14th
2/90: human.245
The ITU H.323 standard is widely used in commercial video conferencing technologies. Rather than specifying how all aspects of video communications should work, H.323 describes a framework for how the different components of a communication should fit together, defining a basic protocol stack and providing an outline for how it can be extended through the incorporation of different audio and video capabilities. Since any given H.323 conference unit has a large number of audio, video and data sharing protocols it supports, the standard includes a control protocol called H.245 that helps sort this out. Among other things, H.245 instructs two endpoints that are trying to initiate a call to list all there capabilities, along with their preferences, then attempts to optimize the connection based on what each endpoint can do. This kind of explicit capability exchange and optimization could also be applied to the growing number of communication capabilities that individuals have, helping to sort out an optimal way to meet. So, for #2, I present human.245.
When two individuals are attempting to meet, they often make an almost random guess about what kind of media is needed and what is easiest. Choices range from staying put and having someone visit, to walking, biking, riding a bus, driving a car (and hunting for parking), making a cell phone call, video conferencing from a conference room, conferencing from a laptop via Skype and many more. The options are so numerous, that the costs and benefits of each are rarely weighed and the most familiar or least uncertain are often selected. human.245 is a system that would help make capability and preference exchange more explicit.
At a first pass, simply compiling a list of all the reasonable communication options would help individuals think more critically about good ways to communication. A little more complicated, a system like this could also integrate with RSS feeds of free parking spaces, traffic reports, bus schedules, network congestion, conference room availability and pedestrian friendless of routes to provide an estimate of the costs of each connection method, along with individual preferences for each method. For a given interaction, the combined cost and preference rankings could be used to highlight good options for connecting. An implementation for this might look like a “Driving Directions” feature on a mapping site, but encompassing both virtual and physical means of spanning distance. Even more ambitious, such a system could be used to plan meetings for an entire day, optimizing based not only on a single connection, but on the cost structure of future hops.
As we have more and more options from getting from Point A to Point B, systems like this will become critical for efficiently routing personal communication across a hybrid physical and virtual network.
2 down. 88 to go.
