Google launched Google Sites, basically a relaunch of Jotspot but with many more features. In short, this new software allows teams to share much like you could with Microsoft’s SharePoint.

Google sites offers users five templates, as TechCrunch explains:

• Standard Wiki
• Dashboard where Google Gadgets can be embedded
• Blog-like template for announcements
• A file cabinet for file uploads
• A page for lists of items

Google Sites is free for all users, with a limited space of 10GB and limited support. Upgrading to Google Apps Premium gives you more support, storage, and administrative features. Google Sites currently doesn’t have an API yet, but that is reportedly coming soon.

The user permissions system works a lot like Google Docs, where you can assign specific user access to certain pages or sections. The wiki pages have RSS feeds. You can embed your Google Docs, spreadsheets, calendar, pictures, YouTube videos, and more into your pages.

Google posted sample screen captures over here for uses with company intranet, team projects, employee profile pages, classroom pages, and student clubs.

There is an incredible amount of buzz going on about this launch, and you can find many of the top articles on Google Sites at Techmeme.

Related Topics: Google: Docs & Spreadsheets

About The Author: Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry's personal blog is named Cartoon Barry and he can be followed on Twitter here. For more background information on Barry, see his full bio over here. See more articles by Barry Schwartz