What to Know When Engaging Cloud Broadcast Services
There are several key questions to consider when engaging cloud broadcast services. Managing expectations, getting a clear demarcation of responsibilities, and looking at the entire workflow to understand what needs to be integrated are all points to examine throughout the process of evaluating cloud vendors, in addition to determining service levels, compliance standards, and possible security threats.
Above all, knowing how well a cloud broadcast service can be integrated into your existing systems is essential from the start. This helps create a better sense of how well the process will be streamlined into and comply with your services, along with evaluating any potential functionality or security issues. “The question I ask vendors is: how can I screw this up?” says Ben Ratner, Live Operations Manager, CNN, Warner Bros. Discovery. “Your services are probably 99.7% uptime and strong, but I’m typically the chain that is going to break something.”
Jean Macher, Business Development Director, SaaS Solutions, Harmonic, also emphasizes the need to establish who does what within the engagement. “What is my responsibility versus what is your responsibility?” he says. “Clarify that, because when you get to cloud services, it could be that the demarcation is less obvious if you are not familiar with the cloud environment. So that's a good question.”
Megan Wagoner, Senior Vice President, Americas, Vimond, concurs with Macher on this, and she also highlights the need to understand integration and workflows. “What are you going to need to integrate?” she says. “Looking at the entire workflow, being able to identify how long it will take. Those types of things are very important.”
One big issue that Wagoner encounters are customers who budget a project before they really understand their market and who they want to target. “I think a wonderful question that somebody can ask a vendor is: can you give me best practices?” she says. “Are there successful examples similar to what we're talking about, and also, what are the failures you've seen?”
Knowing the integration points between existing systems and processes and new technologies is also crucial. “People don't want to reinvent the wheel,” Wagoner says. “So if there is a new technology and there are integrations, there are systems that are set up, hierarchies and things like that which have already been built and established -- share those with the people that are trying to get on air fast.”
Learn more about Cloud Broadcast Services at Streaming Media West 2022.
Watch full-session videos from Streaming Media East 2022.
Related Articles
What are some of the primary factors that drive the decisions to move streaming workflows to the cloud versus remaining on-prem? Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen, Chair, Streaming Media Conferences, and CMO, id3as, talks with leading industry figures from Live Sports TV, Paramount/CBS Sports, and Warner Bros. Discovery about the wide range of variables driving cloud migration within their organizations.
03 Oct 2022
While definitions of "the cloud" can range widely, cloud usage for streaming ultimately results in several improvements to technological capacity and more efficient use of production funds. Four industry figures discuss the different ways they define and use cloud technology to improve workflows and meet complex customer needs.
19 Sep 2022
According to Jason Thibeault of the Streaming Video Technology Alliance, advances in edge computing have changed the streaming ecosystem in ways that require cooperation between CDN competitors in order to best serve the needs of their end users
07 Sep 2022
Jef Kethley of LiveSports talks about how his organization develops solid resiliency models in varying production environments through the use of multiple data centers and cost-effective cloud production.
06 Sep 2022
Zixi has improved live video workflows through their specialized Software-Defined Video Platform, which uses dynamic machine learning and an automated analytics approach to Root Cause Analysis to assist with faster team problem-solving collaboration
14 Jul 2022
Some streaming pros say cloud production has made 5-10 years of progress in the two years since the pandemic shook live production to its core, but when will cloud offer the sort of no-latency communication, preview, and replay producers expect and rely on in on-prem workflows? And will it require a paradigm shift in the way producers think about hardware purchases and usage? Live X's Corey Behnke, CNN's Ben Ratner, LiveU's Mike Savello, and Signiant's Jon Finegold discuss the challenges of cloud migration and the current state of cloud in this clip from Streaming Media East 2022.
11 Jul 2022
Megan Wagoner of Norway-based OTT Video CMS provider Vimond discusses the current state of cloud broadcasting and how the pandemic has accelerated migration to the cloud in this interview with Streaming Media's Tim Siglin at Streaming Media East 2022.
07 Jun 2022
Companies and Suppliers Mentioned