In a move that industry experts say could bring Skype (News - Alert) more users and money, the video communications service announced today that callers will soon be able to share video clips with each other.

 

With the new so-called “Jaman channel,” named for a California-based Internet movie service, Skype customers will be able to embed thousands of high-quality independent and international film scenes and trailers into their online conversations, the companies said.

 

According to Faisal Galaria, San Mateo-based Jaman’s general manager and vice president of corporate development, sharing movies with friends and relatives is one natural segue to the conversations that Skype’s service offers.

 

“Through Skype, Jaman will connect people around the world over the Internet, making it even easier for people to discover and enjoy film,” Galaria said.

 

The move marks a direction that TMCnet President Rich Tehrani has long believed to be a key to Skype’s future success. In his blog today, Tehrani says that video-sharing services will help Skype evolve into a “media sharing social network” – the kind of Web network that’s helped Facebook’s (News - Alert) value approach $100 billion, by some estimates.

 

The Jaman service will be available in the coming months, the company said.

 

Here’s how it will work.

 

Jaman movie clips will be played directly within the Skype client, so users may add a video to their mood and share favorite movie trailers from Jaman with their contacts. While in a chat, Skype users will just click on the “Insert Video” button, then select videos to share in conversations.

 

That kind of technology isn’t the exclusive offering of Skype.

 

TokBox, a free Web-based video communications service, announced this month that users may now talk one-on-one or in larger chat rooms while sharing YouTube (News - Alert) videos. The company’s chief executive officer, Nick Triantos told TMCnet that new upgrades to TokBox are designed to allow users to store more videos and to integrate the service with popular Internet destinations and uses such as Yahoo Instant Messenger, Google (News - Alert) Talk, Facebook and MySpace.

 

In the new Skype feature, viewers will be able to browse and select movies from Jaman’s library, whose genres include comedies and dramas, Kung Fu action movies, cult classics, Bollywood films, art house favorites, documentaries and award-winning shorts, according to the company.