- Impressions: This is Facebook Portal: what if putting a Facebook camera at home is not (so) a bad idea?
- Portal TV.Facebook wants you to put this camera in your living room
Facebook has not been very lucky when it has left what it does well - social networks and messaging - and has opted for physical products, as the 15,000 people who 'chopped' and bought their phone will remember. With Portal this could change, because the device itself is very good, but it has a big problem: you have to have a lot of faith in the company of Mark Zuckerberg to let them put a camera and a microphone in our living room.
Halfway between Echo Show and the electronic framework, Facebook Portal is, in broad strokes, a screen from which to make video calls. Although it has the occasional additional function and is integrated with Alexa, its reason for being is social. Whoever wants an assistant should not look for it here.
Now, for the function of communicator for video calls - an omnipresent device in dystopias that pose series like Years and years, Black Mirror or, basically, any science fiction movie - is perfect. Simple, plain and frighteningly perfect. We do not move far from the future - very present - apocalyptic of which these works tell us that only in some aspects are fiction. Portal not only provides video, but without moving your camera is able to follow the conversation , make a close-up of a face or expand the frame if a new person appears on the scene. Few technologies are as scary when they work well as facial recognition.
At the moment it is compatible with Messenger and WhatsApp, with the possibility of also connecting the Facebook account or the phone to show your photographs. WhatsApp calls are encrypted end to end ; those of Messenger, in transit. Everything should be safe on this side.
On the other hand, all devices have a physical button that turns off cameras and microphone electronically. As laptop manufacturers know, this does not convince anyone, so you can also physically cover all cameras. Eyes that do not see, post-it you save.
Regarding the controversies about whether someone is watching us, Facebook's solution is, at least, honest: it doesn't hide it. Yes, there will be someone listening to improve the service (in theory, not the calls , only the voice control that is activated by saying 'Hey, Portal'). Anyway, users have access to what is stored and can delete it whenever they want.
The new Portal (Portal + came out last year) arrive in two formats and three models. On the one hand, Portal and Portal Mini, with 10 or 8-inch touch screen , assistant soul (can answer questions, control devices and play Spotify, for example) and available for 199 and 149 euros, respectively (it is the official price; all terminals will be discounted 50 euros until the end of the year).
The other proposal is that of Portal TV (169 euros). In this case the screen is set by the TV to which it is connected by HDMI (not included); He puts the camera, the microphone and the personality. Saving the distances - it is elegant and everything subtle that its size allows - reminds the webcam that they made balances on the computer monitor not so long ago.
The control falls on a small remote control that, despite being limited to what its six buttons can do (plus another four of direction and two of volume), does not fall short in a world in which orders usually give them the index finger in direct contact with the screen.
That Portal TV does not include an HDMI cable is quite paradigmatic, because it explains in a very specific way how Facebook does not understand its users . Thus, although it is a minimum nuisance and most have some lost cable - in that drawer in which the Nokia 3310 charger and several pens that do not paint since Zapatero was president also inhabit -, nobody wants to spend 150 euros on a product that as it arrives cannot be used.
Each one has its place and both have the same purpose: to change the way we communicate . At this time, yes, it is worth asking if you really need to take this step when most people have enough with a phone call, if not with a WhatsApp message. The key may be distance; The further you are from someone, the more you want to see him. Erasmus, Seneca and expatriates will see something - someone - that the rest we take for granted.
Everything in the experience is perfect. The calls are clear, the effects are varied and entertaining and the cameras are able to follow the conversation and the arrival of new people to the plane in an amazing way . It is so surprising that to teach someone two things can happen: to marvel or not even realize and take it for granted. And technology aspires just to that, to do its job so well that it is not perceived to be there.
In addition to the calls there are a number of complementary functions that seem to be right to justify the purchase with one more argument , even if it is a rather poor one. Reading interactive stories, watching videos on Facebook Watch or the filters themselves in the calls are more a curiosity that you show a friend when you explain what Portal is for than something that is really going to be used. In any case, round an already spherical set.
The other side of the coin is Facebook, a company that seems determined that nobody trusts it . Every new movement, message and even successful step that has to do with privacy is received with fear, skepticism and a feeling that it is already too late.
Now the company gives us a camera, a microphone and says it will not listen or look. Above, they are good at what they do. Perhaps the best and this is, in part, because they have the support, precisely, of Facebook. The social network calls our bell and tells us, with the best of their salesman smiles, that if they can sit in the living room with their devices that they see and hear with those who, they promise, they will never see or hear.
To open the door you have to take a leap - of faith - that many will not dare to take . Justly. To enjoy the best product that Facebook has made, you have to trust Facebook. And that is very difficult.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
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