Let’s have a look at some of the announced plugins. Here’s what the comment block looks like with plugins enabled:

PollDaddy

This plugins allows you to add a poll to your comment. By the way, PollDaddy is also an Automattic brand.

Seesmic

Seesmic enables video comments that you can record right off your webcam.

YouTube

I think this one is self-explanatory – you can easily insert youtube videos into your comments.

Smileys

Adds smiley support.

You can activate the plugins by going to the IntenseDebate dashboard and clicking the new Plugins tab.

In conclusion, here’s a nice WP hosted video that explains the new features:

• Youtube Custom RSS Search Results
• WordPress Developers – How Do You Make A Living [Poll + Discussion]?
• How To Find Out The Number Of Videos On Youtube
• Beer Planet Hosting Moved Away From Dreamhost (Thank God, Finally!)
• MySQL Indexing Considerations Of Implementing A Priority Field In Your Application