Google offers video sharing for companies

Google has added a video sharing service for enterprises to the Premier Edition of its Apps software suite. Firms that use this service can upload product presentations, training videos, and other videos to Google's servers and connect them to their own web sites.

The "scene browser" displays sections of the video. By clicking on them you can skip to that section. The videos can be sorted by date and popularity, or reserved for viewing by a select audience. Viewers can then add comments, descriptions, and tags to the videos, which can also be rated. As with Google's subsidiary YouTube, no special software is needed, only a web browser. The Premier Edition of Google Apps costs $50 a year per user. Each user has 3 GB of video storage.

Google Video has a scene browser, where sections of the video are displayed as a row of thumbnails. Click on one of the thumbnails, and you immediately go to that chapter of the video. YouTube does not yet have such a function, probably because most of the films there are shorter than financial presentations.

Google says that companies will benefit from this video service by not having to set up their own IT infrastructure for the storage and streaming of the videos. The search engine provider handles both of these tasks. Users can also download videos and for instance, save them on their cell phones.

(trk)