Three functions to ensure a successful live broadcast

Three functions to ensure a successful live broadcast
"The only thing that is constant is change." In a world shaped by the Covid-19 pandemic over the last 18 months, this quote from the Greek philosopher Heraclitus has never been more true. Shaped by lockdowns and social distancing, the world in which we live, learn, and work has irrevocably changed, with technology becoming an essential tool for collaboration, engagement, and the way we consume content. About the Author Gordon Brooks is Executive Chairman and CEO of Zixi. Regarding the latter, for example, according to Nielsen, the most popular activity for housewives was listening to music on an AM/FM radio station or streaming services, with 40% listening daily. This was closely followed by watching TV or streaming content during a break at work, with 33% of them watching it every day. This increase in content streaming, especially live streaming, is not a behavior that is likely to change in the foreseeable future, and it is important for the media and entertainment industry to adapt and adopt new technologies in order to thrive. With that in mind, we've identified three key features for streaming infrastructure to support agile and efficient media workflows. These are:

Let's review in turn.

1. Inherent agility

Modern broadcast workflows need to be able to react quickly to changing market dynamics, as well as take advantage of new opportunities as they arise. To do this, they must be cloud-based. Software-defined and virtualized workflows offer a level of responsiveness that cannot be replicated in any other way. For this reason, we are seeing more and more large-scale media companies increasingly turning to cloud-based end-to-end workflows. The cloud provides five main benefits: improved flexibility, cost savings, increased reliability, faster time to market, and the ability to support a virtualized and remote workforce (later to become a key component of the post-pandemic economy). Each of them is a compelling reason to move to the cloud on their own; Add them up, and it's easy to see why only 35% of future infrastructure developments in a 2020 survey were for hardware-defined infrastructure. 65% envisioned software-defined infrastructure, and given the ability of the pandemic to speed up everything in this area, we'd be surprised if that number wasn't already higher.

2. Universal interoperability

Any IP, any protocol, any infrastructure; The new, more efficient streaming workflows will be IP-based and portable. The shift to IP workflows in the media industry is a generational shift driven by many different factors, from changes in display options to adoption of hybrid network workflows, higher bit rates, better opportunities monetization etc It's also made possible by the increased reliability, adoption, and democratization of managed and unmanaged IP networks beyond traditional transport methods. Managed and unmanaged IP networks are defined as including Internet, leased fiber, cellular, including 5G, and satellite IP. When done correctly, public IP offers greater resiliency, higher reliability, lower latency, higher quality, and significantly more flexibility than traditional methods. If you look around the industry, that's where the momentum lies. Other transport methods have played and continue to play an important role in the general development of IP-based workflows, but they are essentially becoming evolutionary dead ends for new global multimedia workflows that are coming to an end. of its usefulness. path. to connectivity. It is also important to recognize the critical importance of 5G in this area. 5G will generate €1.3 trillion in revenue in the media and entertainment space by 2028, completely reshaping the media landscape and ensuring that if companies do not support it, they risk failure or even extinction. The cloud is also essential for the successful implementation of 5G, as are the other four 5Cs, namely content, carrier, cellular, and consumer. For example, we spent the last year working on a deployment with a major broadcaster to broadcast over Verizon 5G networks using AWS Wavelength Zone technology to enable delivery of 4K UHD broadcasts to business targets with ultra-low latency without the need for satellites. . . The result is a defined architecture that includes local devices (5G routers) in all segments.

3. Data-driven capabilities

Finally, it is important to consider the role of data analytics in ensuring QoE and more. There are quite a few complications here. Data overload can lead to too many false alarms, leaving organizations unsure of what is important and what is not, while a reactive rather than predictive approach can be costly and stressful. What is needed is better RCA (Root Cause Analysis) to quickly understand the causes of instability and failure, get ahead of them, and prevent them from happening in the first place. The increasing use of artificial intelligence and machine learning is having a big impact here, and the right application reduces noise and costs, improves RCA accuracy, improves operational efficiency, and enables predictive approach and proactive transmission issues, allowing users to receive alerts about problems. before they happen.

Conclusion

The drive behind the stream is undeniable. However, there are some pitfalls for the unwary in a rapidly changing field, and there is a chance that solution implementations may be too restrictive to ensure adequate ROI, especially as we look to future developments. However, by ensuring that they engage with partners who provide services with inherent agility, the universal interoperability necessary to accommodate public and private IP networks, hybrid IP and 5G, and data-driven capabilities to ensure reliability and QoE, broadcasters and others Media companies can be confident that their streaming offerings will meet and exceed consumer demand for streaming content, now and in the future.

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