Robert Guest

We launched our multiscreen management platform ACCESS Twine™ at IBC 2014 to help operators address the technological complexity that the multiscreen world has brought to the fore. More devices and content encryption systems become available, proving a challenge for operators looking to launch universal services. This is why we have ensured that ACCESS Twine works with various Conditional Access and Digital Rights Management systems, while supporting industry standards including HTML5, HbbTV, WebKit and the new Blink engine to offer a seamless experience on every screen.

For International CES (6-9 January 2015, Las Vegas Convention Center), we have extended the capabilities of ACCESS Twine, which now offers global search and remote access functionality to help operators provide customers with a solution that enables them to easily find content across multiple sources via a single user interface. This allows subscribers to access the operator content as well as their personal media library on every device.

The new functionality enables operators deploying ACCESS Twine to:

• Offer a single user interface to their subscribers, allowing them to access operator content and personal media securely on any device
• Ensure that consumers access content within the operator environment, improving brand loyalty
• Support advanced next generation advertising models including the possibility to push personalized advertising on every screen and report results

The multiscreen age has seen a wide range of devices brought into the TV mix, and consumers expect to be able to access the content they love on any screen, regardless of wherever it is stored. The ACCESS Twine extension means that operators can allow subscribers to access all of their content seamlessly via a secure TV Everywhere virtual library that brings a whole new level of personalisation to multiscreen.

The CES demonstration, hosted at the ACCESS demo suite in the Bellagio Hotel, Las Vegas, will show how ACCESS Twine facilitates video content discovery and playback on mobiles, tablets and operator branded devices such as STBs. The extended solution can be easily integrated with external metadata sources, allowing consumers to find all their content in one place by collating all locally stored libraries on a single platform. The new global search functionality enables operators deploying ACCESS Twine to offer services encompassing traditional broadcast services, IP delivered content and access to personal content, whether recorded on one or more in-home Personal Video Recorders (PVRs), in the cloud via a nPVR, stored on personal Network Attached Storage (NAS) or on tablets and smartphones.

To see the extended ACCESS Twine multiscreen management platform at 2015 International CES, please request a meeting with us.

As PayTV services embrace Over-The-Top (OTT) delivery for their premium content, they need to enable access from as many devices as possible, and from as many places as possible. Utilising WebKit, an open source web browser engine with high standards support, has proved an efficient solution to this issue. Combined with the utilisation of HTML5 and Responsive Design, the browser has become integral in enabling consumer multiscreen experiences, and will continue as the industry moves forward. Google’s development of the Chromium Blink browser has led to it speeding up development of some new features to provide a viable alternative on higher performance platforms, including those that support Android as the base operating system.

At IBC, ACCESS launched the newest member of the NetFront™ Browser family – NetFront™ Browser BE. Based on the Chromium Blink engine, it is a natural extension to the solutions already offered by ACCESS, enabling our customers to choose a WebKit or Chromium Blink based browser for high levels of HTML5 standards compliance. This combined with our NetFront Browser 4 “microbrowser” aimed at offering a HTML-based UX for resource-constrained platforms enables us, and more importantly our customers, to have all bases covered.

Adobe’s recent Video Benchmark Report, which analyses online TV trends based on aggregated and anonymous data from over 1,300 media and entertainment sites, has provided conclusive proof of the importance of TV Everywhere. It found that the number of TV Everywhere streams watched per visitor each month increased 133 percent year-on-year, which is potentially great news for the video industry. Given that HTML is the technology of choice for presentation of the online video service UX, device manufacturers must offer support for it as standard. This has placed a focus on ensuring web browsers embedded in consumer devices can cope with these interfaces and enable access to the large volumes of TV Everywhere streams. By supporting both WebKit and Blink, ACCESS is perfectly placed to help operators and device manufacturers deliver true TV Everywhere to the widest range of devices with the best standards compliance.

By extending the NetFront Browser family, ACCESS is uniquely placed in the worldwide TV-centric browser market. By extending our solutions to offer support for worldwide interactive TV standards, such as BML, Ginga, HbbTV and Hybridcast, we can continue to provide best-in class browsers for all markets spanning everything from legacy, small footprint platforms to high-end environments. Operators and CE device manufacturers specifying ACCESS broadcast-centric browsers can be confident that they and their end consumers will be able to continue to enjoy multiscreen experiences on as wide a selection of devices as possible.

The traditional TV model, including the ritual of gathering around the living room TV, is increasingly a thing of the past as the worldwide adoption of video-capable consumer electronic (CE) devices has enabled TV consumption anywhere, on any screen and at any time. Although this innovation is exciting for consumers, it has forced operators to rethink their strategies, posing increased challenges when designing user interfaces (UIs) and securing media sharing experiences.

In reaction to these challenges, the DLNA has developed the new Commercial Video Profile (CVP-2) guidelines, which aim to help operators meet the latest security requirements for the delivery of premium content Pay-TV, VOD and catch-up services.  Before multimedia sharing can emerge, operators must provide a system that natively includes three key multiscreen technologies that are vital when responding to customer expectation and providing a reliable, assured service.  These technologies include the deployment of HTML5 for portability and meeting the content industry’s security needs through CVP-2 with the integration of DTCP-IP Link Layer Protection.

The first of these technologies is a response to the demand for single UIs across devices, which can be solved through deploying HTML5.  HTML5 allows operators to develop “write once, play anywhere” content applications across a range of browsers and platforms. Through native integration, HTML5 enables the repurposing of single codebases, resulting in reduced development costs and the provision of a unique UI for every device.

Meeting the content industry’s security concerns is a critical enabler for multiscreen media sharing experiences.  The CVP-2 guidelines will be published in 2014 and provide the additional layers required to deliver secure content to the end user. This new standard enables secure playback across multiple devices whilst strengthening protection for copyright owners and content providers. By leveraging standardised technologies such as HTML Remote User Interfaces (RUI), HTTP adapted delivery and authentication to combine with current DTCP-IP Link Layer Protection; operators are able to provide ‘studio confident’ security and a more efficient articulation between the home network and connected devices. Traditionally, access networks have been preferred to the home network for the distribution of valuable content.  However, access networks require each device to interface directly with the network and aren’t operable with other networks and devices.  The DLNA specifications are designed to remove this issue by simplifying content sharing across CE devices on a local network.  DLNA and CVP-2 ensure that metadata and the UI can be shared in a format understood by all DLNA devices, so that operators can simplify the distribution and monetization of content by leveraging standardised applications and devices.

I believe that implementing the standard is just one part of the game. The development of an API security layer is the final technology component, and is vital to the success of multiscreen media sharing. The API layer integrates with existing CA, DRM and Cloud systems, enabling operators to deliver the most advanced security framework for the end user.  While DRM offers models to increase content distribution and usage, it’s also crucial in the prevention of illegal content distribution.  DRM extends device reach and limits operational costs to improve the process of content rights acquisition, efficiently enabling operators to meet the security requirements that are compulsory in providing multiscreen access and premium quality.

The three key elements (Security, a consistent UI and seamless integration with existing systems)  are  all standards-based and naturally interface with already available components while providing ‘studio confident’ secure solutions for operators to deliver multiscreen on a variety of devices. By doing so, CVP-2 will increase revenue for operators while providing customers with continued access to great quality multiscreen on multiple devices.

A recent study led by the Council for Research Excellence, a UK-based organisation specialising in research for the industry, found out that screen size impacts the multiscreen behaviours in a noteworthy way: the smaller the screen, the more likely the end user’s activities are related to what is happening on the primary screen. This creates additional challenges for monetization specialists as a bigger screen also means in-programme advertising is becoming irrelevant and commercial breaks can’t be used to their full potential. This is an issue, but help is at hand: Responsive Design can ensure the viewer experience is optimised on the fly for any screen size.

Responsive Design is a technique aimed at crafting websites and user interfaces (UI) to provide an optimal viewing experience on any screen. It relies heavily on HTML5, which provides the ability to lay out the user interface proportionally and to use CSS3 media queries to adapt to the screen resolution of the display device. For broadcasters and content providers, the global adoption of the h.264 standard within browsers and silicon vendors enables content to be delivered and consumed on mobile devices, even those that don’t support Flash, in appropriate resolutions or to be scaled on-the-fly depending on the device and the available bandwidth.

As consumers come to grips with the idea of using their smartphone or tablet as a universal access and control device for the connected home, ensuring a seamless experience across devices to help speed adoption is crucial, and this is what Responsive Design helps to address. HTML5 offers a simple solution by providing an environment naturally suited to creating content compatible with any device and screen size through Responsive Design’s key component of on-the-fly smart experience scaling. This enables the easy delivery of content on any device, without bespoke development time for each screen size.

A key aim of using Responsive Design is for service providers, content owners and broadcasters to more effectively monetize the video assets they provide to consumers by offering these across a wider range of devices.

Monetization through tracking the consumer so that targeted advertisements or other relevant information services can be offered is often perceived as complicated on a mobile device, typically due to the absence of cookies for persistent storage. Although this means traditional ways of storing customer information cannot be put to use on a mobile device, HTML5 provides various modules to store information about how the consumer interacts with content on a specific device: SessionStorage, which only stores information during a period of time, the ‘session’ opened by the consumer and available until closed; or LocalStorage, which can store information directly on the device.

HTML5 has already become the standard in mobile video content delivery and is fast becoming a standard for multiscreen due to the inherent developer-friendliness of the technology, its existing dominance in mobile, and its many advantages for the TV by allowing a single, branded experience across many devices. In summary, be it for end users or content providers looking for a consistent experience across all devices, or for broadcast specialists looking for efficient ways to monetize the content watched on any screen HTML5, Responsive Design provide broadcasters with the perfect development environment to efficiently develop and launch compelling multiscreen experiences.