Google Chrome for Digital Signage

Google now offers its Google Chrome OS as a component in its cloud-based, content-management processing systems for video installations and has entered the digital-signage-distribution system business by offering its Google Chromebox and Chrome Management Console that allow web-content providers to house and distribute content in what the company describes as virtually unlimited systems.

Google says the Google-cloud based system features software updates, multiple security layers, virus protection and massive file storage. It also says the Chrome Management Console can handle multiple, multi-level, digital-signage systems.

www.google.com/chrome

Streetwise: The Google Chrome OS is fast, but its electronic components are comparable to other systems. Wires are wires. Most favorable is that Google is big. It offers “massive” file storage (at a cost, of course), security layers, virus protection and an ability to handle multiple-level digital-signage systems. Standard cautions with any such system deal with rights of ownership of stored content, especially if the content owner defaults (it happens). And, what if the storage-provider defaults or experiences system failures (what becomes of your content if the storage provider bankrupts, and how much time to would have to deal with the problem?). You should also explore possible hacking and content theft and misuse; segmented costs; and cloud-storage rate hikes as time goes by.

Remember, once any cloud service holds your content, you are at its mercy, so be sure your contracts allow escape and rescue clauses.