The Streaming Media Guide

How to Successfully Integrate Streaming Media Into Your Communications Strategy

Michael D'Oliveiro

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9780429770890
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Negocios y empresa
• Subtopic: Industria de medios y comunicaciones

Streaming media has irreversibly revolutionised the ways in which media is transmitted and consumed. Most of us engage with streaming media on a daily basis via platforms that deliver our entertainment: Spotify, YouTube and Netflix are new brands which many of us engage with daily for our information and entertainment. It has created upheaval in the entire value chain and wiped out industries slow to adapt to it (like the video store rental chain). And it continues to evolve. Streaming media is transforming business communications in myriad ways, and it is becoming almost as crucial for project managers and marketers to understand streaming technology as it is for media professionals.

The Streaming Media Guide demystifies the technology and features behind a successful streaming media service, especially in the context of how it is used by broadcasters and other media organisations. Common terms and systems being used in this space are presented and defined simply and clearly for non-technical readers. Best practice examples from Michael D'Oliveiro's experiences demonstrate how this technology can be successfully implemented.

This book equips any media professional with the most basic of traditional media knowledge to enable confident conversations in the typical media organisation they work in. For technology-based graduates or dedicated broadcast professional seeking to refresh their understanding, this book provides enough information to form a solid foundation for day-to-day work. Finally, for leaders in cross-functional senior management matrices, information is provided to enable you to understand and exploit streaming media capabilities as a business. This will be the ultimate reference source, guaranteed to be bedside reading for anyone serious about using streaming media.

Streaming media today

Audio-visual media has come a long way since its analogue beginnings and where it stands today is exciting for everyone. There’s been more innovation in the past 20 years than in the 100 years before it, as you’ll get to understand as you read the following chapters in this book. But before we get any further, we should get the basic terms out of the way.

Getting definitions right

It’s common to hear people mentioning the terms digital media and streaming media interchangeably. That’s understandable but not quite correct. Digital media can be thought of as anything that has its information represented as binary information. Ones and zeros that are grouped in bits and then bytes. The classic example is the DVD. It may come in a physical form but its information is certainly digital, which is why it’s able to store so much information and also why it can offer interactivity via a menu and other selectable features. You can’t do that with vinyl records or cassettes.

But with the power of the internet, streaming media offers no physical form to look at, aside from the device you hold in your hands. You don’t even need to download a file if you don’t want to (but that is an option, as you’ll read about later). You can watch something, then pause it and you’ll never need to worry about picking up where you last left off. You could pick another device you own and just continue watching from the same point. It’s incredibly user-friendly in so many ways and full of possibilities beyond just entertainment.

So there you have it. The difference between digital and streaming.

Just to confuse you, the broadcast industry has a more prevalent term of their own: OTT video. OTT stands for ‘over-the-top’ and refers to the ability of companies like Netflix or YouTube to stream their content to you using an internet connection that is provided by a different company. This is normally an internet service provider (ISP) or telecommunications company (telco). The term OTT itself can be applied to other services like WhatsApp which, again, provides a service over the internet connection provided by your ISP or telco. There is a connotation here that the OTT company is piggy-backing on the efforts of someone else in a way that also threatens the latter’s business model by cannibalising it. WhatsApp threatens telcos’ text messaging services since it’s free but uses the internet service they provide. So, while OTT perfectly describes what Netflix does, I have simply not decided to use that term in this book. Not out of reasons of being neutral but for professional consistency. Similarly, the direct term ‘online video’ is also used by many industry organisations and there is nothing wrong with it either. Since this book is for professionals, I’ve decided that ‘streaming’ is a more appropriate word to describe this medium.

So streaming media it is. But how did we get to this stage of being able to watch an epic movie in the palm of our hand?

Streaming media today: the basics

A lot of the consumer habits today have similarities to how people have traditionally consumed media back when it was either available in the cinema, on radio, on TV or on video as a DVD. But we don’t have to go so far back since the biggest and clearest milestone of that evolution was the public growth of the internet. Thus, I would be inclined to mark this milestone by observing the period right before, during and after it. In effect, we can classify these periods as such:

1. Media before the Internet Boom (1960–2000)
2. Media during and after the Internet Boom (2001–2015)
3. Media Renaissance (2015 to the present day)

Media before the Internet Boom (1990–2000)

Right up to the early 1990s, the creation of mass media like Hollywood movies (as an example) were set in the established process as seen in Figure 1.1. Basically, each part of the value chain was owned by specific entities that specialised in the role they played. Content owners (the Hollywood studios) occupied the role of content creator. They were able to enjoy releasing their movies in three different ‘release windows’ that did not overlap, and provide consumers with the ability to choose the viewing window of their choice. There were actually more windows (take TV, which would allow Pay TV to get a movie before Free TV did), but this was more or less the way the industry operated worldwide.

Figure 1.1 Circa 1960–2000: this is a typical production and distribution model for a studio-produced movie that incorporates the three main distribution windows targeted at public audiences

Release windows are crucial to Hollywood studios since they offer multiple monetisation opportunities for their movies. Consumers could watch a movie and then catch it on Pay TV and then buy the DVD loaded with bonus features. They could buy the original soundtrack separately to just listen to the music. As part of this ecosystem, the print media played their role in terms of coverage via news or reviews of a movie as it appeared from window to window. If you take into account the other ancillary revenue that Hollywood generates in terms of sub-licensing and merchandising of content you’ll understand just how lucrative the industry was, and still is, for Hollywood. This pattern obviously then extends to other countries and their own industries (like Bollywood).

The television industry was likewise entrenched in its own distribution structure. There was primetime television when news and series attracted the most viewers, who had to put up with commercial breaks as a result. Television was essentially viewing by appointment. If successful, a series would extend its viewability on the small screen through syndication. The final step was the DVD box set.

Music followed similar distribution structures, albeit a little flatter. Radio helped promote sales of released singles but both ran in parallel. Singles led to albums and that was the extent of the release window. The only musical event that an artiste could exploit were concert tours and then the cycle would repeat itself.

The consumer had little control in how or where they wanted to view content. Daily schedules revolved around cinema showtimes or the TV guide or the Top 40 countdown. If there was frustration, nothing could be done so acceptance became the norm and, indeed, general behaviour. Once you bought a particular item of media you could do what you wanted.

Media during and after the Internet Boom (2001–2015)

With the rise of the internet, new and innovative players began to exploit it as a distribution medium and allow media to be streamed or downloaded over the internet, direct to the consumer. Apple was one such company when it launched the iTunes service in 2003. The service initially targeted music lovers and allowed them to buy only one song or an entire album and store it on an iPod. With playback also allowed on desktop computers and laptops, it transformed the way people bought and kept songs. Apple’s tagline of ‘10,000 songs in your pocket’ proved irresistible for a new generation of internet-savvy commuters. You could create your own playlist and get ready for your start of the day, joining the masses in urban cities wearing those ubiquitous white earphones. When movies, TV shows and podcasts followed suit in 2005, the snowball had become an avalanche. Apple’s involvement was revolutionary to industry because the company itself now became an e-commerce player, threatening retailers who would forever be saddled with inventory management.

Figure 1.2 visualises this early disruption that Apple set in the market. The significance here is that e-commerce was not a separate window that would come in after the retail window started. It itself was part of that.

Figure 1.2 1999–2015: the new, disruptive distribution model for a studio-produced movie provided more viewing choices for the general public but also introduced greater competition at the retail level. The shaded boxes show these newer entrants

Apple’s entrance as a digital distributor of media was ominous for the established retailers and rental providers since it provided convenience and easy availability. No one had to worry about stocks running out. You could buy your movie at any time of the day and watch it immediately. All you needed was a credit card or an iTunes voucher. It was the iPhone, Spotify and Netflix that made the greatest impact on streaming media from 2007 onwards.

By the end of 2007, social media had also started to make an impact on the media eco-system, paving the way for start-ups and these platforms to scale up around the globe and become more advanced.

The Media Renaissance (2015 to the present day)

The Media Renaissance is how I’d describe our present state. It shouldn’t be compared literally with the original Renaissance in history, which can be defined as a ‘re-birth’ of the arts in Europe inspired by the classics of Ancient Greece and Rome. The comparison between that period and today is really about the social and cultural changes that have been seen as streaming media continues to mature and flourish around the globe. When Apple introduced the iPhone, it did not just shake up the mobile phone manufacturing industry, it demonstrated the beginnings of how media consumption could really be ‘anywhere’. With a 3G data-enabled subscriber identity module (SIM) card, you could buy the iPhone from your mobile service provider of choice and take the internet with you at all times. You never had to go online again; you were always online! Mobile operators fuelled growth by launching services and ‘zero-rated’ data for video viewing (that’s industry jargon for not charging data consumption for video to your data quota on your mobile phone bill). Events like the 2010 FIFA World Cup were used to launch such services and drive consumers to early adoption.

While Apple drove media consumption ‘anywhere’, the business model for monetising this was difficult. Apple’s early benefit to consumers only allowed transactional purchases and this still made little sense if consumers had budget constraints. It was also a download-to-own (DTO) model.

Netflix, launched in 1998, pioneered online DVD mailing and followed up this success with a subscription model that allowed unlimited rentals of DVDs each month. The ‘no-contract, no-commitment subscription plan’ provided great incentives for consumers to try out this service. Netflix fought a drawn-out battle with Blockbuster for over a decade that ultimately ended in the latter’s demise as a business and proved industry pundits’ view of the disruptive influence that the internet had over the traditional rental model. Also, Netflix’s declaration that subscription services would replace rentals and overdue fees catered to consumer sentiments. As if its DVD rentals were not enough, in 2007 Netflix also launched a streaming service, convinced that this was a far better user experience than physical DVDs. The clear advantage of streaming was that no one had to worry about saving space on a device due to heavy video files. In contrast, Netflix was able to use analytics features from consumer usage to optimise how the site would be navigated and how titles could be recommended on a personalised level.

On the music front, it was Spotify that created another innovation by launching a ‘freemium’ model for its streaming service. You could try the limited service and put up with occasional advertisements, or you could pay a monthly subscription fee and get access to all songs, at higher streaming quality.¹

Breaking away from industry norms was potentially a financial drag (as of 2017 Spotify is still unprofitable despite annual revenue of EU5.26 billion), but it gave consumers what they wanted: flexibility.

More powerfully, the final step in Figure 1.3 now shows that the ease in creating a medium of distribution has shifted the industry to a more open and accessible playing field. Today, you don’t have to be a broadcaster to actually broadcast to people. Anyone can be a broadcaster in the streaming media world.

Figure 1.3 2015–present day: the Media Renaissance built entirely new industries for a studio-produced movie to be introduced to the general public, including the rise of pure-play streaming businesses. These also produce their own content. By 2016, Netflix was already streaming to global markets but regional players were starting to compete against it. Industries have also disappeared, particularly the bricks-and-mortar rental chains

New uses of streaming media today

Pure-play internet broadcasters

As I mentioned in the Introduction, almost anyone can set up a service and find an audience online to stream to. Success depends really on what you want to do and if there’s demand for it. And there’s no shortage of pioneers in this area.

The record for ‘first ever’ goes to a public access programme entitled Rox, in April 1995, with an episode called ‘Global Village Idiots’. Later that same year, the first fictional series entitled The Spot was also released on the internet, supported by advertising this time.

Noted entrepreneur Mark Cuban set out on a visionary path in 1994, when he invested in a company that eventually became broadcast.com. The fledgling company eventually streamed a number of sporting events live in the US as well as other notable public events (including the first Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show). At the time of its purchase by Yahoo for $5.7 billion in stock in 1999, it reputedly had 570,000 users.

ESPNet.SportsZone.com launched in 1995 (as the precursor to ESPN.com) and eventually too...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of illustrations
• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations
• Foreword
• Introduction
• 1. Streaming media today
• 2. Streaming media technology today
• 3. Protecting your streaming media
• 4. Distributing your streaming media
• 5. User experience
• 6. Identity access management
• 7. Commercialising your service
• 8. Live streaming media
• Bibliography
• Index