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Videophones Provide
TV Coverage
Tuesday
October 16, 2001
From the desolate desert or deep in the danger zone, there's a new high tech tool allowing reporters to beam live pictures back home from the world's most remote locations.
It’s the videophone, a device CNN's chief news executive Eason Jordan says is revolutionizing the way television reporters do their jobs. “We can take just two laptop size cases and go do live TV anywhere in the world.”
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We've come along way since WWII where carrier pigeons delivered some reports from the battlefields. In Vietnam, it took days sometimes to get video out of the dense jungles.
While satellite television brought us live images from the Gulf War, much like a web cam, the videophone can go where cumbersome news equipment often cannot.
It's compact, lightweight, and can be powered by a small battery or a car's cigarette lighter. The images are then fed through a phone line to a satellite. But there is one drawback. Mediaweek's Marc Berman says, “It's not great quality and nobody expects it to be.”
Berman says new versions with better video and audio quality are on their way as the news business competes for the latest technology. He says, “The idea is to get the news out first. And if you want to stay on top you have to have the technology.”
It’s technology that takes you across the world in an instant to witness our new war unfold live on videophone. The videophones cost about $7500 each and the portable transmitter costs $8000. Satellite fees are not included in those prices.
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