After its free online video publishing and sharing service drew eight million people, Pando Networks Inc. has decided to launch a commercial version with grid-computing technology, reports Internet Retailer.

The technology enables a large number of users to share computer processing power, enabling them to view the same video files downloaded from a site or streamed from a server.

This saves users from suffering content delivery problems that occur when a mass tries downloading the same thing at the same time. It also protects retailers from having to shoulder the cost of extra bandwidth.

"We’ve talked about this on a supercomputing level, and now it’s available for retailers as well as consumers," said Founder and CEO Robert Levitan. "We’re using grid computing to facilitate social networking with high-definition video."

The grid-computing system is able to support the use of online video available from websites or e-mail, blogs and social networks.

Michael Arrington on TechCrunch described Pando as easy to deploy, with extremely fast video transmissions. However, he adds that an effective DRM system will need to be implemented as Pando's distribution base widens.

The Pando software is available for free, but commercial users will be charged $5,000 per million deliveries of a 1GB video.

Levitan hastened to add, "Our goal is to eliminate 90%-95% of the cost of delivering online video."