Skype (news, site) may want to watch its back. Shortly after releasing WebRTC, an open-source software project for audio and video chat, the great Google is beginning to build it into the Chrome browser.
Lowering Technological Barriers
We originally guessed at the coming features when Google acquired Global IP Solutions (GIPS), a company specializing in Internet telephony and video conferencing. WebRTC ultimately originated from this move.
Currently, WebRTC uses two audio codecs from GIPS, iSAC for high-bandwidth connections and iLBC for narrowband connections. For video, Google’s open-source and royalty-free VP8 codec is used.
“Our goal is to enable Chrome with Real-Time Communications (RTC) capabilities via simple Javascript APIs,” said Google programmer Henrik Andreasson. “We are working hard to provide full RTC support in Chrome all the way from WebKit down to the native audio and video parts.”