Cisco Study Reveals To Me.....

In reviewing the results of a recently announced Cisco IT services study reveals to me that many of the concepts including unified communications, the use of video in communications and streaming media, three technologies I've been heavily involved with and a consumer of are simply too challenging, even for IT professionals, on a variety of levels.

The challenges are from my perspective are best summed up this way:

1) Network strain and drain-we don't have the capacity
2) Integration-it doesn't work with what's already there easily
3) User Experience-It's not easy to use, requires lots of care and feeding
4) The concept of "No IT Guy Required" is just a dream, not a reality

Another interpretation from the study announcement:

Cisco is trumpeting their video solutions, and using travel reduction as the key. I am suspecting they make a move downward into the SightSpeed, Skype, ooVoo space this year, creating an "on-ramp" to their Telepresence solution using h.264 SIP based video. If you note, they are saying Telepresence less, and video communications more. To me that's what is called an indicator in a subtle shift in positioning and likely a leaning in the direction of something more to come.

Comments

[Richo]

Agreed, Cisco's TP has been slow on the uptake, as has Tanberg's. The issue is not usability but cost. Both are actually very easy to drive, both integrate with IPT/ UM, and can work across SIP and H323 boundaries, if you accept the investment in gateways. Yes there is some complexity in set up - but not as much as you think.
Cisco's build out of Webex is the key to your assertion above. The added integration it has now with Cisco Unified communications Manager 7 and Meeting Place takes the home user experience and makes it enterprise ready. Microsoft is trying a similar thing.
The shift to "user driven innovation" is here now as apps and services like Skype and Sightspeed drive expectations of users.
In fact, Skype has done more for my Tandberg and Polycom sales than any trade show/ marketing campaign as it socializes Video with users.