INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
You have to actually get work done, not just video call all day, but apps like Zoom want to take over your screen
Remote workers who need to stay in touch while staying productive are forced to juggle tabs
Meanwhile, call participants often look and sound far away, dwarfed by their background and drowned in noise.Today, Around launches its new
video chat software that crops participants down to just circles that float on your screen so you have space for other apps
Designed for laptops, Around uses auto-zoom and noise cancelling to keep your face and voice in focus
Instead of crowding around one computer or piling into a big-screen conference room, up to 15 people can call from their own laptop without
But they also want to get stuff done
The plan is to invest in talent and infrastructure to keep video calls snappy.Around CEO Dominik ZaneAround was born out of frustration with
remote work collaboration
Zane and fellow Around co-founder Pavel Serbajlo had built mobile marketing company M.dot that was acquired by GoDaddy by using a fully
as a video chat app that slips into the background rather than dominating the foreground
or exactly how their hair looks
to detect nearby laptops and synchronization to eliminate those strange feedback sounds
Around also employs artificial intelligence and the fast CPUs of modern laptops to suppress noise like sirens, dog barks, washing machines,
But that orthodoxy ignores the fact that a team member on the go might still want to chime in on chats, even with just audio
Mobile apps are on the roadmap, though, with plans to allow direct dial-in and live transitioning from laptop to mobile
The 15-participant limit also prevents Around from working for all-hands meetings.Competing with video calling giant Zoom will be a serious
Around will have to hope that its smaller windows let it keep delays down
new emphasis on video technology for tons of companies, finding great engineers could be difficult
Video products are on the rise
Google and large companies snag all the talent, plus they have the ability and scale to train audio-video professionals at universities in
bugging you about superfluous nonsense
But the heaviness of traditional video chat swings things too far in the other direction
We need presence and connection, but also the space to remain in flow
