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Challenges of New Encoding Scenarios: Reflections on Measuring Perceived Quality

While VMAF has been a valuable tool for assessing video quality, its limitations highlight the need for complementary metrics or the development of new assessment methods. These new metrics should address VMAF's shortcomings, especially in the context of modern video encoding scenarios that incorporate AI and other advanced techniques. For the best outcomes, a combination of VMAF and other metrics, both full-reference and no-reference, might be necessary to achieve a comprehensive and accurate assessment of video quality in various applications.

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What Drives Up Cloud Streaming Costs?

What are the predictable and unpredictable factors that drive up the cost of cloud streaming workflows as complications arise and projects scale? AWS' John Barber, IMAX's Abdul Rehman, Zixi's Eric Bolten, and SVTA's Jason Thibeault offer practical tips for keeping cloud costs in check in this clip from Streaming Media Connect 2024.

What Is Contextual Advertising and How Is it Changing TV?

"Contextual advertising is a really hot topic in TV advertising right now," declared TVREV's Alan Wolk at Streaming Media Connect 2024. But what exactly is it, and how is its growing presence in CTV and streaming changing the TV experience and particularly the way advertisers buy media? Wolk, Estrella MediaCo's Christina Chung, and Mad Leo Consulting's C.J. Leonard explore these issues in this clip from their panel at Streaming Media Connect.

Streaming’s Great Rebundling and the Fight Against Churn

Preventing subscriber churn is the oldest problem in the streaming subscription business, and bundling is hardly a new solution, as analyst Paul Erickson points out in this clip from Streaming Media Connect 2024. So with a purported "Great Rebundling" upon us—and with tiered offerings, hybrid ad models, and other revenue-generating approaches increasingly holding sway—how do contemporary bundling/rebundling strategies differ from old ones and offer greater avenues to success? Ampere Analysis' Guy Bisson, Hub's Jon Giegengack, and Antenna's Rameez Tase offer their takes on current bundling and aggregation strategies and which ones are working in 2024.

How Can Publishers and Advertisers Monetise Roku’s Platform?

Head of Roku Exchange Charlie Goodman and Future Today Marketplace VP Tim Ware discuss the opportunities and the challenges of monetizing the Roku Channel and Exchange for programmers, distributors, and advertisers alike in this clip from their panel at Streaming Media Connect 2024.

Streaming Media Columns

Talking Localisation

Today, localisation remains a critical budgetary line item for content owners delivering shows to diverse and transnational audiences, and it is probably one whose typical costs have not, until recently, changed considerably in quite some time. The increasingly prevalent use of AI in content localisation, subtitling, and translation promises to change all of that—particularly through the controversial and ethically fraught use of imitative synthetic voices.

Post-Peak Performance in the M&E Universe

The recent Subscription Wars report commissioned by U.K.-based digital payments tech company Bango points to consumer dissatisfaction with the fractured state of subscription services in general and the increasing appeal of indirect subscription options and super-bundles of aggregated services sold through telcos like Optus in Australia. Perhaps it's another sign of less-than-inspiring times that the best thing consumers say streaming services can do for them is to stop standing out from the crowd and start disappearing into it.

Is 2024 the Year of WebRTC?

With large sports-streaming operators, WebRTC provides a real opportunity for ultra-low-latency streaming. But those same operators, which spend billions on licensing rights, can't afford to just swap the ability to stream content in real time for basic OTT functionality like SSAI and DRM.

Everything in Streaming Has Its Price

This column isn't meant to be a downer, especially because the overall economy seems to be plugging along. But it is meant to ask those of you in the industry to share anecdotes and stories about the pain points you're facing. We know that everything in streaming has its price, but you are in a better position to help us fully understand what that price entails.

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