Multimedia conferencing: has it come of age?

Multimedia conferencing continues to be an active research area with a diversity of systems being developed for a variety of situations. In particular, multimedia conferencing is central to the idea of the collaboratory, an electronic environment for conducting science. As a vehicle for telecollaboration, multimedia conferencing promises to provide a meeting place for those needing to work cooperatively from afar. The paper reviews current research projects in telecollaboration. The authors frame the discussion of multimedia conferencing with a nomenclature and taxonomy. They compare local versus remote conferencing, touching on issues in system architecture and network communication requirements. They examine the recurring problems researchers have observed and the solutions they have chosen. With the advent of new technologies and with a growing sensitivity to human factors, if multimedia conferencing has not already come of age, it now has the opportunity