Interviews with Digital Media Thought Leaders
Distributing Video to All Three Screens (Part 2 of 2)
Podcast Video | Posted by Phil Leigh on February 26, 2008
If you would like to learn about software that automates the process of preparing professional video programming for distribution to various platforms including Television, Internet, and Wireless Devices, this interview is for you. (Part 2 of 2)
Subject: Our guest today is Russell Zack who is the Vice President of Product Management at Anystream. His company sells enterprise software that automates the process of capturing and transforming audio and video for distribution across all multi-platform providers. Among them are (1) Conventional Television, (2) Video-on-Demand, (3) Internet, and (4) Wireless Devices. In Part 2 of the interview I question Russell about the PowerPoint presentation he made in Part 1. I was especially interested to know how Anystream stacks-up against its competitors and learned that they have over 700 customers. Examples include Disney, BBC, Time-Warner Cable, ESPN, and Fox Sports, among others.
Additionally, I wanted Russell to clarify the difference between their “Production” and “Management” functionalities. The first is essentially transcoding for multiple platforms and formats. Their software can do this in real time, which is important for live events. The second is metadata reporting and customization for targeted users and outlets. An example would be the enforcement of contract rights to the content to the applicable users and outlets.
Phil’s Take: It’s as certain as tomorrow’s sunrise that traditional producers of video programming will seek to get their content distributed in an increasing number of channels and devices. Software that automates the process is ultimately going to be an integral part of the activity.
The devil will be in the details and the vendor-of-choice will be the one that slays all the demons by empowering the customer to focus on producing the video. They’ll want software that manages transcoding and distribution with a minimum of incremental technical intervention. In short, I don’t know whether it will be Anystream, thePlatform, Harmonic, or somebody else that ultimately comes out on top, but it’s an important market with a pot of gold in it for somebody.
Categories: Podcast Video
Tags: digital media, Internet Media, Internet video, Mobile Video, Portable Video, television, Television Networks, Third Screen, TV
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