Watch YouTube Or Google Videos Inside Gmail Chat

It’s a little feature in Googleland, but it adds a dash to our web talk. From the official Gmail blog I got the first hint of a new feature where we can now watch and share videos from within the chat window, while engaging in a normal tete-a-tete.

Presently, the feature only supports videos from Google Video or YouTube and it is available only in the Gmail version of Google Talk and not in the Google Talk desktop client.

The process, as all things Google, is simplicity itself – just drop the video URL into the chat window. A small thumbnail appears within the chat box with a preview and the loading button. Click the button and an inline video player opens up at the top of the chat box. So, a user can watch and discuss the video at the same time.

The previous way of doing things was to click on the received link and open it up in another window. Yes, we still do the same with most of the other chat services (Yahoo messenger 9 though does allow video sharing); Gmail now lets us continue chatting without browsing away to another page. That’s a time saver.

For the musically inclined like me, I use it to share some of the latest song bytes I find on the video sites. Also, one can upload home videos using a YouTube user account and then share it with a chat user. It makes for an entertaining chat session. Yes, the limitation of using video links from Google Videos and YouTube remains. Also, Google Video is on the wane according to some reports following Google’s acquisition of YouTube. But hopefully, as the feature catches on we might see more variety in the Google menu with other video sites being added.

Add this to the fact that Google has added voice and video chat to Gmail, this new arrow in its quiver is another user-friendly step forward.

Have you used this recent feature? Does it add or detract to the chat experience? Share your views with us in the comments area below.