oovoo

Oovoo video conferencing app comes to iPhone (hands-on)

Video calling apps are still fairly few and far between on the iPhone, but Oovoo for iPhone is already a step ahead in offering video conference calls with Oovoo for iPhone.

Features-wise, Oovoo on iPhone, which quietly entered the app store last week as a beta, closely resembles its Android cousin. It has a clean design that shows off the contact list, dialer, communications history, IM, and settings.

With it, you'll be able to place free voice and video calls to up to five other contacts, as long as they're using Oovoo on the iPhone, Android phone, PC, … Read more

Android Atlas Weekly 28: The first dual core Android phone (podcast)

The first dual core Android phone, a whole new Android Market. All that and more on this week's edition of Android Atlas Weekly for Thursday, December 16th, 2010. Join Justin Eckhouse along side guest host, Senior Associate Editor Jessica Dolcourt!

Subscribe:  iTunes (MP3) |  iTunes (320x180) |  iTunes (640x360) |  RSS (MP3) |  RSS (320x180) |  RSS (640x360) EPISODE 28

News Stories

LG’s Optimus 2X is first dual-core smartphone http://www.cnet.com/8301-19736_1-20025831-251.html

Rumor: Honeycomb will be released as Android 2.4 in February at MWC http://androidandme.com/2010/12/news/rumor-honeycomb-will-be-released-as-android-2-4-in-february-at-mwc/

Official Froyo … Read more

OoVoo to take its video-calling app mobile

With the advent of 4G bandwidth, the time may finally be ripe for high-data mobile video calling to take root. That's what video chat company OoVoo is banking on: it just announced its intention at CES to translate its desktop and Web video chat interface to the mobile phone.

Oovoo's desktop video-calling apps (Windows|Mac) can handle up to six conference-call lines at once, and can record conversations, to boot.

We can only guess at this point if video conference calls will figure into OoVoo's mobile app, since it won't even have a product to formally … Read more

Slideshow: Voice chat for free on your PC

You don't need a fistful of dollars to make an international call, just a computer with a microphone, speakers, and one of the six applications we gathered together for you in this collection of free voice-chat apps (some offer upgrades to premium services.) As a bonus, all of these fine downloads offer video calls to let you put a face to a voice.

Featured Freeware: ooVoo

ooVoo is an iChat-like video conferencing and chat tool for Windows, loaded with useful, powerful tools that make it a viable alternative for small work groups using conference calls and screen-sharing applications. A recording feature lets users tape video chats with other participants. Since the video and audio are being recorded to the hard drive, the only time limit is how much free space the computer's hard drive has. In testing, a nearly 15-minute, four-way video conversation only took up 95MB, which ooVoo can convert into a workable FLV file.

A conference calling tool gives host and participants a … Read more

Webware 100 winner: OoVoo

OoVoo is a free, standalone desktop chat application that has both a text and video chat capabilities. It can handle as many as six people in one video conference as well as a dozen in the integrated voice chat conference. Users can drop in and out of conversations, and the video windows will scale with a similar effect to iChat's "swoop."

OoVoo also doubles as a video e-mail service. Users can send each other video messages as long as a minute in length that are available right in the application or via e-mail. Users who get the … Read more

ooVoo adds screen sharing, free conference calling

Remember ooVoo, that iChat-like video conferencing and chat tool we took a look at back in June? Today they've launched a new version that has got a handful of useful, powerful tools that make it a viable alternative for small workgroups using conference calls and screen-sharing applications, such as WebEx.

First up is a new recording feature that lets users tape video chats with other participants. Since the video and audio are being recorded to the hard drive, the only time limit is how much free space the computer has. In testing, I managed to get a nearly 15 minute, four-way video conversation down to 95 MB file. The application took about 10 minutes to convert my conversation into workable FLV file that was at a full 1MB/S quality. It can also step it down to 256kb/s or 512kb/s if the file needs to be smaller.

The other really useful feature is a new conference calling tool that gives host and participants a landline number to call. Other ooVoo users who call this conference line get plugged right into the audio that's a part of the video chat, and just like the video recordings, this audio gets archived too. The new call in lines support up to six people, meaning users can have up to a dozen participants--including those on the video side. The call in service is free this month, but it is moving to a by-the-minute model in March.

Besides the video recording, the other new feature that I think people are going to like is an optional piece of software that's a companion for ooVoo's video player. The companion has two main uses. The first is a screen sharing application that lets users show off an entire screen, or certain zoom levels, to other video chat participants. Users can also drop media files, such as music, pictures, or video into the stream for other users to view. Secondly, it's got a built-in facial overlay tool, like Fix8, that applies digital overlays either to users faces or to replace backgrounds. It's great fun.… Read more

TechCrunch at DigitalLife: A taste of Valley culture amid consumer-tech blitz

You'd think it would've drawn crowds.

TechCrunch founder and controversial Valley 2.0 icon Michael Arrington was making a rare appearance in New York, moderating a panel at the DigitalLife trade show on Thursday night. And the panel in question, called "The Disruptors," included a few of the start-up world's hottest names: Napster, Plaxo, and Facebook veteran Sean Parker (currently of the Founders Fund); Oovoo CEO Philippe Schwartz; SpinVox co-founder Daniel Doulton; IGA Worldwide CEO Justin Townsend; and Ooma founder Andrew Frame. Considering the resurgence of tech culture and startup spirit in New York in … Read more

ooVoo jumps into video and IM chat space

ooVoo is a free, standalone desktop chat application that has both a text and video chat capabilities. Its official launch is next week, but the beta has been available since mid April. I took it for a spin this morning and came away impressed.

There are a ton of chat clients out there, so one of the things it has done to differentiate itself is multiperson video chat. ooVoo can handle as many as six people in one video conference, which is two more than what iChat is capable of. Users can drop in and out of conversations, and the video windows will scale with a similar effect to iChat's "swoop." Along with video, users can chat among themselves with their computer's microphone or a headset. There are volume controls for both speakers and the microphone right in the chat window, a handy addition.

I found the video and audio to be fairly clear, even when topped off at six users. ooVoo's creators tell me that when running full six-user video, it will take up only half the bandwidth on a low-end DSL connection. Assuming you're not downloading or uploading large files in the background, your connection shouldn't drag to a halt.

In addition to live video and text chat, ooVoo doubles as a video e-mail service. Users can send each other video messages as long as a minute in length that are available right in the app or via e-mail. Users who get the e-mail are also provided a link that takes them to a live flash version of the video, so they can access it while away from their home machine.

For people interested in adding a quick way to be reached on their social networking profile or Web site, ooVoo gives users the option to embed a quick contact button that will automatically launch an ooVoo conversation if installed. I've posted an example image of this on the left side of this post.

ooVoo is not alone in the multiperson video chat space; competitor SightSpeed also offers a free video and text chat service. The main difference is that SightSpeed is aimed at businesses and limits video chat to four users at a time with a monthly subscription fee.

ooVoo is currently available only for Windows users, although the team is releasing a beta for Macs in about six weeks. Users on both platforms will be able to chat with one another using the same client.

You can download ooVoo over at CNET's Download.com. For more shots of the service, keep reading.… Read more