Independent report compares codec royalty costs across two major licensing pools

Streaming services evaluating codec licensing face a difficult question: how do the royalty costs of Access Advance Video Distribution Patent Pool and the Avanci Video program actually compare? A new report from Streaming Learning Center's Jan Ozer answers that question with hard numbers.

Peeling Back Sport's Hidden Layer of Streaming Ops and Tech

We spend a lot of time talking about what fans see in sport. The camera angles, the replays, the graphics, the studio analysis. All of it is designed to bring the viewer closer to the action. But the most important part of modern sports broadcasting is not what fans see. It is what they never see. Behind every moment on screen, there is an entire hidden layer of technology and operations working to make that experience feel effortless. And that layer is becoming more complex than ever.

In AI for Live Video, Context Is King, and Less Is More

Last week I attended a webinar titled "Context Is King: Best Practices for AI in Live Video," featuring Norsk's Adrian Roe and Dom Robinson and CaptionHub's Tom Bridges. Although we're always hearing about AI-driven solutions that can streamline, simplify, or turbocharge elements of the livestreaming workflow, or relieve streaming pros of the need to juggle or manage so many of those tasks themselves, this webinar focused not so much on what AI-enabled tools can do for us as what operator-supplied context and context-aware design can do to optimize those tools and more reliably provide the value we want, and increasingly rely on them to provide.

Broadcast Industry Urges Mobile Network Operators to Help Commercialise Live Production Over 5G By Exposing Standardised Quality on Demand APIs

Neutral Wireless, with support of Amarisoft, AW2S, BBC, France Télévisions, Haivision, RAI Radiotelevisione Italiana, and Sony calls on mobile network operators to enable interoperable, on-demand network quality for live 5G broadcasts

Live sport streaming's era of experimentation is ending

The era of experimentation in sports broadcasting is quietly coming to an end. Not because innovation is slowing down. The difference is that technologies that were once considered experimental are now expected to simply work.

Why the Future of Remote Production May Run at the Speed of Light

If immersive, real-time and AI-driven production is the future, the underlying network must change, argue photonics advocates and members of IOWN.

H.264 Streaming Fees: What Changed, Who's Affected, and What It Means

Via's new AVC Streaming Licence Fee structure, which applies to new licences beginning in 2026, replaces the old single-cap model with a tiered system that scales sharply with platform size.

Netflix Ramps Up Ad Suite

Netflix hopes the special sauce of their newly expanded expanded Ads Suite with assists from Amazon and Yahoo DSP will make CTV look different. This balance of data and technology, making things faster, more efficient, and more personalised within the ad environment should bring a unique experience to the marketplace.

Rakuten TV doubles down on ad-supported streaming in Europe

In a market defined by subscription fatigue and advertising reinvention, Rakuten TV is betting that FAST is not simply an add-on to streaming but one of its defining next chapters.

ICYMI: Streaming Media Connect February 2026

Streaming Media Connect February 2026 was all about the business and tech of ad-supported streaming and featured exclusive keynote fireside chats with Michelle Auguste of the NBA, Michelle Munson of Eluvio, and Kimmy Li of GAMELOOP and a slate of expert panels panels packed with speakers from YouTube, Disney, DAZN, Fubo, Fremantle, FloSports, Fuse, LG, Philo, Bitmovin, CacheFly, Tavant, and more. Check out a playlist with Streaming Media Connect sessions on Streaming Media's YouTube channel to catch the sessions you missed and revel in the ones you want to relive through the magic of VOD.

Vertical Leap: Growing the Free Vertical Drama Business at Streaming Media Connect

On Thursday, February 26, at Streaming Media Connect, the panel "Vertical Leap: Growing the Free Vertical Drama Business at Streaming Media Connect" assembled expert practitioners from Celestine Pictures, Hudson Vertical, Stratagem Vertical, and GoodShort to explore the ways that vertical drama is exploding on free streaming platforms, driven by mobile-first viewing, bingeable formats, and a new generation of viewers and global creators.

The Games Behind the Games: Winter Olympics From Mountain Slope to Mobile Screen

That illusion of effortlessness is what makes the Winter Olympics such a powerful lens for understanding where streaming and live production are heading next. Because what happened at Milano Cortina 2026 is not just about new cameras or sharper graphics. It is about the entire journey from capture to cloud to consumer.

MWC26 Barcelona: Operators shift from selling connectivity to selling experience

The global mobile industry may be the "nervous system" of the digital world but its perennial moan to regulators, governments, and policy makers is that network operators are never sufficiently valued. At Mobile World Congress, Barcelona, industry leaders are now exploring greater connectivity by linking cell phones with satellite systems and by hoping to finally earn revenue from 5G.

Paramount Skydance and Warner Bros. Discovery Reshape Streaming’s Power Balance

The proposed merger of Paramount Skydance Global with Warner Bros. Discovery is being framed through the usual lenses—debt loads, political sensitivities, and regulatory scrutiny in the U.S. and Europe. But the real story is simpler and more strategic: this is a scale play built around intellectual property.

Fox Sports to Deliver Vertical Coverage of FIFA World Cup with AWS Elemental Inference

AWS is the latest vendor to offer a solution to reformatting and syndicating vertical video for live sport as rights holders look to capitalise on the mobile first boom. Developed over 18 months with beta customers NBC Sports and Fox Sports, the ambition goes beyond reformatting highlights for vertical viewing but potentially live streaming whole games in the format.

Neutral Wireless Brings Flying Private 5G to MWC26 Barcelona with Real-World Deployments Across Land, Sea, and Air

Rapid-deployment private 5G moves from concept to operational reality at MWC Barcelona

Sneak Preview: Finder’s Feat: Optimising Search & Discovery With Metadata & Machine Learning at Streaming Media Connect

In this era of constant content proliferation and channel saturation, discovery is critical to content monetisation. Join an expert panel at Streaming Media Connect on February 26 to explore how structured metadata and machine learning-powered discovery tools bring great content to light, improving relevance, boosting engagement, and driving measurable revenue impact.

Sneak Preview: Vertical Leap: Growing the Free Vertical Drama Business at Streaming Media Connect

Vertical drama is exploding on free streaming platforms, driven by mobile-first viewing, bingeable formats, and a new generation of viewers and global creators. Tune in on February 26 at Streaming Media Connect as experts from Celestine Pictures, Hudson Vertical, Stratagem Vertical, and GoodShort break down the business models, distribution strategies, and monetisation tactics driving the vertical drama boom—and explain how to scale it effectively.

Private 5G Across Land, Sea, and Air

Private 5G does not reinvent live sport. It gives production teams greater control over environments they already operate in, and the agility to take the network with them wherever the story goes.

Sky ‘super bundle’ moves pay TV from linear to streaming

UK pay TV service Sky's announcement of a "world-first" grouping of streamers under one belt could fire the starting gun on further super bundles - though this particular union does not embrace either Apple TV or Amazon.