While I was posting some of my new videos on YouTube this week I noticed a sweet little notice at the top of my Video Manager page.
YouTube has now launched its live video streaming service to all customers, not just celebrities.
This is very cool indeed. YouTube has been offering live streaming for about a year but it was previously only really offered to high value clients (news publishers and celebrities). I’m not quite sure how YouTube Live works with Google Hangouts but the one catch to being able to use YouTube Live is that you need a Google+ account – and then you can stream to both audiences. I’ve been a fan of some of the innovative uses of Google+ Hangouts, particularly from the Dalai Lama, as I’ve blogged before, but apparently Barack Obama and others have been using them to reach their fans too.
I’ve not actually set up a live stream of YouTube or a Google Hangout. I’ll have to rectify that. But the instructions sound pretty simple (famous last words):
This was just a heads up. If you want a more detailed account, Tech Crunch have given loads more detail and some of the backstory on Google Live.
As I said, I’m not doing live streaming at all but its another option for webinars and seminars. The teleconference and video conference industry probably are looking at how to leverage this – I wonder how it will impact on Skype?