Microsoft has announced on Monday, July 18, the beta launch of a new video service called Stream.
According to Computerworld, Microsoft's video service aims to like a YouTube for the enterprise. Microsoft Stream is supposed to help co-workers to easily work together on creating videos and sharing their content both inside and outside their entreprise.
Microsoft's move comes to take advantage of a growing trend of using internet videos. In the realm of consumer web services, YouTube is still growing and Facebook has recently introduced features that encourage video posts on its popular social network. In this context, with the launch of its open beta for Stream, Microsoft aims to bring videos to the business world.
Users of the Microsoft Stream service will be able to log in to a video portal that allows them to watch all of the videos that are shared with them. Users will also be able to search for subject matter they want to explore, subscribe to channels and follow co-workers whose videos they want to see.
Videos can be easily uploaded to the Microsoft Stream video service by dragging and dropping files from users' computers. People will be able to add titles, capitation files and descriptions to their videos.
Users of the Microsoft Stream video service also have the ability to set sharing permissions that can let lock the videos down to a small group of people or just allow anyone in an organization view a video. This is useful in an organization if the creators of a video file want to get user feedback on a video from a small group before sharing it with a wider audience in the company.
The Microsoft Stream is powered by Microsoft's cloud-based video streaming system Azure Media Services. The video service will come with various features. For instance, IT managers will have greater management controls for the service.
In future developments of the service, Microsoft also plans to let users of its nPowerApps software built apps for Stream and add additional intelligence to Stream's search.
Microsoft already has several apps for sharing video, such as Office 365 Video and SharePoint. According to ZDNet, Stream will eventually replace Office 365 Video.
