September 2021

Magazine Features

Beyond Software: Hardware Processing for Streaming at Scale

Whether you use the cloud or a hybrid solution to encode your live or on-demand streaming content, high-efficiency hardware-based encoding has come of age. This article explores the math and science behind these at-scale solutions that are not only good for business, but also good for the environment.

Welcome to the Ad Tech Jungle

Advertising technology is scary. Here are a few solutions—for ad fill, multicast distribution, monitoring, contextual ad insertion, analytics, demand-side, and supply side—to help you make it out alive

How to Build Enhanced Sports and Esports Streaming Experiences

Even as fans return to the stands, savvy sports streamers realize that home viewers want more than just a game feed and player stats. FOX Sports, Cheesehead TV, and the Fan-Controlled Football League are pushing the envelope.

The Streaming Toolbox: Vistex GTMS, Agora, Transmit

Vistex's GTMS manages content licensing, Agora provides transport protocols and SDKs for interactive media app developers, and Transmit offers a new spin on advertising

Review: The Roland V-160HD Hybrid Event Video Switcher

While detailing every feature of this switcher is beyond the scope of the article, here are the top 10 features of the Roland V-160HD, peppered with some constructive criticism for good measure.

Editor's Note

Editor's Note: The Streaming Gold Rush of 2021

We haven't seen this much funding or merger and acquisition activity in the streaming market in at least 15 years. Don't expect it to slow down anytime soon.

Streams of Thought

Collecting 'Junk' for Better Streaming

Got junk? The Help Me Stream Research Foundation can take your tech castoffs and use them to research better streaming practices, repurposing it into efficient and inexpensive solutions that can run on intermittent power—dovetailing with the efforts of another new organization, Greening of Streaming.

The Video Doctor

The Future Is Real Time, and It Starts Now

Where and how does "real time" fit into your workflows in this "COVID and beyond" era? Similar to global wars accelerating advan­ces in medicine such as plastic surgery, COVID has pushed all of us working in streaming media to rethink, innovate, optimise, and rebuild many components of our day-to-day responsibilities. 

The Producer's View

Judging Apple's Advanced Video Quality Tool

As a metric, Apple's Advanced Video Quality Tool (AVQT) showed some bright spots, but it's hard to see it bumping VMAF or SSIMPLUS from real-world workflows without a lot more verification.

Class Act

Pandemic Mergers and Acquisitions in Educational Video

Three transactions from the last year illustrate how educational video providers are capitalizing on trends in streaming media, both specific to e-learning and more broadly