Live streaming video and broadcasting has been gaining traction as online video and technology have evolved, and today the biggest player in the industry made the latest push in this growing trend.  Google is beginning to roll out YouTube Live, which integrates the ability to product live streams into the site’s core system.

“YouTube’s move into live streaming took a big step forward today with the initial rollout of YouTube Live, which will integrate the tools for producing and discovering live feeds into the site’s core system for the first time.”

Approved YouTube partners have gained access to the new tools, and YouTube hopes thousands of its partners will eventually utilize the system.  Earlier this week Google released yet another YouTube update, and the company is willing to invest a lot to give the YouTube homepage a serious facelift.

A number of arts and sports channels, as well as twenty (or even more) channels dedicated to professional programming, produced exclusively for YouTube, will be featured on the revamped homepage. And as we’ve learned, Google is willing to invest nothing sort of $100 million in these channels, which comes to show just how serious YouTube is to raise the bar when it comes to quality video on the site.

When it comes to video streaming, quality is one of the hottest trends right now. The best quality possible, however, is not a preference suiting all users equally – which is why Netflix recently added several manual control options to the quality of Netflix video streams for Canadian customers.

Online video streaming has transformed to a very large industry throughout the past few years. So much so in fact Dish has acquired Blockbuster, including all of its 1,700 remaining stores for a winning bid of $320 million. However, Dish is only interested in Blockbuster’s online video streaming service, disc-by-mail rentals and rental kiosks that will be integrated with the cable company’s existing offerings.