Could transparent telepresence replace real presence?

Today’s communication methods allow us to experience a very limited sense of ubiquity. From almost any-where in the developed world we can see and talk to others located almost anywhere else on Earth, and we can passively view remote locations live through web-cams. However transparent telepresence offers the possibility of being able to fully experience and interact with the remote environment and its inhabitants as though we were actually there. This paper considers the social, business, educational, and medical advantages and disadvantages of such systems, considers the technical problems still to be overcome, and indicates the state of the art in both commercially available products and current research activity. Using all of this as a basis it suggests an answer to the question – could transparent telepresence replace real presence?