The only real-time informal video we can find on the Web comes from webcams, cameras that point at public places. This paper shows that existing Web languages and protocols can be used to provide informal video communication to distributed people without threatening their privacy. It begins by presenting some general requirements for informal video communication support. It then describes several technical characteristics of HTTP and HTML that meet these requirements, and then it presents videoServer , a Web-based tool for video communication. Finally it describes some of the problems or limits encountered while developing this tool.
Accessibility requires easy access over time and space.
Ideally, we would like to be able to communicate through the Web without having to install any plug-in or helper application. Today, publishing documents on the Web is like putting them in the middle of the street and hoping that someone will see them. But it is hard to tell if anyone sees them and if so, who they are. If the documents are to contain pictures or live video of people, the important issues of privacy and solitude must be addressed. The users need to know who is retrieving the documents they publish and possibly to adapt the contents of the document according to who is retrieving it.