Choose the right expert at the right price, anytime day or night, at PC World Expert Help . Someone Harry McCracken investigates the state of video chat, where the Webcam never blinks. Personal spacecraft and cybernetic servants are nowhere in sight. So I look for glimmers of Jetsonian living where I can. Geeky types have been propping cute little Webcams atop their monitors and making Internet video calls for years.
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What's more, a new wave of free services eliminates the hassle of earlier, quirkier videoconferencing applications such as Microsoft's NetMeeting. When my PC was ready to go, though, I found that those of my distant friends often weren't. I don't often see in person, even if they looked a tad fuzzy. But George and Jane Jetson would undoubtedly sneer at video chat circa 2001. Picture quality often became blurry, blocky, or dim.