Keywords CSCW, groupware, videoconferencing, awareness, attention. Copyright on this material is held by the authors. It was thought that this could be achieved by adding video images to existing telephony-based applications. The visual channel in VMC systems would support the use of visual cues and this information richness would stimulate a sense of social presence amongst the remote conversational partners. A typical VMC system is shown in figure 1.
Users see themselves and the other participants arranged in a grid on their screen.
They can also speak to each other. Images are conveyed by a camera on top of their screen. A typical VMC setup. However, some organizations planning to adopt VMC as a core communications strategy are reconsidering their options. According to Van der Velden, VMC systems such as the one shown in fig.