Viewplicity is a Flash-based group video collaboration service with customizable components for both the novice website owner and the experienced web developer.  That’s what we say we offer, but what does that mean?  At the core, we are a video chat service.  What makes us stand out from the crowd?  Why use Viewplicity when you can use free services like Skype?

We asked Bob Nimon, one of our developers, to expain the differences between Viewplicity and Skype.  In this two-part series, Bob gives us a peak into the many features that makeViewplicity stand out in the crowd.

Functional Differences

• Skype is an application—it is a downloaded and installed application with its own user database requiring users to register and login to it.  Viewplicity can be embedded into your own web site, and can be used with out the need to run a third-party application. Web sites using Viewplicity to provide collaboration use the omnipresent Flash player (no download, typically) and they use their own user database – no login required to a foreign database or entity. It can be configured so that web site users do not have to click anything to be connected to the video player.

• Skype only supports two-party video conference calls, while Viewplicity supports conferences with entire groups of people.

• Skype does not support recording the video streams. Viewplicity not only provides a recording feature, but also provides a management interface for users deal with the recordings. Viewplicity supports playing back videos that are in a group’s archive simultaneously with live video conference streams. Videos are recorded directly on Viewplicity’s servers and therefore available for playback to anyone in the group almost instantly.

• The web site designer has many options for integrating and skinning (coloration, sizing, etc.) of the Viewplicity components so that the collaboration features feel more a part of the web site and its user community. Skype looks the way Skype looks.

• Skype does not provide any meaningful way for web site owners to track the usage of their service, while Viewplicity provides real time and monthly reports available 24/7 from our site that details usage by group  and members within a group.

• Skype provides a simple mechanism to group contacts into a list called a “group” and give it a name. You can then use that to make an audio call (no video). Viewplicity’s concept of a group is much more powerful. Skype’s group is only a list of contacts with a single users list. There is no knowledge of the group outside of the single workstation. With  Viewplicity, a group is a subset of the entire web site’s membership that is owned by a member who is allowed to invite others. Members that join a group can see others who are in the group and instantly be connected.

• Viewplicity keeps up with all of the groups that a user belongs to and allows him to switch quickly from one to another. The members that are online in a group can send text messages instantly to all members that are also online, or they can select individuals and send private messages very similar to Skype. However, Skype functions as if there is only one large group, while Viewplicity supports collaboration groups that align with your purpose (scouting, church, customers, support, etc.) Viewplicity organizes video recordings in the groups. When you switch groups, you see lists of the recordings that pertain to that group and have the option of instantly connecting to all members in the group who are online with you in that group.

Stay tuned for Part 2 in this series on the differences between Viewplicity and Skype.