NPAW's Bruno Giner and ESHAP's Evan Shapiro Talk Better Data for Better Business Outcomes at Streaming Media Connect 2025

Streaming Media Connect 2025's featured a fascinating Keynote Fireside Chat featuring NPAW VP Sales Global | DXI Bruno Giner and Media Universe Cartographer Evan Shapiro. The discussion focused on the importance of data in the streaming industry and NPAW's strategic approach to it, emphasizing the need for democratization and unification of data across departments to improve business outcomes.

ICYMI: Streaming Media Connect February 2025

Streaming Media presented its 16th Connect virtual conference February 25-27, featuring speakers from YouTube, Meta, Amazon, Roku, Akamai, NPAWm Google Cloud, Plex, DAZN, Fremantle, A+E, Vevo, Philo, Tubi, The Trade Desk, Sinclair, Vizio, Revry, and more, and session topics ranging from live streaming delivery and FAST infrastructure and monetisation to app and UX to programmatic vs. direct advertising to CTV and the OS wars.

European telcos cry foul over OTT traffic—again

Telcos have been crying that they are being treated unfairly by Big Tech for at least a decade and the record seems to have stuck. MWC in Barcelona provided another chance for European operators to vent their frustration and this time they are armed with the provisional backing of the European Union.

Trump trade war rewires the geo-political importance of Big Tech

Sweeping tariffs imposed by the US on China, Canada, Mexico and potentially the European Union represent a potential rewiring of the global trade order with technologies like AI at the center of the power struggle.

Netflix revenues to overtake YouTube while Barb announce landmark YouTube measurement

Underlining YouTube's own declaration that "YouTube is the new television," UK TV measurement body Barb is to become the world's first to report YouTube viewing on TV set.

Challenges and Opportunities in the CTV Ecosystem: Evan Shapiro in Conversation With Matthew Henick of The Trade Desk

Kicking off the latest Streaming Media Connect, media universe cartographer Evan Shapiro sat down for an in-depth discussion about the challenges and opportunities of the CTV ecosystem with Matthew Henick of The Trade Desk. They discussed the importance of fairness, transparency, and user-centric strategies in the ad-supported streaming landscape, and they highlighted the need for better ad personalization, efficient ad inventory management, and the alignment of incentives to enhance the overall user experience and support premium content creation.

Sustainability Slips Down Industry’s Agenda Says Bitmovin Video Developer Report

The latest Video Developer Report compiled by Bitmovin shows sustainability slipping down the list of priorities, a casualty of the search for short term profit. The report made clear the industry's top priority is monetizing content more effectively with ad tech, which can be attributed to the huge spike in AVOD and FAST business models.

Meta's David Ronca Talks Benchmarking and Deploying AV1 in the Android Ecosystem

The arc of AV1 codec adoption at large-scale content owners has been long and complex, as Meta Senior Media Software Engineer David Ronca (who also spent 12 years developing encoding solutions at Netflix) knows as well as anyone. In this interview with Jan Ozer of Streaming Media and Streaming Learning Center, Ronca discusses the integration of AV1 into the Android ecosystem, focusing on the challenges and solutions for mobile devices. 

One quarter of video subscriptions will be managed by telcos in 2028

As subscription fatigue appears to be taking hold globally, content providers are turning to telcos as a key intermediary between themselves and the consumer in aggregating subscription services into Super Bundles. The global value of the subscription economy is U$331 billion, per Juniper Research, rising to US $996bn by 2028 of which a quarter will be delivered by telcos according to Omdia.

When should you licence a third-party commercial codec?

For some streamers, open-source solutions meet all their needs. For others, commercial codecs deliver efficiency and optimisations that justify the cost. This article explores the factors that influence those decisions.

Roku Data Cloud Arrives—Is Data (Finally) Becoming More Transparent?

Roku is betting on their Data Cloud to provide better, more targeted advertising for media, agencies, and brand customers and more valuable advertising budgets to Roku. In this interview with Roku's Miles Fisher, we discuss why Roku created the Data Cloud and what it will provide in terms of measurement and data.

Sneak Preview: OS Wars - The New CTV Playing Field

On Thursday, February 27, Mark Loughney, Senior Consultant, Hub Entertainment Research, will moderate the Streaming Media Connect panel "OS Wars: The New CTV Playing Field." From live linear to FAST, AVOD, and all flavors of free streaming, how are the OEM and OS wars transforming the way TV is distributed and monetised? As the global battle for TV interface dominance persists, and powerhouse OEMs increasingly assert their role as content gatekeeper, are we moving toward a closed society when it comes to CTV? Confirmed panelists include experts from Revry, Hartbeat, Shout! Factory, and Whale TV.

Sneak Preview: FAST Forward - How FAST Platform and Infrastructure Providers Can Better Serve the Market

On Thursday, February 27, leading industry consultant Brian Ring will moderate the Streaming Media Connect panel "FAST Forward: How FAST Platform and Infrastructure Providers Can Better Serve the Market." As with any other type of streaming delivery, FAST needs to "just work" to support publishers' monetization goals, but that's nowhere as simple as it sounds. This panel examines essential infrastructure challenges and key emerging strategies for better FAST delivery. Join us to learn about manifest manipulation vs. encoded playout; optimizing and maximizing "Be Right Back" slots as in-house inventory; using GenAI to program the channel; solving the context/genre madness with LLMs and captions; advanced graphics for background, tune-in, and monetization; QR code execution, a must-have skillset; and how to execute picture-in-picture content programming. Confirmed panelists include experts from A+E, Plex, Revry, and Freemantle.

ISE2025: Use GenAI to unlock ‘unknown unknowns’ to innovate not iterate

AI was the buzzword at professional AV show ISE 2025. Microsoft talked about the AI-powered Workplace, AI postproduction tools were said to be "transforming the industry" and UK firm Synthesia claimed it was building the world's first enterprise AI video platform.

H.267: A Codec for (One Possible) Future

H.267 should be finalized between July and October 2028. If history holds, this means H.267 won't see meaningful deployment until 2034-2036, long after I hang up my keyboard. Here's a brief description of what the standard is designed to deliver and my free and totally unsolicited advice to the committees and technology developers that will create it.

ISE 2025: Broadcast AV fuels Pro AV bonanza

Unveiling fresh data industry data at the ISE show in Barcelona this week, co-organizer AVIXA pointed to the rise of ‘Broadcast AV' and the related boom of the ‘experience economy' as some of the most significant factors impacting this burgeoning side of the business.

Broadcast news splinters and paywalls in last ditch bid to save “high quality, fair-minded, trustworthy sources”

Cost-cutting combined with transition to streaming and attempts to diversify business models are part of an ongoing response by news organizations, traditional print and TV, to irreversible shifts in the way audiences everywhere consume news. That's the background to a number of incremental and sweeping changes reshaping broadcast news--among them the pending shake-up at European broadcaster Sky News, which includes plans to create a paid model for some content and services.

Sneak Preview: Will Programmatic Advertising Overtake Brand Advertising in 2025?

On Thursday, February 27, Alan Wolk, one of the industry's most influential thought leaders, will moderate the Streaming Media Connect debate "Will Programmatic Advertising Overtake Brand Advertising in 2025?" The ability of digital media advertisers to deliver targeted messages through automated platforms—aka programmatic advertising—has enabled them to buy audiences, rather than space or time as in traditional brand advertising. In streaming and CTV, this creates the potential for substantially lower CPMs. But such a hands-off approach also raises considerable brand safety concerns, and its effectiveness remains comparatively untested. So, is the programmatic ad revolution really upon us? Confirmed debate panelists include leading industry figures from Roku, Philo, Vevo, and Fremantle.

Plateauing subscriptions push EU streamers to Freemium and consumers like it

Almost all major streamers have launched ad-supported services (Apple being the main exception) as they look to diversify their revenue streams in markets which are already saturated with SVOD. These ad models are succeeding in converting existing subscribers and growing overall subs numbers, as is evidenced in Germany.

What to expect from FAST in 2025

The rapid growth of FAST channels in 2024 shows no signs of slowing, with ad-supported streaming set to dominate as its popularity rises worldwide and the gap between ad-supported and ad-free tiers widens. But with the space evolving so quickly, one question lingers: how long can this momentum last? FAST Channels TV has just released its What to Expect from FAST in 2025 Trends Report, and Russell Foy, CEO of FAST Channels TV, outlines how FAST platforms can remain competitive in this rapidly developing streaming space.