Program Announced For Streaming Media West Show – Speaker Placement Starts Today
The advance program for the Streaming Media West show, taking place Oct. 30-31 in LA, has been completed. I have included the entire program at the end of this post, or you can download a PDF of it here. In the next week or two it will be added to the West website along with online registration.
If you want to speak or place someone else as a speaker, please look over the agenda and let me know the top (2) sessions you would like to be involved in. Sessions in red are not available and I am no longer accepting any new session proposals. Aside from any last-minute cancellations, the list of session topics and entire agenda is now final. If you are interested in speaker placement for the Enterprise Video Conference, that will open up shortly and I’ll have more details on that soon.
I will no longer hold spots for companies for months at a time. I plan to place speakers much faster than I have in previous years and while I will still be happy to hold spots while you confirm with a speaker or check schedules, I will not hold them indefinitely. Companies that want to be involved are going to have to decide and confirm much faster than previous years. I can’t continue to have companies say they want to speak, but then wait months for them to decide on the details. If you wait until after the summer to decide, I guarantee most spots will be gone.
Whenever I post the advance program I get tons of emails from people who simply reply and say, “I want to speak”. They don’t include any details on who they are, what their background is, what their company does, what topics they can speak to, what previous shows they have spoken at or why they should be selected. Emails like that will be ignored – unless you have spoken at the show in the past and I know who you are. If you want to speak, you must include the details I need to consider you.
If you have any questions about the speaking or selection process, call me (917-523-4562). I am happy to speak to anyone, at anytime, to help make the speaker selection process as easy as possible for you and I always answer and return all calls.
Click on the “continue reading” link to see the advance program.
Tuesday, October 30th, 2012
A101 – Content Discovery for Movies
TV Everywhere has changed the model for studios to drive consumers to their content. Join cable, studio and digital distribution executives as they discuss how Facebook and mobile discovery apps are playing a role in helping movie viewers find what they want, and share what they like; and how satellite and cable providers are driving people to rent and buy movies digitally. Panelists showcase real-life examples and case studies, as well as provide expert guidance in terms of both planning for and implementing successful strategies and tactics to boost exposure and discoverability.
Moderator: Steve Polsky, President, CEO, Flixster
B101 – Social TV: Where’s the Money?
In a world cluttered with badges, check-ins, stickers, hashtags, likes, plusses, apps, and so many other terms, is there any real money being exchanged in the world called Social TV? Are users “engaging” with “conversations” about “social” programming or are they sitting on their couch texting with their friends? TV is inherently a social medium, and people are tweeting and liking things, so there’s some smoke – but where’s the fire? This panel will dive into the fire and try to emerge with some real answers about what’s happening today, and where the business opportunities are tomorrow.
Moderator: Jeremy Toeman, CEO, Dijit
C101 – How Super-Savvy Viewers are Transforming The Future of TV (not available)
Mass-market entertainment options and video viewing habits are fragmenting at lightning speed. In this presentation, TVGuide.com will present their latest original research on the consumption of video entertainment and advertiser demands. Some of the themes this presentation will explore includes time-shifting, social TV, and parallel viewing – their impact on traditional business models and implications for the future of streaming media.
Presenter: Christy Tanner, EVP, GM, TVGuide.com & TV Guide Mobile
A102 – Balancing the Viewer Experience and the Need to Monetize
Making business decisions around the usability and the user experience for consuming video is often limited by budget, technical limitations of consumer devices, and business rules around the consumption of media. This session touches on issues such as design and usability in conjunction with technical features such as ad integration, security concerns, and inclusion of social media functionality, as we examine the needs of content owners versus the desires of consumers.
Moderator: Michael Dube, Manager, Systems Integration and Operations, HBO
B102 – Smart TV or Dumb TV?
The TV industry operates on perpetually shrinking margins, and each year seek out the “hot new thing” that will increase revenue, decrease buying cycles, and otherwise help contribute to the bottom line. In the era of Smart TVs, however, consumers have a challenging value proposition today, with limited features and built-in fear of future obsolescence. Our group of consumer electronics pros will have a hearty discussion to get to the bottom of what should be done with Smart TVs. Do people want them, or do they just want “feature” TVs? Will fragmentation kill the industry before it even really gets off the ground? Is Smart the new 3D or the new HD?
Moderator: Jeremy Toeman, CEO, Dijit,
C102 – DASH Session
The industry has been buzzing about the potential offered by MPEG-DASH as a complementary format that brings together the various adaptive bit-rate (ABR) specifications in use by the industry today. This panel discussion will take a fresh look at the key questions that were posed when MPEG-DASH came on the scene, and see what answers we have found. Panelists will also tackle the next round of topics as we head toward mainstream adoption of DASH technology. What’s the technical reality in terms of encoding and players? Who is deploying DASH? Are there any early results in? And what can we expect over the next year?
Moderator: Matt Smith, VP, OTT Strategy & Solutions, Envivio
A103 – Making DASH Workable: The DASH-264 Recommendation
To make the DASH standard useful in the real world, a number of key industry players are defining a practical subset of the standard to serve as a base-line for device implementations. In this session, attendees will learn what feature capabilities are available with DASH (multi-bitrate, multi-language, multi-channel, common encryption, trick modes) and how these are being defined and presented as a set of conformance and interoperability tests. If you need to ensure that DASH will work with your encoder, CDN, playback device or website, this is the session for you.
B103 – Is there a Killer App for TV, Or is TV the Killer App?
Some say the future of TV is the TV itself is relegated to just being “an app” that can run on any screen you own. Others believe the TV is king, and we’ll see a deluge of apps on smart TVs and second screens to enhance or even create new experiences. We can already see service providers like Comcast and Time Warner release apps on TVs, and on the flipside YouTube has their own lean back experience. This discussion will address content, distribution, and consumer-facing challenges of TV in an app world.
Moderator: Jeremy Toeman, CEO, Dijit
C103 – HOW TO: Choosing a Live Streaming Encoder (not available)
This session will discuss factors to consider when choosing live streaming encoder, starting with free or inexpensive software options to high-volume, big iron systems, including quality, performance, portability, features and format support. The session will also examine how new cloud-based features like live transrating are changing the requirements for on-location encoding. If you’re considering buying hardware or software for producing live events, you’ll find this session particularly useful.
Presenter: Jan Ozer, Principal, Doceo Publishing
A104 – HOW TO: Simplify Video Delivery and Slash Your Up-Front Costs By Using The Cloud (not available)
As you look for a unified, ‘any-screen’ streaming media delivery solution, how can you reduce the complexity and cost while reaching more and more devices? Come learn about how to use the latest cloud offerings from Amazon and Microsoft to deliver live, on-demand, and time-shifted video and audio content to your end users, whether they are all in one region or spread across continents. If you already know the basics of streaming, join us in this session to see how to get started today with cloud-based media delivery.
Presenter: Chris Knowlton, VP, Product Management, Wowza Media Systems
B104 – The Future of Digital Entertainment in a Multiscreen World
This panel of leading service operators and content owners will discuss how they solve some of the challenges in delivering the creator’s intended entertainment experience across new devices and consumer use cases. The panel will also share their vision on where the future of digital entertainment is heading and key industry drivers that could enable the next-generation entertainment experience on mobile and tablet devices.
Moderator: John Couling, VP, E-Media Business Group, Dolby
C104 – Over The Top, And Into Your Bank Account
This session will focus on how programmers and aggregators monetize TV Everywhere deployments. As more live, linear broadcasts (and networks) are deployed on secondary screens, the need for ad insertion/replacement models is emerging. What are the functional building blocks required to originate the signal and stream? How are the ad breaks recognized and marked – and what happens in order to re-purpose the broadcast ads for these additional screens? This session will explore the technical workflows, business requirements and rules and ‘need to know’ elements to help get a video ad deployment up and running.
Moderator: Matt Smith, VP, OTT Strategy & Solutions, Envivio
A105 – Currency vs. Measurement in Online Video Advertising
There has been a lot of discussion around how to provide measurable metrics for online video, with many companies such as Nielsen and comScore evolving to be the standard. But, with an industry overflowing with data, perhaps the issue is not that there aren’t measurement methods, rather there is no online video “currency” that is currently accepted by all. This session will explore the efforts behind qualifying audiences for agencies and advertisers, and how it translates back to its effect on delivering streaming video to consumers.
Moderator: TBD
B105 – Case Study: How Huffington Post Built Their Live Video Network (not available)
This session presents a case study of the recently launched HuffPost Live, which generates 12 hours of live programming five days a week. Attendees will learn about the challenges faced in launching a long form community driven live streaming platform. Learn about live streaming workflows, quick VOD turnaround, community based collaboration technology, and Huffington Post’s attempt to break away from standard broadcast methods.
Presenter: Dylan Armajani, Streaming Manager, HuffPost Live
C105 – HOW TO: Encoding Video for HTML5 (not available)
Learn the technological fundamentals behind encoding both H.264 and WebM formats for playback with the HTML5 tag. Learn the basics of H.264 and WebM encoding, and how to produce it for HTML5 distribution. In addition, see how the various H.264 and WebM encoding tools compare in regards to performance, quality, and features.
Presenter: Jan Ozer, Principal, Doceo Publishing
Wednesday, October 31st, 2012
A201 – Brand Safety in The Online Video Advertising Market
One of the biggest reservations buyers exhibit when it comes to video advertising is the fear of their ad landing in an inappropriate location. This session of buyers, publishers and tech companies will explore the state of video brand safety today, and address the current fears around available video inventory. They’ll also explore the options advertisers have for controlling their ads, and how video can move toward 100% brand safe ad buying.
Moderator: Mark Trefgarne, CEO, LiveRail
B201 – Deconstructing Content Offerings for the Second Screen
Surveys today show that an increasing amount of TV watching is done with a “Second Screen” in hand. Some of that time is work, Words With Friends, and throwing birds at pigs, but the rest of it is users beginning to engage with the content in some manner. Second screen offerings can really complement some content, like sports and reality TV shows. For others its a distracting mess. This session will focus on how to separate the signal from the noise, and identify the right kinds of content and how to optimize a second screen experience to win with audiences.
Moderator: Jeremy Toeman, CEO, Dijit
C201 – Best Practices for Planning Your Live Streaming Event
This session will focus on the different methods and approaches to producing a live event, from a production planning perspective. Learn the best practices for interfacing with event video production teams, what streaming infrastructure choices you have, what’s a realistic timeline and budget and what technology you need to know about. Learn the steps and choices you need to make in advance to make your live streaming event a success.
Moderator: Jon Orlin, Executive Producer, TechCrunch
A202 – HOW TO: Creating a DASH-264 Player (not available)
With all the device fragmentation in the market, it is getting increasingly difficult to provide content to all of them equally. The MPEG-DASH specification promises to unify the field and provide a ubiquitous format, which can be used by most devices. Within the DASH specification, several different Codec’s can potentially be supported, but amongst the most promising is DASH-264, which uses h.264 within the DASH standard. In this technical session we will explore how to build a DASH-264 player using OSMF. This will be most useful for ActionScript developers familiar with Adobe¹s Open Source Media Framework.
B202 – Virtual Coffee Tables and TV App Graveyards
In the past year, we’ve cluttered iPads and Smartphones with dozens of TV related apps. Some are still kicking, some barely have a pulse, and some are the former “hot new things” gone cold and dead. What is there to learn from this all? Is there a one-size-fits all answer or approach to TV apps? Is there an uber-TV app coming, or are we destined to have a dedicated app for each TV show we like, each network we watch, each movie we see, etc?
Moderator: Jeremy Toeman, CEO, Dijit
C202 – HOW TO: Choosing an Enterprise-Class Video Encoder (not available)
This session will discuss factors to consider when choosing an on-demand enterprise video encoding systems from the likes of Digital Rapids, Elemental, Harmonic, Sorenson, and Telestream. Factors incorporated into the analysis will include performance, output quality, quality control options, format support, expansion options, programmability, and other variables. If you’re considering buying an enterprise encoder or upgrading your current systems, you’ll find this session particularly useful.
Presenter: Jan Ozer, Principal, Doceo Publishing
A203 – Strategies for Preparing Your Video for Tablets and Mobile Devices
If you distribute or produce content that will be digitally consumed, you are faced with preparing your media for a multitude of screens. From Android-based tablets to the iPad, iPhone 4, and beyond, mobility is the new video frontier. So what’s the right strategy to reach all these devices? How many variants of one clip must a publisher create? Which platforms will yield the greatest uptake? In this session, industry leaders with hands-on experience will answer these questions and provide a best practices approach to help you develop your content to multiple devices.
Moderator: TBD
B203 – Monetization and Distribution Design Across Broadcast and OTT Environments
Formulating the availability of content to consumers is complex when traditional television distribution agreements affect the access rights to content across tablets, mobile phones and other internet connected devices. This session will discuss how some content owners are navigating a new age of distribution, security and conditional access in a multiscreen world.
Moderator: Michael Dube, Manager, Systems Integration and Operations, HBO
C203 – New Device Demos: Vizio and Livestream (not available)
This session will feature new product demos from Vizio; showcasing their new $99 Co-Star streaming box and Livestream; which will demo their new $495 Livestream Broadcaster. See both of these devices in-action and get your questions answered by company executives.
B204 – Best Practices for Migrating To a Cloud-Based Encoding Platform
More and more content owners are leveraging cloud-based transcoding services to scale their video platforms and stay current with rapidly changing video technologies. This session will explore the advantages and challenges faced by industry professionals who migrate their video encoding to the cloud. Learn the best practices for selecting and integrating cloud-based encoding services into your video workflow to optimize for speed and video quality.
Moderator: TBD
C204 – HTML5 And Web Video Standards
As video becomes increasingly important on the web, content providers, browser developers, and end users can no longer afford to have the primary video delivery mechanisms locked up in standards that cannot be adapted to new environments. This is especially true for emerging trends such as mobile video and cross-device video technologies. HTML5 Video might be the answer, and we’ll discuss what it is, the challenges it’s facing, and how it affects other formats such as Flash and Silverlight, as well as how leading platforms and web giants such as Google, Mozilla, and Apple are supporting it.
Moderator: TBD