HITS

The pace of change in TV technology “has been accelerating” faster than ever in recent years, which represents the biggest single challenge facing content producers today, according to Dave Frederick, senior director of media and entertainment at content workflow service provider Quantum.

“Even though we’re not delivering 4K to all households, that doesn’t matter,” he said during an Aug. 17 webinar on “Managing Media in a ‘Multi-Multi’ Broadcast World.” He explained: “We need to capture the best pixels possible and we need to work in those formats and we need to keep all that data. So, the problem that I see happening for a lot of customers is they’re just overwhelmed by trying to keep up with changes in technology. And just the pace of change has gotten to the point where it’s almost impossible to handle.”

The challenge posed by 4K in particular was also cited on the webinar by Eivind Sandstrand, corporate business manager for North America at Arvato Systems, a
provider of software solutions for media and broadcast companies. “4K is a challenge on its own,” he said, adding: “The development and emergence of new standards — that’s one thing. But the demands on storage and processing capacity for 4K content are simply staggering. And the integrated workflows for 4K are going to be different.”

Meanwhile, as broadcast station groups grow larger, whether via consolidation and/or acquisitions, “they’re looking for ways to avid duplicating content and efforts,” while trying to control costs, moderator Mary Yurkovic, director of the Media & Entertainment Services Alliance (MESA) SMART Content business, said.

By creating “hubs” for content, processes and distribution, station groups can deliver the same content to multiple owned-and-operated stations for multiple platforms, while at the same time tailoring or differentiating the content so that it fits the local audiences or regional market they need to target, she said. Handling and storing all the content that an organization uses when it’s coming from multiple sources is challenging, she said, pointing out that there are three components that must be aligned: “the people, the process and the technology” — and it’s not so simple to achieve those things.

Using a media asset management (MAM) system has become a requirement for many companies, Sandstrand said. A MAM system is important when an organization’s workflow is focused on speed and reliability, and the processes must be managed from one end to the other, he said. Content, after all, comes from multiple sources inside and outside a company today, and a media organization typically must reach audiences on the many devices they are using, wherever they are located, he said.

“New and powerful software-based integrations are going to be possible to do now,” and that will also “enable the flexibility and speed that you need,” he said. But to do IP networking and content delivery, you must “rely on proven, off-the-shelf technology,” as well as “adhere to standards,” he said.

The cloud now makes it possible to deliver content wherever users are and where contributors are, and that makes multi-platform publishing possible, he said, calling it a “very important trend.”

Summing up the key reasons why MAM systems are such an important tool, he said they increase operational efficiencies, allow for the end-to-end automation of content creation-to-distribution workflows, streamline work group collaboration across multiple locations, facilitate low-cost, multi-platform media asset distribution, and enable the monetization of media assets.

Asset and archive management has “become the number one priority when it comes to actual projects,” he said. “Now, media asset management is becoming mainstream,” he said. As a result, he said, “your competition is gearing up for the ability to do multi-platform publishing, multi-site management because they are installing these MAM systems,” he said.

The MAM system “sits at the heart of the media enterprise … in the middle of your value chain,” he said.

There are a few ways to know when it’s time for an organization to evaluate a MAM and enterprise storage solution, Josh Hatter, solutions consultant at Diversified, said. They are: when a facility is using file and folder structure to organize large amounts of media files, when the facility has multiple full-time editors and no central production storage, and when one is spending part of the day manually copying, FTP’ing, Aspera’ing, and “sneaker netting” media files, he said. “Anybody that’s creating video content, and storing it and distributing it to multiple places and bringing it back up on a regular basis is a candidate” for a MAM solution, he said.