Google is introducing new Workspace features largely for Google Meet designed to help organizations scale up its distributed work models and boost productivity and security.
In addition to new in-meeting reactions and emojis in Meet, Google is bringing Meet directly to Docs, Sheets and Slides so users can quickly start a meeting and bring it to a document, spreadsheet or presentation and present that content to everyone in the meeting. This allows users to collaborate in real-time during a meeting without having to change tabs.
For security, Google is rolling out client-side encryption in Google Meet. The optional feature, currently in beta, will give users direct control of the encryption keys and identity provider used to access those keys.
Google adds that it is planning to introduce optional end-to-end encryption for all meetings.
The company also announced picture-in-picture in Google Meet, allowing users to see up to four video tiles of meeting participants in a window on top of other applications as they share content or send a message in Gmail.
Google is also improving the in-room meeting experience with the rollout of automatic noise cancellation on all Google Meet hardware, including purpose-built devices form Logitech, Acer and Asus. This comes after recently rolling out Companion mode for meet to give in-room attendees a way to stay engaged from their personal devices while using in-room audio and video.
In addition, in-room participants will be able to add their own personal video time from Companion mode and their laptop camera to make it easier for remote participants to see them.
For those using Google’s videoconferencing and collaboration platform for livestreaming, the company is releasing the ability for attendees to participate in Q&A and polls, and the ability to stream meetings directly to Google-owned YouTube, allowing users to use just one Google account for authentication.
Other new features include an improved Spaces experience with inline threading that allows users to respond to specific comments and create side conversations.
Elsewhere, Google is making other improvements to Spaces, Chat, content moderation, Google Voice, new admin capabilities and more designed to boost productivity, workflow and efficiency.
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