Problems with Multimedia

Despite the real and potential benefits, the adoption of multimedia by businesses has been very slow. There are various reasons for this reluctance. The quality of some of the early systems proved to be disappointing as well. The developers had not understood the need to use skilled designers for the interactive and audiovisual elements in these systems. Some of the problems remain unsolved. Other, newer problems are likely to arise in future. Various problems occuring with multimedia are:

• Investment Costs: Against the positive economic benefits outlined above we must set the high cost of implementing a multimedia system. As the cost of technology is falling steadily, the cost of development work remains high. Most other computer- based systems, multimedia involves a high proportion of information in a form that is very expensive to create and maintain. Most managers underestimate the skills involved, the need for a new approach to product management and the length of development time.
• Technical Barriers: Multimedia is surrounded by a barrage of a new terminology, often involving strings of acronyms that are confusing to users. Many new untired technologies are involved. Managers should be aware that they will need to upgrade their infrastructure to provide:               

1. New file servers that can manage large volumes of data stored on optical or magnetic media.
2. Local area networks that can transmit multiple concurrent streams of multimedia data.       

The lack of standards have made it difficult  to ensure compatibilty between the users equipment and that of the distributor of information. Networking the application will exacerbate this problem.