users via the SMS (Short Message Service) protocol. The multimedia messaging service (MMS) protocol enables users to send and receive multimedia content, such as photos, audio files and video files. As their functionality has increased over

History of videotelephony - Misplaced Pages Continue

4830-578: The Bell System by 1975. However, by the end of July 1974, only five Picturephones were being leased in Pittsburgh, and U.S.-wide there were only a few hundred, mostly in Chicago. Unrelated difficulties at New York Telephone also slowed AT&T's efforts, and few customers signed up for the service in either city. Customers peaked at 453 in early 1973. AT&T ultimately concluded that its early Picturephones were

4945-560: The British General Post Office had 16 demonstration models of its Viewphone built, meant to be the equivalent to AT&T's Picturephone. Their initial attempt at a first generation commercial videophone later led to the British Telecom Relate 2000, which was released for sale in 1993, costing between £400-£500 each. The Relate 2000 featured a 74 millimetres (2.9 in) flip-up colour LCD display screen operating at

5060-596: The German Reichspost (post offices) in Berlin and Leipzig and connected together via a dedicated broadband coaxial cable to cover the distance of approximately 160 km (100 miles). The system's opening was inaugurated by the Minister of Posts Paul von Eltz-Rübenach in Berlin on March 1, 1936, who viewed and spoke with Leipzig's chief burgomaster. Schubert's system was based on Gunter Krawinkel's earlier research of

5175-501: The German Reichspost public videophone system of the late 1930s. In 1972 the defense and electronics manufacturer Matra was one of three French companies that sought to develop advanced videophones in the early 1970s, spurred by AT&T's Picturephone in the United States. Initial plans by Matra included the deployment of 25 units to France's Centre national d'études des télécommunications (CNET of France Télécom ) for their internal use. CNET intended to guide its initial use towards

5290-539: The Picturephone "Mod I", in booths that were set up in New York's Grand Central Terminal , Washington D.C., and Chicago. The system was the result of decades of research and development at Bell Labs, its principal supplier, Western Electric , plus other researchers working under contract to the Bell Labs. However the use of reservation time slots and their cost of US$ 16 (Washington, D.C., to New York) to $ 27 (New York to Chicago) (equivalent to $ 118 to $ 200 in 2012 dollars) for

5405-577: The Second World War, Bell Labs resumed its efforts during the 1950s and 1960s, eventually leading to AT&T's Picturephone. In early 1936, the first public video telephone service, Nazi Germany's Gegensehn-Fernsprechanlagen (visual telephone system), was developed by Dr. Georg Schubert , who headed the development department at the Fernseh-AG , a technical combine for television broadcasting technology. Two closed-circuit televisions were installed in

5520-520: The United States, AT&T 's Bell Labs conducted extensive research and development of videophones, eventually leading to public demonstrations of its trademarked "Picturephone" product in the 1960s. Its large Manhattan experimental laboratory devoted years of technical research during the 1930s, led by Dr. Herbert Ives along with his team of more than 200 scientists, engineers and technicians. The Bell Labs early experimental model of 1930 had transmitted uncompressed video through multiple phone lines,

5635-658: The United States. Despite AT&T's various videophone products meeting with commercial failure, they were widely viewed as technical successes which expanded the limits of the telecommunications sciences in several areas. Its videotelephony programs were critically acclaimed for their technical brilliance and even the novel uses they experimented with. The research and development programs conducted by Bell Labs were highly notable for their beyond-the-state-of-the-art results produced in materials science , advanced telecommunications , microelectronics and information technologies . AT&T's published research additionally helped pave

5750-514: The Wirephoto staff initially did not want to transmit the drawing because it was not a photo. The New York Times 's Wide World News Photo Service had just installed a prototype photo transmitting machine in San Francisco the day of the crash. A photo was taken of the Macon 's survivors when they came ashore and quickly transmitted to New York City over regular phone lines for publication

5865-493: The advent of smartphones, mobile phone manufacturers have also included consumer electronics companies, such as Apple , Samsung and Xiaomi . As of 2022, most mobile phones are smartphones, being a combination of a mobile phone and a personal computing device in the same unit. Most smartphones are primarily operated using a graphical user interface and a touch screen. Many phones have a secondary voice user interface, such as Siri on Apple iPhones , which can operate many of

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5980-451: The analog cellular system evolved into digital networks with greater capability and lower cost. Convergence in communication services has provided a broad spectrum of capabilities in cell phones, including mobile computing, giving rise to the smartphone , the dominant type of telephone in the world today. Before the development of the electric telephone, the term telephone was applied to other inventions, and not all early researchers of

6095-401: The assistance of a telephone operator. What turned out to be the most popular and longest-lasting physical style of telephone was introduced in the early 20th century, including Bell's 202-type desk set. A carbon granule transmitter and electromagnetic receiver were united in a single molded plastic handle, which when not in use was secured in a cradle in the base unit. The circuit diagram of

6210-526: The base station and charger units by means of a DC transformer which plugs into a wall AC power outlet. A mobile phone or cellphone or hand phone is a handheld telephone which connects via radio transmissions to a cellular telephone network . The cellular network consists of a network of ground based transmitter/receiver stations with antennas – which are usually located on towers or on buildings – and infrastructure connecting to land-based telephone lines. Analog cellular networks first appeared in 1979, with

6325-404: The bell, induction coil, battery and magneto were in a separate bell box or " ringer box ". In phones connected to common battery exchanges, the ringer box was installed under a desk, or other out-of-the-way place, since it did not need a battery or magneto. Cradle designs were also used at this time, having a handle with the receiver and transmitter attached, now called a handset , separate from

6440-542: The business sector, to be later followed by personal home usage. Its estimated unit cost in 1971 was the equivalent of £325, with a monthly usage subscription charge of £3.35. Studies of applications of videotelephony were conducted by CNET in France in 1972, with its first commercial applications for videophones appearing in 1984. The delay was due to the problem of insufficient bandwidth, with 2 Mb per second being required for transmitting both video and audio signals. The problem

6555-409: The capacity, quality, and cost of the network. Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) was launched in the 1980's, providing businesses and consumers with access to digital telephony services such as data, voice, video , and fax services. The development of digital data communications methods made it possible to digitize voice and transmit it as real-time data across computer networks and

6670-517: The consumer market. It came with reduced capabilities but had with a larger black and white display. Other Japanese electronic manufacturers marketed similar image transfer phones during the late-1980s, including Sony's PCT-15 (US$ 500), and two models from Panasonic, its WG-R2 (US$ 450) and its KX-TV10 (US$ 500). Much later the Kyocera Corporation , an electronics manufacturer based in Kyoto, conducted

6785-470: The cradle base that housed the magneto crank and other parts. They were larger than the "candlestick" and more popular. Disadvantages of single-wire operation such as crosstalk and hum from nearby AC power wires had already led to the use of twisted pairs and, for long-distance telephones, four-wire circuits . Users at the beginning of the 20th century did not place long-distance calls from their own telephones but made an appointment and were connected with

6900-469: The desk set, obviating a separate ringer box. The rotary dial becoming commonplace in the 1930s in many areas enabled customer-dialed service, but some magneto systems remained even into the 1960s. After World War II, the telephone networks saw rapid expansion and more efficient telephone sets, such as the model 500 telephone in the United States, were developed that permitted larger local networks centered around central offices. A breakthrough new technology

7015-563: The device over, he will hear the voice of his friend and see his face on the screen, in color and in three dimensions. If he does not see and hear him he will know that the friend is dead. — Harold Osborne , 1948 After a period of experimentation, the system entered public use and was soon extended with another 160 km (100 miles) of coaxial cable from Berlin to Hamburg , and then in July 1938 from Leipzig to Nuremberg and Munich . Point-to-point video calling required swapping connections on

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7130-420: The device's functions, as well as enabling users to use spoken commands to interact with the internet. Typically alphanumeric text input is accomplished via an on-screen virtual keyboard, although some smartphones have a small physical keyboard. Smartphones offer the ability to access internet data through the cellular network and via wi-fi, and usually allow direct connectivity to other devices via Bluetooth or

7245-492: The device, manufactured by Marconi Electronics , to sell at a rate of 10,000 per year, but its actual sales were minimal. Its second generation videophone thus also proved to be commercially unsuccessful, similar to AT&T's VideoPhone 2500 of the same time period. This time period saw the research, development and commercial roll-out of what would become powerful video compression and decompression software codecs , which would eventually lead to low cost videotelephony in

7360-402: The earliest Strowger switch automatic exchanges had seven wires, one for the knife switch , one for each telegraph key , one for the bell, one for the push-button and two for speaking. Large wall telephones in the early 20th century usually incorporated the bell, and separate bell boxes for desk phones dwindled away in the middle of the century. Rural and other telephones that were not on

7475-526: The early 2000s. Advances in video compression allowed digital video streams to be transmitted over the Internet, which was previously difficult due to the impractically high bandwidth requirements of uncompressed video . To achieve Video Graphics Array (VGA) quality video ( 480p resolution and 256 colors ) with raw uncompressed video, it would require a bandwidth of over 92   Mbps . A common compression technique used to significantly reduce bandwidth requirements in videotelephony and videoconferencing

7590-457: The electrical device used the term. Perhaps the earliest use of the word for a communications system was the telephon created by Gottfried Huth in 1796. Huth proposed an alternative to the optical telegraph of Claude Chappe in which the operators in the signaling towers would shout to each other by means of what he called "speaking tubes", but would now be called giant megaphones . A communication device for sailing vessels, called telephone ,

7705-524: The first digital cellular networks appearing in the early 1990s. Mobile phones require a SIM card to be inserted into the phone. The SIM card is a small PVC card containing a small integrated circuit which stores the user's international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI) number and its related key, which are used to identify and authenticate subscribers to the cellular network. Mobile phones generally incorporate an LCD or OLED display, with some types, such as smartphones, having touch screens. Since

7820-465: The following morning. By 1936, a wirephoto copier and transmitter that could be carried anywhere and needed only a standard long-distance phone line was put into use by International News Photos . During the United States's leaflet dropping campaign over the Empire of Japan near the end of World War II , Honolulu would transmit some radiophoto images to Saipan depicting proposed leaflet messages for

7935-406: The future. Beginning in the late 1960s, several countries worldwide sought to compete with AT&T's advanced development of its Picturephone service in the United States. However such projects were research and capital intensive, and fraught with difficulties in being deployed commercially. France's post office telecommunications branch had earlier set up a commercial videophone system similar to

8050-518: The issue still arise from time to time. Charles Bourseul , Antonio Meucci , Johann Philipp Reis , Alexander Graham Bell , and Elisha Gray , amongst others, have all been credited with the invention of the telephone. Alexander Graham Bell was the first to be awarded a patent for the electric telephone by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in March 1876. Before Bell's patent,

8165-494: The late-1920s that he displayed at the 1929 Internationale Funkausstellung Berlin (Berlin International Radio Exposition). Schubet's higher-performance system employed a Nipkow disk flying-spot scanner for its transmitter (a form of mechanical television ) and a 20 cm (8 inch) cathode-ray display tube with a resolution of 150 lines (180 lines in later versions) running at 25 frames per second. After

8280-621: The local communications system can be compromised. Wirephoto Technologically and commercially, the wirephoto was the successor to Ernest A. Hummel 's Telediagraph of 1895, which had transmitted electrically scanned shellac -on-foil originals over a dedicated circuit connecting the New York Herald and the Chicago Times Herald , the St. Louis Republic , the Boston Herald , and

8395-429: The mid-1920s, first being utilized in electromechanical television . More practical "all-electronic" video and television would not emerge until 1939, but would then suffer several more years of delays before gaining popularity due to the onset and effects of World War II. The compound term "videophone" slowly entered into general usage after 1950, although "video telephone" likely entered the lexicon earlier after video

8510-486: The mobile video-camera phone was commercially successful, spawning several other competitors such as the DDI Pocket , and one from Vodafone K.K. Telephone A telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone , is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound , typically and most efficiently

8625-412: The model 202 shows the direct connection of the transmitter to the line, while the receiver was inductively coupled. In local battery configurations, when the local loop was too long to provide sufficient current from the exchange, the transmitter was powered by a local battery and inductively coupled, while the receiver was included in the local loop. The coupling transformer and the ringer were mounted in

8740-405: The original demonstration units, approximately six inches (15 cm) square in a roughly cubical cabinet. The original Picturephone system used contemporary crossbar and multi-frequency operation. Lines and trunks were six wire, one pair each way for video and one pair two way for audio. MF address signaling on the audio pair was supplemented by a Video Supervisory Signal (VSS) looping around on

8855-468: The other end, or the exchange operator , by whistling into the transmitter. Exchange operation soon resulted in telephones being equipped with a bell in a ringer box , first operated over a second wire, and later over the same wire, but with a condenser ( capacitor ) in series with the bell coil to allow the AC ringer signal through while still blocking DC (keeping the phone " on hook "). Telephones connected to

8970-489: The popular periodicals of the day. It was also mentioned in various early science fiction works such as Le Vingtième siècle. La vie électrique (The 20th century. The electrical life) and other works written by Albert Robida , and was also sketched in various cartoons by George du Maurier as a fictional invention of Thomas Edison . One such sketch was published on December 9, 1878, in Punch magazine. The term " telectroscope "

9085-435: The possibility of "seeing by electricity" using devices that employed tellurium or selenium imaging components. Bell wrote, decades prior to the invention of the image dissector : Should it be found ... [that the image sensor] is illuminated, then an apparatus might be constructed in which each piece of selenium is a mere speck, like the head of a small pin, the smaller the better. The darkened selenium should be placed in

9200-545: The price to $ 75 per month with forty-five minutes of video calling included to stimulate demand. The Picturephone's video bandwidth was 1 MHz with a vertical scan rate of 30 Hz, horizontal scan rate of 8 kHz, and about 250 visible scan lines. The equipment included a speakerphone (hands free telephone), with an added box to control picture transmission. Each Picturephone line used three twisted pairs of ordinary telephone cable, two pairs for video and one for audio and signaling. Cable amplifiers were spaced about

9315-576: The receiving unit, which displayed them on a small cathode-ray television tube. AT&T had earlier promoted its experimental video for telephone service at the 1939 New York World's Fair . The more advanced Picturephone "Mod I" (Model No. 1) had public evaluation displays at Disneyland and the 1964 New York World's Fair , with the first transcontinental videocall between the two venues made on April 20, 1964. These demonstration units used small oval housings on swivel stands, intended to stand on desks. Similar AT&T Picturephone units were also featured at

9430-410: The same time also had Nazi political and propagandistic overtones similar to the broadcasting of the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. The German post office announced ambitious plans to extend their public videophone network to Cologne, Frankfurt and Vienna, Austria , but expansion plans were discontinued in 1939 with the start of the Second World War. After Germany subsequently became fully engaged in

9545-426: The service location to the emergency services when an emergency telephone number is called. A cordless telephone or portable telephone consists of a base station unit and one or more portable cordless handsets . The base station connects to a telephone line, or provides service by voice over IP (VOIP). The handset communicates with the base station via radio frequency signals. A handset's operational range

9660-453: The signals of a conventional analog telephone; an IP Phone , a dedicated standalone device; or a computer softphone application, utilizing the microphone and headset devices of a personal computer or smartphone. While traditional analog telephones are typically powered from the central office through the telephone line, digital telephones require a local power supply. Internet-based digital service also requires special provisions to provide

9775-589: The significantly higher cost ADSL telephone service lines used by several other videoconferencing manufacturers. It was limited by analog phone line connection speeds of about 19 Kilobits per second, the video portion being 11,200 bit/s, and with a maximum frame rate of 10 frames per second, but typically much slower, as low as a third of a video frame per second. The VideoPhone 2500 used proprietary technology protocols, including AT&T's Global VideoPhone Standard (GVS). Again, AT&T met with very little commercial success, selling only about 30,000 units, mainly outside

9890-510: The size of their keyboards. Typically, smartphones feature such tools as cameras, media players, web browsers, email clients, interactive maps, satellite navigation and a variety of sensors, such as a compass , accelerometers and GPS receivers . In addition to voice calls, smartphone users commonly communicate using a wide variety of messaging formats, including SMS, MMS, email, and various proprietary messaging services, such as iMessage and various social media platforms. In 2002, only 10% of

10005-406: The suburb of Oak Brook, before expanding to other large East Coast cities. In addition to an installation charge of $ 150 for the first set, companies paid $ 160 per month ($ 947/month in 2012 dollars) for the service on the first set and $ 50 per month for each additional set. Thirty minutes of video calling was included with each Picturephone, with extra minutes costing 25 cents. AT&T later reduced

10120-415: The supposed invention as a " fairy tale ", and publicly commented on the charlatans promoting bogus inventions for financial gain or self-promotion. However Dr. Alexander Graham Bell personally thought that videotelephony was achievable even though his contributions to its advancement were incidental. In April 1891, Dr. Bell actually did record conceptual notes on an "electrical radiophone", which discussed

10235-414: The system's image quality was primitive by modern standards, it was deemed impressive in contemporary reports of the era, with users able to clearly discern the hands on wristwatches. The videophones were offered to the general public, which had to visit special post office Fernsehsprechstellen (video telephone booths, from " far sight speech place ") simultaneously in their respective cities, but which at

10350-550: The system, after which they could call anyone in the network from their home or office. The inaugural video call occurred on June 30, 1970, between Pittsburgh Mayor Peter Flaherty and Chairman and CEO John Harper of Alcoa . The service officially launched the next day, July 1, 1970, with 38 Picturephones located at eight Pittsburgh companies. Among the first subscribers, Westinghouse Electric Corporation became Bell's largest Picturephone customer, leasing 12 sets. The following year, Picturephone service expanded to central Chicago and

10465-425: The technical issues of signal compression that Bell Labs would eventually resolve. Signal compression, and its later sibling data compression were fundamental to the issue of transmitting the very large bandwidth of low-resolution black and white video through the very limited capacity of low-speed copper PSTN telephone lines (higher resolution colour videophones would require even far greater capabilities). After

10580-458: The telephone transmitted sound in a way that was similar to the telegraph. This method used vibrations and circuits to send electrical pulses, but was missing key features. Bell found that this method produced a sound through intermittent currents, but in order for the telephone to work a fluctuating current reproduced sounds the best. The fluctuating currents became the basis for the working telephone, creating Bell's patent. That first patent by Bell

10695-460: The telephone, thus creating the concept of a videophone. Fraudulent reports of "amazing" advances in video telephones would be publicized as early as 1880 and would reoccur every few years, such as the episode of "Dr. Sylvestre" of Paris who claimed in 1902 to have invented a powerful (and inexpensive) video telephone, termed a "spectograph", the intellectual property rights he believed were worth $ 5,000,000. After reviewing his claim Dr. Bell denounced

10810-438: The user alternately listening and speaking (or rather, shouting) into the same hole. Sometimes the instruments were operated in pairs at each end, making conversation more convenient but also more expensive. At first, the benefits of a telephone exchange were not exploited. Instead, telephones were leased in pairs to a subscriber , who had to arrange for a telegraph contractor to construct a line between them, for example, between

10925-663: The video quad to ensure continuity. More complex protocols were later adopted for conferencing. To deploy Picturephone service, new wideband crossbar switches were designed and installed into the Bell System's 5XB switch offices, this being the most widespread of the relatively modern kind. Hundreds of technicians attended schools to learn to operate the Cable Equalizer Test Set and other equipment, and to install Picturephones. AT&T's initial Picturephone "Mod I" (Model No. 1) and then its upgraded "Mod II" programs, were

11040-522: The voice at a distant location. The receiver and transmitter are usually built into a handset which is held up to the ear and mouth during conversation. The transmitter converts the sound waves to electrical signals which are sent through the telecommunications system to the receiving telephone, which converts the signals into audible sound in the receiver or sometimes a loudspeaker . Telephones permit transmission in both directions simultaneously. Most telephones also contain an alerting feature, such as

11155-583: The war its public videophone system was closed in 1940, with its expensive inter-city broadband cables converted to telegraphic message traffic and broadcast television service. A similar commercial post office system was also created in France during the late-1930s. The Deutsche Bundespost postal service would decades later develop and deploy its BIGFON (Broadband Integrated Glass-Fiber Optical Network) videotelephony network from 1981 to 1988, serving several large German cities, and also created one of Europe's first public switched broadband services in 1989. In

11270-411: The way for other companies to later enter the field of videoconferencing . The company's videophones also generated significant media coverage in science journals, the general news media and in popular culture. The image of a futuristic AT&T videophone being casually used in the science fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey , became iconic of both the movie and, arguably, the public's general view of

11385-456: The world's population used mobile phones and by 2005 that percentage had risen to 46%. By the end of 2009, there were a total of nearly 6 billion mobile and fixed-line telephone subscribers worldwide. This included 1.26 billion fixed-line subscribers and 4.6 billion mobile subscribers. A satellite telephone, or satphone, is a type of mobile phone that connects to other phones or the telephone network by radio link through satellites orbiting

11500-517: The years, many types of mobile phone, notably smartphones, require an operating system to run. Popular mobile phone operating systems in the past have included Symbian , Palm OS , BlackBerry OS and mobile phone versions of Windows . As of 2022, the most used operating systems are Google's Android and Apple's iOS . Before the era of smartphones, mobile phones were generally manufactured by companies specializing in telecommunications equipment, such as Nokia , Motorola , and Ericsson . Since

11615-454: Was able to process two video frames per second. The 155 gram (5.5 oz.) camera could also take 20 photos and convey them by e-mail, with the camera phone retailing at the time for 40,000 yen, about US$ 325 in 1999. The VP-210 was released in May 1999 and used its single front-facing 110,000-pixel camera to send two images per second through Japan's PHS mobile phone network system. Although its frame rate

11730-497: Was also used in 1878 by French writer and publisher Louis Figuier , to popularize an invention wrongly interpreted as real and incorrectly ascribed to Dr. Bell, possibly after his Volta Laboratory discreetly deposited a sealed container of a Graphophone phonograph at the Smithsonian Institution for safekeeping. Written under the pseudonym "Electrician", one article earlier claimed that "an eminent scientist" had invented

11845-457: Was an impedance matching transformer to make it compatible with the impedance of the line. The Edison patents kept the Bell monopoly viable into the 20th century, by which time the network was more important than the instrument. Early telephones were locally powered, using either a dynamic transmitter or by the powering of a transmitter with a local battery. One of the jobs of outside plant personnel

11960-512: Was coined in 1935. Prior to that time there appeared to be no standard terms for "video telephone", with expressions such as "sight-sound television system", "visual radio" and nearly 20 others (in English) being used to describe the marriage of telegraph, telephone, television and radio technologies employed in early experiments. Among the technological precursors to the videophone were telegraphic image transmitters created by several companies, such as

12075-473: Was crude and its memory is considered tiny in the present day, the phone was viewed as "revolutionary" at the time of its release. The Kyocera project was initiated at their Yokohama research and development center by Kazumi Saburi, one of their section managers. His explanation for the project was "Around that time, cellular handsets with enabled voice and SMS communication capabilities were considered to be just one among many personal communication tools. One day

12190-608: Was designed and built by the German Post Office Laboratory. Videophone equipment used in other German cities were developed by Fernseh A.G. , partly owned by Baird Television Ltd. of the U.K., inventors of the world's first functional television. During its life the German system underwent further development and testing, resulting in higher resolutions and a conversion to an all-electronic camera tube transmission system to replace its mechanical Nipkow scanning disc . While

12305-484: Was first used to transmit a picture across the Atlantic in 1921. Western Union transmitted its first photograph in 1921. AT&T followed in 1924, and RCA began sending Radiophotos in 1926. The first wirephoto systems were slow and did not reproduce well. In 1929, Vladimir Zworykin , an electronics engineer working for Western Electric, came up with a system that produced a better reproduction and could transmit

12420-436: Was introduced, packaged in three parts. The transmitter stood on a stand, known as a " candlestick " for its shape. When not in use, the receiver hung on a hook with a switch in it, known as a "switchhook". Previous telephones required the user to operate a separate switch to connect either the voice or the bell. With the new kind, the user was less likely to leave the phone "off the hook". In phones connected to magneto exchanges,

12535-529: Was invented by Captain John Taylor in 1844. This instrument used four air horns to communicate with vessels in foggy weather. Johann Philipp Reis used the term in reference to his invention, commonly known as the Reis telephone , in c. 1860. His device appears to be the first device based on the conversion of sound into electrical impulses. The term telephone was adopted into the vocabulary of many languages. It

12650-587: Was originally started by the Ataritel division of the Atari Video Game Company in 1983 under the direction of Atari's Steve Bristow. Atari then sold its division to Mitsubishi Electric in 1984. The Lumaphone was marketed by Mitsubishi Electric of America in 1986 as the Luma LU-1000, costing US$ 1,500, designed with a small black and white video display, approximately 4 centimetres (1.6 in) in size, and

12765-601: Was solved worldwide by the creation of software for data encoding and compression via video coding and decoding algorithms , also known as codecs. In Sweden, electronics maker Ericsson began developing a videophone in the mid-1960s, intending to market it to government, institutions, businesses and industry, but not to consumers due to AT&T's lack of success in that market segment. Tests were conducted in Stockholm , including trial communications in banking. Ultimately Ericsson chose not to proceed with further production. In 1970

12880-492: Was the master patent of the telephone, from which other patents for electric telephone devices and features flowed. In 1876, shortly after Bell's patent application, Hungarian engineer Tivadar Puskás proposed the telephone switch, which allowed for the formation of telephone exchanges , and eventually networks. In the United Kingdom, the blower is used as a slang term for a telephone. The term came from navy slang for

12995-426: Was the first to be granted a United States patent for a device that produced clearly intelligible replication of the human voice at a second device. This instrument was further developed by many others, and became rapidly indispensable in business , government , and in households . The essential elements of a telephone are a microphone ( transmitter ) to speak into and an earphone ( receiver ) which reproduces

13110-591: Was the introduction of Touch-Tone signaling using push-button telephones by American Telephone & Telegraph Company (AT&T) in 1963. The invention of the transistor in 1947 dramatically changed the technology used in telephone systems and in the long-distance transmission networks, over the next several decades. With the development of stored program control and MOS integrated circuits for electronic switching systems , and new transmission technologies such as pulse-code modulation (PCM), telephony gradually evolved towards digital telephony , which improved

13225-423: Was to visit each telephone periodically to inspect the battery. During the 20th century, telephones powered from the telephone exchange over the same wires that carried the voice signals became common. Early telephones used a single wire for the subscriber's line, with ground return used to complete the circuit (as used in telegraphs ). The earliest dynamic telephones also had only one port opening for sound, with

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