Google Slides vs SlideShare

2020. Scribd acquires presentation-sharing service SlideShare from LinkedIn



SlideShare has changed ownership, as LinkedIn has sold the presentation-sharing service to Scribd for an undisclosed amount. Both platforms have had somewhat similar missions, but SlideShare has primarily focused on PowerPoint presentations and business users, while Scribd has emphasized PDFs, Word documents, and long-form written content for the general consumer. Despite the transfer of ownership, SlideShare will continue to operate as an independent service, distinct from Scribd, while maintaining its strong integration with LinkedIn. LinkedIn acquired SlideShare in May 2012, recognizing the increasing trend of professionals utilizing LinkedIn for purposes beyond professional networking.


2018. Google Slides gets real-time automated captions



Google is introducing an exciting new addition to its Slides presentation tool, allowing users to activate real-time automated captions during their live presentations. This feature proves to be immensely valuable for individuals who are hard of hearing or deaf, as well as for those who prefer reading over listening. The capability is currently being rolled out to all Slides users who have set their default language to U.S. English and utilize the Chrome browser. Google has plans to expand this feature to support additional languages in the future. To activate the feature, users can simply click on the new "CC" button in the Slides navigation box and continue using their computer's microphone as usual.


2016. Google Slides adds Q&A feature to help presenters connect with their audiences


Google has introduced a new functionality for its presentation service Slides, enabling presenters to receive questions and feedback from their audience. Additionally, audience members can vote for their preferred questions. Presenters can initiate a Q&A session by clicking a button in the Slides presenter view. On mobile devices, this feature will be accessible through the "audience tools" button. Subsequently, a link to the customized Q&A for the specific presentation will appear above the slides. This feature enhances the efficiency of post-presentation Q&A sessions, particularly at events where it can be assumed that the audience has smartphones or laptops at their disposal. This is especially valuable for individuals who prefer not to approach a microphone and ask questions in front of a large audience (as those who do might be excessively enthusiastic about being in the spotlight).


2015. Google Slides now allows to present from Android phones


Google Slides, Google's equivalent to PowerPoint, has introduced a new feature that enables users to deliver presentations from any Android phone or tablet directly to a Hangouts video call. With the Slides app, all you have to do is click on the present button, and if the meeting is scheduled on your calendar, you can commence your presentation immediately. Throughout your presentation, you can utilize your phone or tablet to navigate through slides, access your speaker notes, and keep track of time using the app's built-in timer (as no one wants a presentation that goes overtime). Google emphasizes that even while presenting, you can still see the participants of the video call.


2014. SlideShare gets iOS app



LinkedIn has introduced the first-ever iOS app for SlideShare, the platform dedicated to presentations and content sharing. The app presents a modern and streamlined layout, enabling users to effortlessly browse and search through the extensive collection of presentations available on SlideShare. Furthermore, it enhances the social experience by allowing users to like and share the presentations they encounter, as well as follow their preferred categories. The app includes user profiles where individuals can access their liked, uploaded, and saved presentations. Additionally, users can view presentations shared by their friends and professional network, creating a more direct integration of LinkedIn's social graph into SlideShare. This integration provides users with insights into the popular presentations within their own group.


2014. SlideShare makes Pro features Free



The presentation publishing service SlideShare, which is owned by LinkedIn, has made a significant change by transitioning to a free model. The PRO accounts have been eliminated, and all additional features that were previously available for a fee are now accessible to all users at no cost. One of the most popular paid features was analytics, providing insights on who viewed presentations (including location), how they discovered the content, which websites referred traffic, and other engagement metrics—similar to the profile viewing analytics on LinkedIn's main site. Other paid features included profile customization, the option to set presentations as private for specific users only, and video uploads. This shift in strategy aims to increase active visitors and uploads on the platform while enabling LinkedIn to gather more data on how business professionals utilize its cloud-based services.


2012. LinkedIn acquired Youtube for presentations - SlideShare



LinkedIn, the leading professional social network, continues to thrive. In the past two quarters, LinkedIn has achieved impressive growth, with its income doubling to a staggering $188 million per quarter. This outstanding performance has propelled the company's valuation to a remarkable $10 billion. As a result, LinkedIn has the financial means to acquire new users on a large scale, as demonstrated by its recent purchase of the online service SlideShare for $119 million. SlideShare functions similarly to YouTube, but focuses on presentations instead of videos. Its primary target audience consists of business users, aligning well with LinkedIn's user base. SlideShare allows you to upload PowerPoint presentations and share them anywhere using an embeddable web viewer, much like a YouTube video. In addition to being a platform for sharing presentations, SlideShare itself serves as an additional marketing channel with a substantial audience. By publishing presentations on SlideShare, you can attract new customers and partners. Although the specific integration plans between LinkedIn and SlideShare are not yet clear, LinkedIn has already embedded a LinkedIn presentation on the SlideShare homepage, indicating potential collaboration between the two platforms in the future.


2011. Google Presentations adds real-time collaboration



Google continues to compete with Zoho and SlideRocket for being the online presentations champion. Today Google rolled out completely new Google Presentations editor. It adds more than 60 new features, but the main one - is the ability to collaborate on a presentation in real-time. Everything is very similar to collaborative tools in Google Docs and Google Spreadsheets that appeared last year: in the right pane you can see who is currently working on the presentation, chat with them. And in the presentation view, you can see what objects the collaborators are currently editing (these object are highlighted with the corresponding colors). And with the help of Google+ Hangouts you can even video chat with colleagues while co-creating the presentation. ***


2011. Online presentations go HTML5: SlideShare and Zoho Show


It seems that the days of Flash as a platform for the Rich web interfaces are really coming to an end. Online presentation services, for which the Rich-interface is most important, are ditching Flash in favour of HTML5. Last year, the market leader, SlideRocket released the HTML5-viewer and today the most popular presentation sharing service SlideShare has done the same. Moreover, SlideShare not just added the HTML5-view option but completely removed the Flash-option. Developers say the new HTML5-viewer is 30% faster and displays presentation on tablets (like iPad) and smartphones. In addition, you can now select and copy text from a presentation with the help of the mouse. ***


2009. SlideShare Now Lets You Fuse YouTube Into Your Presentations

SlideShare has introduced a highly requested feature that allows users to embed YouTube videos into their Flash-based presentations, offering a multitude of potential applications. This addition enables users to include personal introductions, relevant supporting videos, or demonstrations of website features for startup pitches. Previously, users had to include separate links to video files, which undermined the simplicity of sharing PowerPoint presentations. While the feature works well, there are a couple of limitations: videos cannot autoplay (although CEO Rashmi Sinha promises this will be available soon), and clicking outside the play arrow redirects to the YouTube address. Nonetheless, this enhancement greatly enhances the product. It's worth mentioning that SlideShare has supported embedded audio in slideshows since 2007, and they recently launched an impressive cloud-based feature that integrates the native PowerPoint client with SlideShare accounts. Competitors in this space include SlideRocket, DocStoc, Scribd, SlideSix, and SlideBoom.