Twitter introduces live video through Periscope integration

Twitter takes a major step for its 317 million active monthly users (2.8 million of these in Australia, as of May 2016) by delivering live video.

It has done this by integrating the live streaming service Periscope, which it bought two years ago for US$88 million, within the app for iOS and Android devices.

To access the feature, Twitter customers are required to update the app through the Apple or Google Play app stores.

By pressing the camera button, they can broadcast live, as well as interact with videos by retweeting, commenting and sending hearts without any extra need for the Periscope app.

According to Periscope CEO Kayvon Beykpour, “We started Periscope because we wanted to give people the superpower to share Live Video with an audience.

“Bringing this capability directly into the Twitter app is an important step because it brings that superpower to the hundreds of millions of people who use Twitter.

“It’s the place where people go to see what’s happening. With this update, anyone can now broadcast what’s happening live.”

Twitter’s monthly user growth has slowed in the past few years, presumably because of its 140-character limit restricts the extent of a dialogue for, say, a music concert.

Twitter is hoping to draw more users now that they are given the chance to broadcast their music shows and increase their participation in the chatterbox through Live Video.

For companies, this can allow them to expand viewers and engagement by providing an insight of how they operate, demonstrate their latest products and services, host live Q&As and provide tutorials.

Facebook, which launched Facebook Live 12 months ago, had 1.79 billion monthly active users as of the third quarter of 2016. The number is estimated to be around 5 million in Australia, making it the biggest social media platform in this country, over 14.3 million for YouTube.

Last month, Instagram announced its Live video broadcasting features, which included finding live videos selected by Instagram algorithmically.

Earlier this week, it started making the features available to all users in the U.S. However it’s live videos are only available when they are being broadcast, and cannot be stored for later viewing.

Of Instagram’s 500 million active monthly users around the world as of June 2016 (up from 400 million in September 2015), 5 million are Australian. That makes it the fourth largest social media service in Australia, beaten to third place by WordPress.com with 5.5 million.