Originally published in 2021. Updated in 2024.
When I was a kid in the ’70s, my grandpa used to call on the phone and tell me he could see me.
“I’ve got a video phone,” he’d insist.
“No you don’t. There’s no such thing,” I’d reply every time.
He’d keep me going for a while before finally admitting he was joking. Then, without fail, he’d say, “One day there will be. You’ll see.” He truly believed it. I think about him every time I hop on a video call, and what a shame it is that he didn’t live long enough to see he was right.
If you’re Gen X like me, you probably remember The Jetsons. It was basically The Flintstones, but set in the future instead of the past. My favorite episode was the one where Jane Jetson had a scheduled video chat with three of her friends. She had just woken up, her hair and makeup were a mess, and in a panic she grabbed a mask of her own face and held it in front of the camera. When the scene switched to the other women, every one of them was doing exactly the same thing.
Ahh… the magic of video calling.
I must have been about eight years old when I first saw that episode, but it stuck with me. Looking back, it’s funny that my grandfather dreamed about video phones, only for the rest of us to spend years trying to avoid turning the camera on.
Fast forward a couple of decades and i’ll admit it took me a while to warm up to video chat too. Suddenly I was expected to brush my hair and put on makeup just to sit in my own living room. What’s next, wearing something nicer than my comfy sweatpants?
I’ve worked remotely in the tech industry for years, so video meetings weren’t new to me. More and more companies were embracing them, and a lot of us developed our own little tricks. Turning the camera off. Uploading a flattering profile picture. Basically the modern version of Jane Jetson’s face mask. Every time I see someone’s headshot light up while they’re talking, I still think of that episode.
And then Came Covid
At the time, I was living in London, where we spent the better part of two years in lockdown. Overnight, video chat went from being something many of us used for work to a lifeline almost everyone relied on just to stay connected.
I actually have some good memories from that time. Friday nights at the pub turned into Zoom happy hours. I’d throw on a cute top, brush my hair, maybe add a little mascara… and keep the sweatpants. My friends and I caught up from different countries without leaving our couches.
The pandemic accelerated the inevitable pushing the rest of the world to embrace video technology, as the tech world had already done, faster than it probably would have otherwise. Businesses embraced remote work. Families celebrated birthdays online. Grandparents learned how to FaceTime. Teachers taught classrooms through webcams. For a while, it even felt normal to know what everyone’s home office looked like.
Eventually life slowly returned to normal although video chat never went away. Today we don’t think twice about interviewing for a job over Zoom, meeting with clients on Google Meet, or FaceTiming family across the country. It’s no longer a novelty. It’s just another way we communicate. My grandfather didn’t predict the pandemic, but he did sure got video phones right.
What was once science fiction is now a very real part of how we live and work.
Looking back, I think that’s what technology does. It feels futuristic until one day it doesn’t (just ask Walt Disney about their “Tomorrowland” and “EPCOT” displays!) Our generation has watched it happen over and over again. We grew up with rotary phones, cassette tapes, paper maps, and encyclopedias. Then came home computers, the internet, smartphones, social media, streaming, and video chat. Every one of them seemed unbelievable at first. Now they’re just part of everyday life.
