Streaming Media - October/November 2007 - (Page 66) From Trend to Reality YouTube for the Enterprise new breed of user-friendly, video-centric sites and technologies has helped to make video as much a part of our online experience as music downloads, photo sharing, and email. Most notably, with 100 million videos viewed daily and a $1.65 billion price tag, YouTube has catapulted interest in internet video. YouTube, along with other video-based technologies including TiVo, webcams, and video-enabled handhelds, has changed the market perception of video. Consumers today are far more comfortable creating and viewing video than ever before. The adoption of video technologies and acceptance of video as a must-have communication medium has spread from the consumer marketplace to the enterprise. More and more, users are asking for YouTube and TiVo-like capabilities at work. Now IT departments are asking how they can best respond to this market trend and what is required to support video in the enterprise. a Democratized Video Creation The desire to make video capabilities available to all in the enterprise is a noble undertaking, but “YouTube for the enterprise” is not a one-solution-fits-all proposition. A number of distinct use cases exist across user groups in the enterprise, each with its own solution requirements. The most common use cases found in the enterprise, along with brief descriptions, are included in Table 1. Table 1 - Enterprise User-Generated Video Use Cases Studio Webcasting Separate presenter and moderator interfaces with viewer interactivity. High-scale live and on-demand. Simple presenter interface with limited/no viewer interactivity. Generally low-scale live and on-demand. Push-and-go presenter interface through video conferencing. Low- to mid-scale live and on-demand. Content created “off the grid” through varied means, then uploaded to central platform. On-demand volume based on popularity. Research, “Firms using Web 2.0 technologies are driven by gains in worker efficiency and a fear of competitive pressures.” Consequently, businesses are beginning to incorporate the underlying technologies, platforms, and concepts into their IT departments and lines of business. A recent McKinsey & Company survey found that more than three-quarters of executives who responded said they plan to maintain or increase their investments in technology trends that encourage user collaboration, such as peer-topeer networking, social networks, and web-based services. Additionally, more than half said they are pleased with their past internet investments, though some regret not boosting their own capabilities to exploit technology. More executives said they should have acted faster rather than slower. In a follow-up discussion, respondents describe how these innovations are creating a new way of bringing technology into businesses—a method that is easier to implement and more flexible than traditional topdown approaches. The data McKinsey provides from business leaders indicates that the interest, credibility, and relevance of new, collaborative technologies are all rapidly increasing in the eyes of C-suite decision makers. The push to increase the volume and speed of information flow at all levels of the enterprise, coupled with the pull from the user population to embrace technologies from the consumer marketplace, has created a perfect storm for rapid adoption of video technologies in the enterprise. Eyes on the Enterprise By Steve Pattison Training Room Capture Conference Room Streaming User-Generated Content Consumer vs. Corporate—How is Video Different? Typically, consumer video websites process video files in a fairly straightforward fashion: A user uploads a video file, the file is transcoded to a common format (Flash, for example), and then, when a viewer clicks on a link to view a program, the content is progressively downloaded to the viewer. In most cases, video is viewed on-demand as opposed to being streamed live, and it is accessed by individuals one at a time with limited or no interactivity between the creator and viewer. Additionally, in the consumer marketplace, video is distributed over the public internet with minimal concern for publishing control and content security. In the enterprise environment, requirements for live and on-demand video are significantly more robust. Companies require live streaming and on-demand video applications Without tailored applications for each use case, and an underlying platform to manage and distribute the various forms of video, coverage holes may emerge and a portion of the potential creation and viewing audience will not be supported. Achieving the Web 2.0 vision of a democratized, participatory community where anyone in the enterprise can create and view video content in support of their job function is a concept gaining traction in both IT and functional departments. According to a recent report by Forrester 66 STREAMING MEDIA October/November 2007
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