What is media streaming?
Media streaming refers to the process of
delivering multimedia content, be it audio or visual to an end user.
Traditionally, the medium of delivery for video has been via television
signals, and before this, audio was transmitted by radio.
Media streaming dates back to the mid-20th
century. However, due to the lack of suitable technology its progress
was fairly slow. In the 1980s, personal computers began to make it into
the mainstream, complete with the CPU power to display media such as
video. At this stage, however, media was limited to non-streaming media
such as CD Roms
The advent of the internet completely
revolutionised the whole process of streaming, opening up a host of new
and exciting possibilities. Initially this was curtailed by the
relatively slow speed of dial-up internet access. When broadband came
on the scene, however, streaming really took off and came into the
mainstream as a dominant media, and as an effective means of displaying
information to the masses. As broadband becomes increasingly more
widely available, including the rise in the usage of mobile broadband,
people now have greater access to the internet than ever before. This
has fuelled the demand for live
video streaming services.
Many companies are now offering IPTV. Giants BskyB
are among a number of broadcasters who offer free online streaming of
their channels to subscribers. Experts are predicting that in the
future, as technology continues to develop at a rapid pace, more and
more video content will be streamed via the internet. The devices used
to access streams will also develop, with 3G enabled mobile phone
handsets capable of streaming media in real-time becoming more widely
used.
The beauty of the internet is that it is a
cost-effective platform, which can allow you to stream media almost
instantaneously to audiences across the globe. One could cite YouTube
as a shining example of the level of demand for streaming media.
Many businesses have embraced this new technology offering useful and
entertaining streaming media content to help them establish strong
brand awareness.
Live vs. on-demand video streaming
Media streaming comes in 2 forms, live and on
demand. The difference between these is as follows:
Live
streaming is a real time, one-off broadcast of an event which
is transmitted instantly to the recipient.
On demand video streaming is stored on a server
and is transmitted at the user’s request.
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