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Veovera Software, a not-for-profit organization, has stepped forward to spearhead the mission of modernizing RTMP, aligning its specification with the latest state-of-the-art technology. With the support of Adobe, a member of the organization, Veovera’s current focus is to steward and modernize the RTMP specification. YouTube and Twitch, also members of the organization, are backing the objective of enhancing RTMP. (Link to specs here)

RTMP was initially developed by Macromedia as a TCP-based protocol for high-speed transmission of audio, video, and data between servers and Flash players. It became the de facto standard for web-based streaming video as a crucial component of Flash Video. While RTMP died as a delivery protocol, RTMP continues to be a dominant force, especially on the ingestion side. Many broadcasting platforms incorporate this protocol into their processes due to its speed and reliability, characteristics that are particularly vital for first-mile delivery.

Slavik Lozben, Chairman of Veovera and one of the original creators of RTMP, told me that, “RTMP remains the most widely used format for live broadcast, with over 75% of broadcasters relying on it for ingestion. (According to Wowza’s Video Streaming Latency Report from 2021) Surprisingly, the next most popular technology accounts for less than a third of this usage. What’s remarkable is that RTMP hasn’t been updated in over 10 years. Given the escalating demands of the streaming community, it’s clear that RTMP needs enhancements to meet present-day challenges.”

RTMP has not been updated in over a decade, causing challenges related to not having the latest tech (e.g. support for current codecs, HDR). Companies that rely on RTMP now face a pivotal decision: should they invest in a costly overhaul or continue to utilize this increasingly outdated technology? Enhancing RTMP specification is a more manageable task compared to investing in an expensive transition to a different protocol.

Twenty-one years later, it’s astonishing to witness RTMP retaining its relevance after its original introduction in Flash Video. As an initial step, Veovera has incorporated support for AV1, VP9, and HEVC and is now striving to quickly define additional capabilities. Their goal is to continuously refine RTMP while ensuring backwards compatibility, without disrupting the internet or current tools. RTMP has remained untouched for quite a while, likely due to the absence of an organization willing to lead the effort to formally align the protocol within the industry. The challenges are not just technical but also involve logistical aspects. Veovera aims to:

• Prevent protocol bifurcation and maintain RTMP as a single, unified definition
• Enhance and modernize the RTMP/FLV specification with new functionality
• Collaborate with organization members and third-party solution providers to help deliver implementations that support the enhanced RTMP specifications
• Engage with the RTMP community to promote RTMP enhancements

Veovera says there’s a significant demand for this initiative across the industry and solution providers who rely on RTMP are eager to see these enhancements become a reality. Despite being in existence for many years, RTMP has remained relevant. Any longstanding streaming service has likely utilized RTMP at some point. Today, platforms and services such as Google, YouTube, Twitch, PlayStation, Meta, OBS, FFmpeg, VideoLAN, TikTok, and others continue to incorporate RTMP in their workflow.

Veovera has enhanced the RTMP specification by introducing popular video codecs like VP9, HEVC, and AV1. As for their 2023 roadmap, Veovera has a goal to enhance the recent video codec updates with the inclusion of widely-used audio codecs. The top contenders for this integration are Opus, FLAC, AC-3, and E-AC-3. Furthermore, Veovera intends to specify more features for RTMP, such as support for a seamless reconnect command plus other capabilities. Considering these enhancements, we can anticipate content to have lower latency and better quality. As a result, it’s plausible that RTMP will continue to stay relevant for many years to come.

The writers and actors strike comes down to a discussion on how best to measure the impact that content has, on a per title basis, with metrics and methodology that both sides agree on, while offering transparency. That’s not promising.

The writers and actors strike is a complex topic due to, amongst other things, a lack of agreed-upon methodology for defining streaming viewership and data transparency. But when SAG-AFTRA is quoted as saying, “It is not okay anymore for companies to just bring in huge amounts of revenue from people’s work and not share it with them,” I think a clear distinction needs to be made between “revenue” and “profits”. Those are very different metrics.

Many are talking about how much money Disney and others streamers are making, but Disney’s DTC business is not profitable. Their DTC business has $10.84 billion in losses from Q1 fiscal year 2020 through Q2 fiscal year 2023. Disney has said they expect Disney+ to, “achieve profitability in fiscal 2024, assuming we do not see a meaningful shift in the economic climate”, but their business is not profitable today. Why isn’t SAG-AFTRA suggesting profitability as one of the metrics so that the more a streaming platform makes, the more writers and actors could make?

Instead, SAG-AFTRA proposed that performers receive a 2% share of the revenue generated from streaming content and they want to use Parrot Analytics’ content valuation platform to determine what revenue was generated by each piece of streaming content. The problem is that Parrot Analytics is using metrics such as Google searches and social media engagement to define which content is considered most valuable to the streaming platforms – based on their “estimates”.

The AMPTP has correctly pointed out that that Parrot’s data is not available to anyone who doesn’t subscribe to them and it, “lacks any demonstrable link to the actual revenue received by the service in the form of new or retained subscribers.” When the core methodology being proposed is not based on actual viewership, I think that’s a problem. Using “popularity” in Google searches and on social media is too vague of a methodology. Popular doesn’t always equate to profitability.

Studios value content differently on a host of factors including the content costs, type of content, target market etc. and those values change. Streaming platforms are constantly evolving their strategies on what content to invest in and that shifts all the time. It’s an extremely fluid business and will continue to be so going forward. Streaming does not and will not look like what linear used to look like. Applying a linear TV model for royalty payments tied to streaming distribution is not going to work.

Both sides are so far apart on the foundation of what should even be measured, how to measure it and what data to share. It’s not looking good to this strike being resolved any time soon.

I’m excited to announce the Streaming Summit is coming back to NYC, as part of the NAB Show New York, October 24-25. The call for speakers and sponsorships are now open and I am looking for speakers, moderators and presenters. The show will focus on the latest trends around sports streaming, bundling and packaging of content, advertising measurement, content discovery, scaling video workflows and delivering a great user-experience at scale. Both business and technical topics will be covered and a networking reception will take place October 24th at 5pm. Full details are on the website and speaking spots will go fast! If you want to be involved in some capacity, now is the time to reach out to me to discuss your ideas.

Podcast Episode 62 is live! This week we peel back the layers of NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV dissecting the potential implications and benefits for the streaming media industry. We discuss the criticality of promptly addressing technical glitches before mainstream media taints the image of streaming technology. Learn how YouTube TV’s new ‘multiview’ feature could amp up the NFL Sunday Ticket experience, or just add another layer of complexity.

We also scrutinize Netflix’s future advertising plans and their proposed creation of a new ad format similar to a half-hour commercial drawn out over days. Also covered is the rollout of YES Network’s single-screen interactive stats on connected devices in partnership with Ease Live. Tune in as we delve into the fiery debate taking place in Europe with ISPs suggesting that content providers including Netflix, Apple, and Google should pay ISPs to carry their video traffic.

I also call out Sandvine for continuing to publish garbage data on the topic, stating opinions as facts, using high-level marketing terms with no definitions, and using the debate to push the need for companies to pay them to use their platform – a severe conflict of interest.

Microsoft has announced it will shut down Azure Media Services on June 30, 2024 and exit the video workflow business. This comes as no surprise since they let go of Azure’s CTO, Hanno Based, in the first half of last year and started restructuring internally around that time. Various Azure Media Services pages on the Microsoft site had broken links and images as of May of last year and are still broken, having never been fixed or updated.

The Media Services revenue for Microsoft was never big enough to continue to justify their investment and Microsoft never really had an aggressive go-to-market strategy for the promotion and sales of Azure Media Sales. Microsoft says that going forward they will be “focusing on strategic areas of secular growth and long-term competitiveness for the company,” and the streaming video stack won’t be one of them.

Azure Media Services didn’t compete for business in the market very often and was rarely seen in big RFPs, especially when compared to Amazon’s Media Services platform. Unlike Amazon which bought Elemental and other companies to build and operate an in-house media workflow platform, Microsoft relied on a third-party partner ecosystem approach for encoding, packaging, and delivery. Microsoft is recommending that their current customers move over to Harmonic, MediaKind, Bitmovin, and Ravnur.

Updated July 7th: See this post from Microsoft on LinkedIn where they say, “Over the past few years, our company has undergone significant growth and transformation. As part of this journey, we have reassessed our media strategy. After careful evaluation and consideration, we have determined that Azure Media Services has not been a core component of our media strategy for quite some time.”

For customers doing video delivery through Microsoft Azure, I don’t expect any changes since Microsoft outsourced most of that business for nearly the past 10 years to Verizon via their EdgeCast CDN (now Edgio) and years later, added Akamai as a second CDN partner. Microsoft already announced in March they were shutting down “Azure CDN Standard” on Akamai, so it leaves Edgio as Azure’s stand-alone CDN partner. Microsoft never pushed much in the way of traffic to their CDN partners so the shutdown of Azure’s integration with Akamai has no impact on Akamai’s revenue. Microsoft also has their own CDN, Azure Front Door, so they are also pushing more customers to use their own platform. Side note, it would be nice if Microsoft updated their CDN solutions page to list their partner’s name properly since Verizon hasn’t been the name of the delivery service for many years.

Microsoft exiting this portion of its business won’t have much of an impact on video customers or the streaming media industry at large. I think it’s good any time a vendor cuts products, services, or solutions that are not their core strength. Focus is a good thing.

Podcast Episode 61 is live! What do TikTok’s video lengths and user engagement tell us about the future of content consumption? Join us this week as we uncover the surprising data behind this social media giant and its innovative audience. We’ll also dive into the growing trend of long-form content including movies and TV shows being chopped up into bite-sized pieces for a more interactive and engaging viewing experience.

As the demand to get to profitability with DTC services grows, content owners are slashing millions in infrastructure costs through optimization of their video workflows, especially around encoding, storage and delivery. We discuss how advanced codecs and content adaptive technologies are enabling reduced bit rates without sacrificing quality. You will also learn about Netflix’s multi-year technology and workflow transformation, and the increasing importance of purpose-built silicon in the race for 4K streaming.

Lastly, we tackle the issues of media inaccuracies and AI hype within the industry. From the sensationalized reporting surrounding Disney’s CFO’s leave of absence to Microsoft’s questionable AI claims, we emphasize the importance of accurate information and transparency. Discover the potential impact of AI on the streaming industry and Microsoft’s relationship with Open AI – all in this eye-opening episode.

NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV is the first streaming service making consumers pay $250-$440 upfront, well in advance of the season. Having spent that much money, consumers are going to demand perfection from the service from day one, which won’t be possible. Even if YouTube TV delivers a flawless stream on their end with zero technical issues of any kind, users are still going to have problems with things out of YouTube TV’s control including devices, internet issues within the home, and video delivery within the last-mile. The streaming video stack is extremely complex and that is multiplied even further when you have a live stream that includes content protection, authentication, and getting blackouts accurate based on location. [Updated June 23: YouTube TV had another outage for some users, the second this month, due to a “networking issue impacting YouTube’s connectivity with Verizon.”]

When NFL Sunday Ticket launches on September 10th, it’s going to be very interesting to see what challenges users have in signing up and managing their accounts. Watching comments on Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, and other websites, consumers are still asking a lot of questions about account management and billing. YouTube TV has made it very clear there are no refunds, so anyone who might experience technical issues isn’t going to be happy they can’t cancel. Also, there will be no free trials of the service so consumers won’t be able to try before they buy. Never before in the streaming industry have users paid so much in advance of a service without being able to try it out and not having a way to cancel.

The options for signing up and billing will confuse some consumers since NFL Sunday Ticket is not (yet) available for purchase for YouTube TV viewers billed by Google Play, Verizon, or Frontier. Also, if a consumer cancels or pauses their YouTube TV Base Plan, they will lose access to NFL Sunday Ticket. Right now, one of the most popular questions being asked on Google on this topic is, “can i buy sunday nfl ticket without youtube tv.” Users can get a standalone NFL Sunday Ticket subscription through YouTube Primetime Channels but no matter how much education YouTube TV does, there is going to be a lot of confusion around sign-up and usage of the service.

Even though it is very clear that the NFL Sunday Ticket is for out-of-market Sunday games, with YouTube TV also pointing out that, “locally broadcast Fox and CBS games, Sunday Night Football on NBC, select digital-only games and international games excluded,” consumers expect it all when it comes to streaming. No playoff games are included with NFL Sunday Ticket and I’m sure that’s going to catch some users by surprise.

It also doesn’t help that there is a lot of misinformation on news sites about the service. I’ve read multiple “reviews” of the service where the post makes false statements including, “viewers will be able to purchase a certain number of games for a cheaper price,” and “watch every regular season Sunday afternoon game.” YouTube TV has made the terms for NFL Sunday Ticket very clear, but they are going to have their work cut out for them educating consumers on how it all works. YouTube TV’s support is going to be very busy communicating which games they can and can’t watch and what exactly they are allowed to do with their subscription, on top of all the technical questions that are going to come in. Outside of any technical issues, I believe the success or failure of the launch is going to come down to the quality of support YouTube TV provides and how well they communicate. If they farm support out to another country where they don’t speak English natively like we see a lot of streaming services doing with their support, it will be a disaster for YouTube TV.

In May, YouTube TV offered a free 10-day trial, for new members only, during a limited promotion. As we get closer to the NFL Sunday Ticket launch, I’m curious to see if they will run the trial again to get more users familiar with their platform. Doing so would also help them test out their multiview option at scale since to date, the rollout has been, “limited to users who have specific equipment,” with many complaints of it not working right coming in during March Madness. In fairness to YouTube TV, they did say they limited the “early access” to the feature so they could collect feedback and “improve the experience.” This month, multiview functionality was removed from the platform with YouTube TV tweeting on June 18th, “we’re working on some improvements to multiview, so it isn’t available atm. but we’ll be sure to let everyone know once we have an update.”

With less than 90-days before NFL Sunday Ticket kicks off on YouTube TV the amount of work going on at the company, across the entire YouTube video stack, is enormous. People within YouTube tell me the level of planning for NFL Sunday Ticket is like nothing they have ever seen before, which is exactly what we would expect. Google knows what’s at stake with the NFL and I can’t imagine the pressure Google is under from the NFL to deliver a great user experience from day-one. I’m rooting for the Google and YouTube TV teams to have a flawless execution not just week one, but every week throughout the year. If they can keep any technical issues to a minimum, and short-lived, plus provide accurate and timely support, it helps the entire streaming industry. If YouTube TV has any widespread problems with streaming the NFL Sunday Ticket, the backlash from many will be that streaming is not ready for prime time and can’t be used as a replacement to broadcast TV distribution.

Note: Many in the media keep writing that YouTube TV, “has over 5 million subscribers”, which is not accurate. As stated on the YouTube TV blog and in the press release with the NFL, YouTube TV, “has over 5 million subscribers and trialers in the US,” based on their July 2022 announcement.