According to YouTube co-founder Steve Chen, YouTube will begin to offer live streaming video before the end of 2008. Chen confirmed that live video was coming to the service in “2008″ and that the company has wanted to feature it for some time
In a brief interview videotaped at a New York party thrown by YouTube, Chen told Sarah Meyers of Pop17.com that YouTube had always wanted to offer live video but lacked the resources. That, however, has changed, since Google’s acquisition of YouTube in 2006.
YouTube is apparently getting ready to try and revolutionize the live streaming video market.
Live video on YouTube may well be integrated into Google’s larger business plan. The same technology could be employed in an additional service for, let’s say, Google Apps. It could provide videoconferencing and the such to companies, a very useful feature I might add.
Many believe though that YouTube has the popularity to truly make live streaming video market mainstream, with shows, and more.
The potential of a YouTube live video streaming service goes far beyond 24-7 video shows. It’s not hard to imagine something similar being used as a video conferencing app within Google Apps, or perhaps even adding online video-chat to gTalk.