But before that happens, users will have to thread their way through a landscape littered with incompatible options, segmented by carriers, mobile apps, and networks.

Vivox, developer of the , Tuesday acquired Palo Alto, Calif.-based Droplet Technology, for an undisclosed sum. "We're adding Droplet to upgrade the capabilities of our current communications platform," Vivox CEO Rob Seaver told PCWorld. "Mobile video is a highly demanding environment that requires specialized technology. Droplet is optimized to handle mobile video much better than other applications and to reduce the bandwidth demands on a mobile network."

The VoiceEverywhere platform offers voice, video, and text chat capabilities, and is already integrated into multiple gaming and communications applications, Seaver said. He said that the technology is already used by more than 80 million people who want to communicate while playing games from Sony and Nexon or while wandering through the Second Life virtual world. "You can walk up to people and start talking to them," said Seaver, "and if you walk away, their voices will fade."

The technology is also used in T-Mobile's , which runs on iPhones, iPads, and Android phones and lets Facebook users initiate video chats with friends.