Yowie takes its video chat to the masses

Video chat company Yowie today said it's planning to go head-to-head with Skype, Google Hangouts and Tiny Chats, offering enhanced video chat for consumers.

You might best know Yowie for connecting fans with celebrity chat hosts like Colin Farrell, Amy Poehler and presidential hopeful Gary Johnson, who've all used the platform as a--well--platform of sorts.

Now, the company said, it wants to provide Yowie as a tool for "simple and safe" video chatting among friends, family, co-workers or even total strangers.

"By working with some of the biggest names in entertainment over the past year, we've learned that people with similar offline interests are looking to authentically connect online," said Yowie founder and president Jamie Snider. "With the new Yowie, we're making it simple and safe to not just video chat with a celebrity but with anyone around almost any topic."

Yowie said it has a number of features that differentiates it from other providers. Among them:

• It includes "reputation scoring," which tracks on-site user behavior, including how and why users are being kicked, banned or reported for abusive behavior. Yowie surfaces all of that information on each user's profile.
• Users can include YouTube or Vimeo media during their Yowie group chats, and new video and audio content partners--both live and recorded--are being added.
• Popular chats will be showcased to users based on their personal preferences, or users can proactively search for specific topics.
• Users will be rated by experience points and earn badges as they use new site features (e.g. playing media or sharing the room with friends on social networks), encouraging people to use Yowie as a visual and social connection.
• Chat organizers will be able to designate whether a conversation can be made public or private.

The free service is browser-based and needs only an Internet connection and video camera to be used.

Yowie launched its celebrity video chat service in late 2010 and has hosted more than a thousand chats with actors, athletes, comedians, musicians and politicians.

For more:
- see this release

Related articles:
Newest iteration of Google+ Hangouts a great tool for SMBs, startups
Fring adds live group video chat to VoIP call menu
Facebook partners with Skype to launch video chat
Fring launches free group video calling for iOS, Android devices
TokBox: OpenTok growth spurs mobile chat initiative