New Lycos Service Combines Streaming Video and Live Chat

Posted on November 13, 2006

Reuters reports that the somewhat forgotten Lycos website is launching an interactive video channel, called Lycos Cinema, that will stream full-length movies and let users chat about them.

Having missed much of the explosive growth of its rivals Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc., Lycos, now part of the second largest Korean Internet portal Daum Communications Corp. will launch a high-speed Internet video channel this week and let viewers watch movies simultaneously across the Internet and discuss them.

The service, called Lycos Cinema (http://cinema.lycos.com/) aims to combine two tenets of new Internet businesses -- online video and social networking, embodied by popular sites YouTube Inc. and News Corp.'s MySpace social network.

The ability to upload your own videos will come as early as December or early next year, Lycos Chief Operating Officer Brian Kalinowski told Reuters in an interview on Friday.

"The technology we've created allows for the virtual living room," Kalinowski said.

Lycos Chief Operating Officer Brian Kalinowski told Reuters that people will be able to upload their own videos by December or early 2007. There is nothing new about streaming video or online chat but together they might make be compelling enough to interest teens. It could get irritating if an annoying troll is posting spoilers in the chat room.

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