JENNY BROWN: When I say video conferencing, what comes to mind? Bad connection? Calls that are hard to schedule and even harder to join? Terrible interfaces? With employees working remotely more now than ever before. We need video conferencing that is secure, fast, reliable, and above all else, easy. LILIANA YU: Jenny? Hi. What are you doing? JENNY BROWN: I thought rather than just tell people about new Hangouts Meet, I'd show them. LILIANA YU: Oh, great idea. Where are you calling from? JENNY BROWN: You know, it's funny that you'd ask. And it's also funny how our producer schedules time for me to record even when I'm on vacation. Thanks, Heather. LILIANA YU: Hangouts Meet is new video meeting experience that seeks to improve every aspect of video conferencing. JENNY BROWN: First of all, scheduling a meeting is a piece of cake. Oh, I didn't order this, but is it gluten-free? On either my computer or smartphone, I go to Google Calendar and create an event. I invite guests to the event. And then when I click Send, they'll receive a notification email that contains a direct link to the video call. That's it. LILIANA YU: One way Meet streamlines videoconferencing is by starting every meeting with a shared link. JENNY BROWN: No plugins, logins, or super complicated downloads required, just a URL that's short and unique. LILIANA YU: I can also start an instant meeting on my computer by going to Meet.Google.com. Once there, I click Start a New Meeting. And then I click Copy Info to copy the meeting link and share it with others. JENNY BROWN: If I'm on my smartphone, there's a new Meet app I can use that shares a much higher quality video with others, lets you see presentations in vivid detail, and gives you contacts and meeting just like a desktop. Then, I just tap Add to create a video meeting and Share to send the meeting details to my guests. LILIANA YU: Joining a meeting is every bit as simple as creating one. Meet effectively allows you to join a meeting in two clicks via desktop or smartphone. In Calendar, I click the event I want to join. And then I click on the video meeting link. I can also click on that same link in an email notification or text message. JENNY BROWN: Alternatively, I can go to Meet.Google.com on my computer or the Hangouts Meet app on my phone and see a list of my scheduled meetings and select the one I want to join. LILIANA YU: G-Suite Enterprise customers also have a dial-in option for audio only access. Whenever an event is created for a G-Suite Enterprise customer, it automatically includes a randomly allocated US phone number and PIN. So if you don't have Wi-Fi, you can still call in. JENNY BROWN: We're also working on a way to let you connect via telegraph, Ouija board, or passenger pigeon. LILIANA YU: Really? JENNY BROWN: No. But in the future, we will have an in-message chat so you can message all the participants without interrupting the speaker. LILIANA YU: Also, let's chat about the new interface. JENNY BROWN: Ha, funny, I like it. Meet has a new user interface designed for efficient meetings which load faster, use fewer client resources, and run more reliably. That means less, eh, uh, ah, uh-- LILIANA YU: You're really good at that. Jenny? Jenny? JENNY BROWN: Gotcha. LILIANA YU: OK. Well, in addition to reliably sharing your face, you can also reliably share your screen. During a meeting, when discussing a certain file, I can easily share my screen to present documents, presentations, spreadsheets, and more. I just click Present in the bottom-right corner and select either a window to share a specific window or your entire screen to share-- well, you get the idea. When I'm done, I simply click Stop Presenting. JENNY BROWN: Meet is also a fully scalable experience. Currently, up to 25 devices can join a video meeting. That's 30 for G-Suite Enterprise users. And we're planning to increase this to 50 sometime soon. Meet allows up to five active participants to be visible at a time while less active participants are included in an easily toggled participant list on the side. I can also add guests to a meeting already in progress. I just click Copy Info from the bottom corner and then paste that information into an email or text to send to the new guest. LILIANA YU: Also, scheduled meetings are synced automatically across all your devices. So I can start a meeting on my computer and then seamlessly continue it on my phone. JENNY BROWN: Well, this was fun, Lili, but I've got to get back to my vacation now. LILIANA YU: I'm so jealous. See you soon. JENNY BROWN: And see you all next week. Check out Hangouts Meet and let us know what you think in the comments below. SPEAKER 1: The difference between team drives and my drive is exactly what it sounds like. Team drive still allows you to easily search, access, and store any file anywhere on any device. The difference is team drives is owned by the team. Whereas, my drive is owned by an individual.
