My experience is similar; this is definitely a company/team culture thing. At my workplace, if you see someone on camera the assumption is that it's accidental and you should let them know so that they can turn it off.

I've recently switched from project which extensively used Hangouts in meeting rooms into project that uses Lync and dinky Windows machine.

Asides from being much worse experience in terms of dialing in, sharing screens, etc, not seeing faces is so much worse. Inability to see emotions is terrible for team trust. We have 200 facial muscles that carry tons of information. We should use them.

I've worked remote for 3 years and I've never done a video conference call. I go into the office once every two weeks. Not an option for everyone but I'm sure I can't be the only person who works like this