Ensemble-Emagazine

Streaming only: Avoiding the threats
Content is a very tricky business not
only because it is costly to acquire, but
it also needed to be protected from
piracy and legal tangles. It was a myth
that streaming is the only safe option
as it is not saving anything on device
but piracy is always two steps ahead of
security. There is a need to enhance the
user experience without compromising
on security of the contents. Piracy is
a function of Price VS experience for
example, a not so good experience
delivered to a subscriber will cost USD
10 when same is available for USD
1. Good Experience with economical
packaging will draw more and more
people to the service.
Offline: To bring more subscribers
Online
Spotify, A music streaming service
started “download and Play” as a
premium subscription
Where subscriber needs to pay if he
wants to download his choice of music
in his device and play it anywhere
irrespective of connectivity or recurring
data usages. Spotify is using its
free basic streaming services as a
showcase to attract more and more
paid subscribers.
This model is being followed by other
players like Apple Music, Gaana etc
and it creates a real stickiness towards
the service
Offline VoD : its already around the
corner
Unlike the music, Videos are very
heavy on size and has its associated
price of acquisition. Where best music
quality can be achieved in 320 Kbps,
Acceptable low quality video starts
from 500 Kbps + and goes on till UHD
. Actually Offline viewing or “Download
and Play” is more relevant to Video
rather than music but its adaptation
was slow earlier. The biggies like
“Netflix” said a big NO to any plan
towards “Download and Play” but
YouTube has started offline play options
for User Generated contents, which
was easy from the content rights
perspective.
When Netflix crossed high bandwidth
markets and entered into highly
populated but bandwidth deprived
markets like India, Africa. It has
realized that anything purely based on
streaming will not work well and people
will use their catalogue to identify the
content to get it from pirated market.
Netflix has finally entered in to the
Offline Play world in late 2016 for
selected contents
Offline Play is secure
Offline contents mostly work in the
same way streaming works from
the technology perspective. Unlike
streaming it is a Burst traffic which
need not ne continuous and it may
be configured to pick-up high quality
profile irrespective of available
Bandwidth as it will take long time to
download but once downloaded, it can
be played in highest quality and any
number of times within the subscription
and content entitlements.
The content security is governed by
DRM (Digital Rights Managements)
and Entitlements. The DRM is making
sure that the encrypted contents can
be played back into the signed clients
and content should be insulated
from frauds. The Entitlement defines
subscription, License period, Geo
fencing, Quality and Device attributes
etc.
> > The content downloaded in the App
is not accessible as file to device
File system and cannot be accessed
outside of the client
> > The Client connects back to backend
at a defined frequency (Per
Hour, Day or Hour) to re-authorize
the subscribers and refresh his
downloaded contents based on
rights and entitlements
> > After subscription expiry or
termination/expiry of license of any
content the content(s) cannot be
played back
Conclusion
“Download and Play” is here to stay,
it will not only help subscribers to
consume high quality contents and help
to reduce piracy in turn. The mobile
devices are slowly taking over the “On
Couch Viewing” to “Anywhere Viewing”.
It will be an advantage for mobile
operators as well which are not getting
any benefit but stressing their networks
for OTT videos as the replays or the
same contents and intelligence related
to download patterns will enable them
to create better caching and availability
arrangements with OTT players.
India and Africa may take some time
to match the revenues coming from
US and Europe for Netflix but due to
Volume and demand for local contents
it has the capability to surpass it in near
future.
Alok Tripathi T
(BNES GSI S&M Services & Sol TVM)