[vorpalhex]

I suspect a lot of it is quality and UI/UX woes.

In a default video app you struggle to see everyone, only one speaker can be heard clearly and usually there's audio/video sync issues. Add a sprinkle of bad hardware and suddenly it's more like talking to a robot over dialup than any semblance of a conversation.

On the other hand, have the participants use good hardware, high quality connections and fix the audio issues and the problems greatly get reduced.

Anecdotally, comparing my work meetings to my video-chat social calls seems to reinforce this. Work folks typically use just their laptop and have questionable wireless, and we use Google Meet which seems to get worse with every update especially on the audio front. Meanwhile the social group is primarily streamers with high end cameras and microphones and better networking, which when combined with Discords significantly improved audio muxing dramatically improves call quality and reduces "Zoom fatigue".