Google strengthens its tools for hybrid work (face-to-face and remote) through its Workspace productivity suite, which has just added a new tool with the acquisition of Playspacea platform that allows videoconferencing, screen sharing and collaboration between different collaborators working on a shared virtual desktop.
Playspaces facilitates a collaborative virtual environment for work groups
From Playspace they define themselves as “a dedicated and flexible space for meetings, brainstorming, workgroup meetings and everything you need” to work in a collaborative way.
The main work environment in Playspace shows a list with the appointments or meetings pending for the current day, a list of people (contacts, collaborators, clients…) where their connectivity/availability status is indicated and finally a section of rooms, where virtual meetings are held and where a series of interactive toolsA whiteboard to share sketches, a space to type text or even the possibility that the whole group in a meeting can be listening to the same sound (a background song or an audio to work on).
There is also a tool that allows sharing the desktop view of each of the participants that allows active collaborative work. Another interesting capability of Playspace is its integration with Slackeven allowing recordings or live streaming, as well as being able to create events in Google Calendar.
Playspace began the presentation of its platform last April to a select group of teams and since then has been working on a global presentation that should happen next week, although it will now be integrated into Google Worskpace since it has been acquired by Alphabet (parent of Google Workspace).
This will make it possible to have an integrated mode some features like those currently offered (but not integrated) Google Chat, Rooms, Jamboard or Docs, although at the moment it is unknown whether it will be as a standalone tool or will be integrated into Gmail.