TECHNOLOGY: 01/26/11

Adaptive Bit Rate Video Streaming: Why Delivery Will Matter More Than Codec

Greg Philpott is the founder and president of mDialog, an innovator in the fast-evolving mobile video sector. Greg has worked in media and technology for the past 18 years, and is pioneering work in Internet video and Digital Asset Management across a number of companies in the media and entertainment industry.

Though H.264-based MPEG-4 is currently the video format of choice for big video publishers and distributors such as MLB, iTunes and Netflix, premium video publishers and broadcasters generally don’t deliver their video assets via an H.264 progressive download. They require secure streaming protocols to deliver or stream their video assets to the video player.

At a high level it goes something like this: Video can be encoded into different formats such as H.264-based MPEG-4 or VP8 based WebM; the video is delivered or streamed using one of several possible streaming formats/protocols such as HTTP Live Streaming, Smooth Streaming and HTTP Dynamic Streaming; finally, players implemented in HTML5, Flash and Silverlight receive these streams and play them out for the viewer.

In this post we’ll focus on the approach to Adaptive Streaming that Apple is supporting. The technology, called HTTP Live Streaming (HLS), allows you stream live or on-demand video to devices like Apple’s iPad, iPhoneand iPod Touch without the need for a specialized video streaming server — any HTTP web server will do the trick. While created by Apple, the specification has been submitted to the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), the first step on its path to becoming an Internet standard.

Here’s a partial list of key features that benefit video publishers, advertisers, viewers and even mobile carriers.

The Basics

HTTP Live Streaming is backed by Apple, Smooth Streaming is backed by Microsoft and HTTP Dynamic Streaming is backed by Adobe, but they all have one thing in common: They each use the MPEG-4 H.264 as their inputs. I believe the real story isn’t which video format will be supported by HTML5, but more importantly, when it comes to premium video, which video streaming format will be supported.

All three delivery methods are forms of Adaptive Bit Rate Streaming. This delivery method will have a massive impact on every aspect of Internet video delivery because it allows the stream to actually adapt the video experience to the quality of the network and the device’s CPU.

In other words, the video stream can increase or decrease the bit rate and resolution of the video (its quality) in real time so that it’s always streaming the best possible quality the available network connection can support. The better the network connection, the better the video image quality. The fact that the stream handles all of this complexity means the mobile video viewer doesn’t have to do anything; everything is left to the stream and the player.

So how does this all work? To prep your video content for HLS, you start off with a high quality version of your video and encode multiple copies of it using MPEG-4 H.264. These copies are at various bit rates and resolutions ranging from lower quality renditions appropriate for slower 3G connections, up to extremely high quality renditions suitable for fast devices on fast networks. The renditions are then wrapped into MPEG-2 Transport Streams and chopped up into 10 second segments or chunks. It’s these segments that are eventually streamed to an HTML5 Video Player on a mobile device, browser or set-top box, and because the player receives the video in 10 second chunks and can detect the quality of the network connection, it can switch to a higher or lower quality video segment every ten seconds if bandwidth conditions change.

Real Cost Savings

HLS saves the video publisher and the receiving viewer’s data plan money. HLS is a true video stream, which means it only delivers a few segments of video as it plays. For example, if a viewer watched five minutes of streamed video, their data plan is only dinged for five minutes of data consumption. In contrast, a progressive download of a video could result in only five minutes of actual view time, but 20 minutes of downloaded video passed to their iPhone.

This is a big problem for everybody involved. The viewer’s data plan gets charged for video they didn’t actually see, the publisher pays their CDN for video delivery that’s never consumed (or monetized!), and the carrier’s network gets congested delivering video that it really didn’t have to.

Another major cost consideration for the video publisher is they don’t have to pay for and maintain specialized and proprietary video streaming servers. HLS uses an ordinary HTTP server, and if they are publishing a website, they already have one.

Security

The HLS specification has provisions to ensure security of the stream, which is great news for broadcasters or publishers who want to stream licensed content. The entire HLS streams can be encrypted using AES-128; you can even encrypt each rendition or even a group of segments using unique keys. Because the streams themselves are encrypted, you can deliver the content over normal HTTP, rather than SSL, which keeps the speed fast. The keys can be hidden and protected using authentication, tokens and signing. All of this makes it much more difficult for people to use your content in ways you don’t want them to, while ensuring that the stream is efficient and the goals of HLS are still met.

Live Streaming

Another big advantage of HLS is you can stream live video content to iOS devices. Streaming live video to tablet devices like the iPad is very compelling. The iPad is basically a personal TV that you can take anywhere. The tablet as a TV is an idea that’s not lost on the major broadcasters and cable companies. Now that premium Video on Demand is established on the iPad as a viable business model, the live re-transmission of linear broadcasts to the iPad via HLS is a natural progression.

Live HLS encoding requires an additional step in the publisher’s workflow (to encode the live feed in real time). That’s where encoding appliance companies like Inlet Technologies or Elemental Technologies come it. They have developed turnkey products that handle all of the complexities of creating a HLS stream and delivering it to the cloud.

Real-Time In-Stream Ad Delivery

Last, but certainly not least, is how HLS provides the publisher with a unique opportunity when it comes to in-stream ad insertion. Recall how HLS is a stream of ten-second segments of video; those segments can be created in such a way that a video ad can be injected into the content stream so that it plays out seamlessly for the viewer. The viewing experience is basically identical to watching a commercial on broadcast TV.

Injecting the “ad stream” into the “content stream” is a new concept several major broadcasters such as Canadian Broadcaster Global TV have adopted. The traditional delivery mechanism for pre- or mid-roll video ads is to perform a (disruptive) video player switch.

You see this a lot with your typical web video players: While watching a video, the stream goes blank while another player is presented, and a spinner or buffer is shown until the video ad stream is cued up and ready for playback. Then when the ad is finished, that player is closed and the feature content player is opened and a spinner presented until the feature content is cued up and ready for playback.

With HLS, you have the opportunity to do all your video content switching in the stream rather than within the video player. Additionally, you can take advantage of the adaptive nature of HLS to further ensure the video ad gets presented so the viewer never sees spinners or buffers as the ad loads. The ad experience is seamless.

Disclosure: The author’s company develops in-stream advertising technology.

The Future is Adapting

All of this is a bit reminiscent of the “video codec” wars of a few years ago. Back then, Apple, Microsoft and Adobe were all promoting different video encoding technologies (MPEG-4 H.264, VC1 and On2). Each produced good looking video, but it was a major headache for video publishers. The industry eventually settled on H.264 once it reached mass adoption, but it’s still a horse race when it comes to Adaptive Video Streaming. One thing is for sure: Adaptive Bit Rate Streaming is the future of video delivery across all device types, from PCs to smartphones to set-top devices.

Will HLS win out over other Adaptive Streaming solutions? It’s still early, but one would think that the open spec and submission to the IETF would give it a leg up on the competition, just as it did for H.264. If HLS is going to take off as an Internet video streaming standard, it has to expand beyond just iOS devices.

Android, Google’s mobile OS is now capable of playing HLS video thanks to a company called Nextreaming, which has built a robust HLS player SDK for the Android platform. And HLS is no longer a just a mobile video play. Roku, which makes one of the leading set-top streaming players, now supports HLS. Perhaps, most importantly, several major video publishers such as ABC, Netflix and Hulu are taking advantage of HLS in their iPad Apps. One thing is certain: You will be seeing a lot more adaptive video in 2011.

Google Acquires Telephony Startup SayNow

In the wake of new Google Voice announcements, we’ve just learned that Google has acquired SayNow, a startup in the telephony space. The terms of the deal have not yet been released.

In a brief annoucement on its website, SayNow’s co-founders write, “Through the web, smartphones, and even land lines, our products brought communities together through the power of voice. And as Google has some of the best voice products in the world, we believe combining forces with the Google Voice team will let us innovate in new and unexplored areas.”

The company has been around for a while, but it hasn’t been on our radar since 2006, when it released aMySpace widget for bands that let fans click to leave musicians a voice message.

According to the SayNow website, the company started out to create “voice-based experiences that are fun and social” — a goal similar to those of many current startups like Fotobabble and Twaud.io. However, SayNow says that the development didn’t stop with social audio apps. “Along the way, we reinvented the way phone calls are made today.”

That last statement puts SayNow in direct competition with Google Voice, making the company a prime target for acquisition.

The Palo Alto-based startup boasts 15 million users — including celebs like Soulja Boy and NFL coach Mike Ditka — and just like Google Voice, its platform can be used for voice messaging, user-to-user conversations, and group calls. SayNow also integrates its calling services with social and mobile platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Android and iPhone. The company has released APIs and claims a robust ecosystem of third-party apps.

There’s no word yet on whether SayNow will be shuttered or whether product development will continue, but we can’t imagine the former Google Voice competitor will be operating as an independent product for very long following the acquisition.

10 Fascinating Facts About E-mail

Love it or hate it, there’s no debating just how much e-mail has changed the way we communicate.

Since the 1990s, electronic mail has eclipsed snail mail and the fax to become the standard in the business world, and although social media sites are edging in on personal online messaging, e-mail still holds strong in that arena.

You may use it everyday, but how much do you know about e-mail? Do you know who sent the first message? What the biggest webmail provider is in the U.S.? What about the most common Hotmail password?

We’ve found 10 fascinating facts about electronic mail. Have a read, and do share in the comments below any relevant trivia you know on the topic.

1. What Was the First E-mail Message?

Ray Tomlinson is credited as being the first person to hit send on a network e-mail message.

Tomlinson had not been specifically tasked to develop e-mail, but he was working out some useful applications for MIT’s ARPANET project (which later evolved into the Internet). He took the time to work on e-mail “mostly because it seemed like a neat idea.”

Sent between two side-by-side computers, the first message was a small step for e-communications, but an important one. Tomlinson says he can’t remember the content of that first message but it likely read “testing 123″ or “QWERTYUIOP” — the letters found on the top line of a QWERTY keyboard.

2. Where Did the Word Spam Come From?

The term spam is widely thought to have come from the above Monty Python sketch, where its incessant chanting by Vikings (naturally!) drowns out all meaning.

These days, while the term refers to nuisance e-mail, it seems the phrase pre-dates e-mail as we know it, and has been traced back to online role playing chat rooms from the ’80s called MUDs. Generally, the term refers to any type of abusive online behavior.

3. What’s the Most Common E-mail Password?

We are nothing if not unimaginative with our e-mail passwords. It seems “123456″ is the all-time most popular choice for protecting our precious online correspondence. This sequence came out on top in 2009 when 10,000 Hotmail passwords were exposed online. (“123456″ also topped the list of passwords in the recent Gawker hack.) Come on netizens — must try harder.

4. What is Google’s Spam-Flavored Easter Egg?

Google has a little fun with spam via an Easter egg that can be viewed in any Gmail account. Opening the “Spam” folder turns the “web clips” display into recipes for the canned pork product. Spam Primavera, Spam Swiss Pie, Creamy Spam Broccoli Casserole and Spam Veggie Pita Pockets are just four examples of the delicious recipe links Google offers. Mmmmmm, Spam.

5. What is the @ Sign in Morse Code?

Despite the rise in popularity of e-mail in the late 20th century, Morse code didn’t get a character for the “@” sign until 2004.

The string combines Morse for “A” and “C,” and is known as the “commat,” an abbreviation of “commercial at.”

6. How Do You Spell E-mail?

So is it e-mail, email, Email, E-Mail, E-mail or eMail?

That depends who you ask. While many dictionaries and style guides are beginning to drop the hyphen and the caps in favor of “email,” the The Associated Press Stylebook still insists on seeing the word as an abbreviation of “electronic mail” and therefore sticks with e-mail. Here at Mashable, we do the same.

7. What’s the Biggest Webmail Service in the U.S.?

As of September 2010, Compete revealed that, based on the U.S. Internet browsing population, Yahoo! Mail clearly dominates. Hotmail — or “Windows Live Hotmail,” as Microsoft insists on calling it these days — comes in second. A little upstart known as Gmail looks positively minnow-esque in third place.

8. What is the @ Sign Called?

In English, “@” is commonly known as the “at” sign or symbol — or if you want to be adventurous, the “commercial at.” Other languages have much more poetic ways to describe the symbol, many of them animal-related.

In Dutch, it’s apestaart — “monkey’s tail.”

In Swedish, it’s snabel-a — “A” with an elephant’s trunk.

And in Italian, it’s chiocciolina — small snail.

Other languages nickname it “mouse’s tail,” “sleeping cat,” “little duck,” “dog,” and “little worm.”

9. When Was the First E-mail Sent From Space?

The first e-mail from space was sent in 1991. The crew of STS-43 Atlantis used Apple’s early AppleLink software on a Macintosh Portable to transmit the following:

“Hello Earth! Greetings from the STS-43 Crew. This is the first AppleLink from space. Having a GREAT time, wish you were here… send cryo and RCS! Hasta la vista, baby… we’ll be back!”

Oh, and if you guessed from the latter part of the message that 1991 was also the year Terminator 2: Judgment Day came out, you’d be correct.

10. Which Animated Character’s E-mail Was Hacked?

It was everyone’s favorite donut-loving, dysfunctional dad — Homer Simpson. Simpson’s e-mail address — chunkylover53@aol.com — was revealed in The Dad Who Knew Too Little.

Back in 2003, a Simpsons writer used to reply to messages in-character until the address became unmanageable due to sheer volume of mail.

Once the address was inactive, some dastardly hackers sent messages from the account to people who had added chunkylover53 to their AIM buddy list. The messages promised exclusive access to a new Simpsonsepisode, but instead delivered nothing but malware.

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Wednesday, January 26, 2011