Bell Telephone’s Picturephone went on display at the 1964 World’s Fair, and it went into actual commercial use on over 50 years ago.
From a booth set up in Grand Central Terminal, a person could talk to a friend in Chicago or Washington while also seeing them on a small video screen. The friend would also have to go to a special booth in those cities to take the call. The price for the novelty of a three-minute call was $16. That would be equivalent to $121 in today’s money.
Today, you can simply decide that you want to look at someone while talking to them on a phone — and do it for hours without needing to traipse to a special room downtown. The price: $0 using a service like FaceTime or Skype…
Take a look at these cool pics to see what picturephones looked like from the 1960s.
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