We're not entirely sure what the 800-pound social network has in mind in its new live streaming video offering, but they plugged whatever it is in last week. Facebook Live is a video streaming
channel at the site that is supposed to take us inside the company. The socially-enhanced feed allows for live Q&A with the audience through an "Ask a Question" feature that directs the query to the
moderator. The video is surrounded by the real-time Live Feed of everyone who is watching as well as a chat feature.
The content is an odd mix of talk-show, news and B2B-style content. In
just the first few days we have seen an interview with America Ferrera to push her new indie move, but there have also been a feed of an internal lecture at Facebook and an interview with one of the
first Facebook speakers in their company speaker series. Most of the videos come from the Palo Alto home office. We have also heard from one of the Facebook engineers and European Policy Director.
Facebook Live takes the form of an app that users can plant onto their own pages. Once the programming falls into some sort of regular schedule and predictable mix then it may be of value to
various members to post specific programming. There is a full suite of sharing options for distributing the video on and off the Facebook world as well.
It all feels more like a proof of concept
and technology than a fully shaped video project. The content for now feels like public access TV run by the kids in AV class. But it certainly speaks to Facebook's ambitions to move more deeply into
the video social networking ecosystem. One can imagine the technology being offered to media partners in order for them to live stream their own events on Facebook or their own sites and have a
built-in live chat and audience interactivity component.