What is H.323?

Georgia Tech's Video Development Initiative defines H.323 this way:

In order to communicate effectively, a common language between the two (or more) participants must be chosen. Without a common language, there will be little or no understanding, resulting in a passing of merely "noise" between the parties. This doesn't apply only to people; computers particularly must have common ground when communicating to one another, notably because of the context-free world in which they operate.

Networks of computers, therefore, are built on standards and protocols, selected so applications that are dependent upon the network can exist and operate at their fullest capabilities. There are several notable organizations that work to develop standards, both formal and ad hoc, across a variety of fields. The ITU (International Telecommunications Union) is one such organization, a prominent group that develops internationally recognized recommendations and standards to enable computers, radios, and other machines to interact with one another.

The ITU H.32x family of standards handles multimedia communications. This family includes H.320 (communication over ISDN [integrated services digital networks]) and H.324 (communication over SCN [switched circuit network], better known as traditional phone services).