This week the
Honeycomb team made their way over to the International Broadcasting Convention
(IBC) in Amsterdam, to see what was on the horizon for broadcasters,
distributors, and in turn – consumers.
Held every September at the Amsterdam RAI Exhibition and Congress Centre, IBC exhibits everything from drones to cloud transcoding and we asked the Honeycomb team to tell us what most impressed them amongst the many exhibitors and speakers this year.
Angus Fear, Managing Director UK
The Yospace Stand
No connection between YoSushi (Japanese fast food) and Yospace (dynamic user-targeted ad insertion).
This amazing tech takes broadcast commercials selected by an adserver and creates a tailored commercial break on the basis of data about the viewer. This can then be inserted into the existing linear stream to replace the standard break with one just for that particular household or individual.
Yospace are already well established. They have been around for a few years and are already working with the biggest broadcasters in UK and other markets. Through set top box and other data, the broadcaster knows where you are down to the post code. They know you have children and own a dog, so the opportunities for localising broadcast and other targeting are huge.
The Yospace Stand
And targeted
commercial breaks, maybe with your nearest branch address in the end-frame,
means lots of clocks to be delivered. It was exciting to see another example
where only Honeycomb speed and prices can meet the demands of this new
broadcast landscape.
The Honeycomb team planning their next lunch
How Secure is Your Data? Panel Session
Panel speakers from ITV, Fox, Microsoft Azure, NABA and IBM
shared their alarming experiences in security to an audience of broadcast
heavies from BBC, PBS and more. Given the growth of IT in all broadcast, this
is a hot issue as broadcasters are exposed to cyber-attacks, and defending
against them has become more demanding and expensive over the last few years
since the high profile incidents with Sony and TV5Monde.
Some sobering facts emerged during the panel session, for
example – on average breaches of security are undetected for 170 days. One
major UK channel fends off attacks, which are attempting to cause loss of
service, every day, and their real concern is an attack that could actually
change content. Mischievous spotty teenage hackers used to be the problem, but
now it’s well organised hacktivists.
All this
reminds us that broadcast is now very much part of the IT world with all its
strengths and weaknesses. And modern broadcasters need a delivery service that
is driven by leading edge IT for speed and the visibility of assets. Lucky for
them, Honeycomb have got that covered!
We don't know what it is - but it looks cool!
Lindsey Kistler, Head of Product Strategy
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
& Elemental Combined Stand
After the acquisition of Elemental last year, it was interesting
to see how they set out their stalls for what should be a match made in heaven;
the platform as a service (PaaS) cloud transcoding system that dynamically
scales like the best of AWS. Over some good coffee made by a barista, we
learned more about how things are going for them together these days.
It’s a real best-of-both combination, with Elemental fully
virtualising what they did as applications and AWS enabling seamless scaling
and volume to match the most demanding use cases, including 4K and live-to-VOD.
Acquisitions like these becoming partnerships, where both parties keep their
identities (which is probably, dare we say, tied to their nimbleness and
innovation), and combine their strengths are heartening sights for the
industry. They are key to making big improvements for broadcasters and platform
owners, namely being able to scale up to UHD and 4K, as well as tackling
high-volume traffic like Honeycomb’s at a competitive price point.
It's nice to see the relationship working out so
well.
Caution - branded contents are hot
Hall 11
I have a soft spot for Hall 11, mostly because of two companies,
Go Pro and Drone Volt, whose stands are usually neighbours and who I always try
to visit when I attend IBC. Their juxtaposition always brightens things up for
me, especially after a long day slogging around the halls. They make me think
about the exciting possibilities that are hovering (ha ha) around the corner in
combining drone and video technology.
Go Pro is well known for its rugged, tiny
high-quality cameras, mounted on everything from surfboards to skydivers. Drone
Volt makes some large and impressive 4 and 6 rotor drones. I’m not sure exactly
how to explain their appeal to me, as I’ve never been notably into shooting
video, extreme sports, or the world of drone hobbyists. I guess it’s because I
have a bit of a fascination with the democratisation of video, as well as
literally changing the rulebook on airspace with drone technology. They’re a symbol
for me of how rapidly change has come in these areas in such a short time.
While their neighbours are touting genuinely impressive bits of professional studio-quality kit – giant booms, lighting systems and fancy cameras, these two seem to be selling things that ordinary people might reasonably acquire to create and do cool things with, whether as hobbyists or in ways that disrupt current technology or media. And that makes them fascinating symbols of possibility, as well as quite fun.
Rory Franklin, Software Engineer
My first proper trip to IBC was a whirlwind tour of meetings
with technology partners such as Signiant, Telestream, Screen and AWS among
others as well as a host of random interactions with people on the conference
floor and at the Beach Bar.
It would be rude not to
It's a pretty full-on experience as there is so much to see and so many people there to talk to. It was great to get to explain just what Honeycomb are doing and how it is in such an exciting position to really improve the way advertisers, agencies and the like operate. This was the right audience for that conversation!
Some particular highlights were that giant Sony
4K screen, Craig Russell-Roy shouting "Boom" over and over again
(just kidding, that was painful), and being able to have some particularly
enlightening conversations with our partners about how we can better utilise
the technology we have in place to make our user's jobs easier.
Bumping in to an old friend on the convention floor who I hadn't
seen in a few years was a bonus too - don't get the chance to meet up in London
where we both live, but in the mayhem that is IBC – sure!
IBC is a great mix of people and companies, and
it is really interesting to see all the innovation that is going on – let’s be
honest, the drones were pretty cool!
Just one of the many drones you weren't allowed to play with