Broadcast Live Video with the Periscope App

Earlier this year Twitter launched Periscope, a new app that lets you broadcast live video using your iPhone. Periscope allows you to capture and broadcast live allowing others to experience the world through your eyes.

The app is free from the App Store and thanks to Twitter integration you don't need to create a new account to join Periscope. Instead, you can simply link your Twitter profile. Once you’re signed using Twitter, the app will look through the people you follow on Twitter to see if they’re using the app as well. You can select users to follow on Periscope from that list and search out new ones.

When you’re all set up you can watch live broadcasts by tapping the TV icon at the bottom of the app and selecting from a feed showing you live and recent broadcasts. You can also watch broadcasts on your computer. While you’re watching a live feed you can interact with the video by commenting live or indicating your approval by sending hearts. To start your own broadcast you simply tap the camera icon and set your desired level of privacy and whether you’d like to share the broadcast on Twitter. Your video will be broadcast live and remain available for replay for 24 hours.

Periscope is a fascinating way to view the world. It allows users to discover events and places that might not be otherwise accessible to them. For example, a lot of footage from the events in Baltimore has been captured and broadcast over the new social network this week.

I decided to give Periscope a try this week to broadcast a behind the scenes of my weekly tech radio show, GetConnected Radio. We featured it as our app of the week and invited the audience to join us by live streaming us on Periscope. I have to say, having a live video broadcast brought an additional element of engagement that was quite different from the typical tweets and call-ins. Not only were people asking questions as we went but they also seemed more likely to contribute answers or advice in response to questions from callers. The video made people feel like they were actually part of a discussion, instead of just passively listening to us on the radio. It’s definitely a great tool for connecting with people, and with over a million users joining the network in just a few weeks it’ll be interesting to see how Periscope evolves over time.

Have you tried Periscope yet? Tell us what you think of it in the comments.