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NAGRA, the Kudelski Group digital TV business and the world’s leading independent provider of content protection and multiscreen television solutions, announced today that its DRM technology, NAGRA MediaAccess Persistent Rights Management (PRM), was approved by the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) to protect the streaming of premium SD and HD content to open devices for its UltraViolet streaming service.
It takes a lot of confidence in the online entertainment market to devote two years and $20 million (£12.75 million) to the development of an end-to-end video platform for premium content. London-based Saffron Digital has done just that with Stage, which it describes as the industry’s first true end-to-end solution for premium OTT. It combines all the tools required to launch a multi-platform OTT entertainment service or UltraViolet storefront and is aimed at retailers, MSOs, TV broadcasters, mobile network operators and content owners that are seeking to launch new services or upgrade to the latest technology with the minimum of upfront investment. Stage encompasses a suite of products that includes MainStage for the creation of OTT services, MainStage UV for the creation of an UltraViolet storefront and BackStage, a custom content-management system (CMS). StagePlay is a device player that uses Saffron Digital’s own technology to control every key component of content delivery, ensuring the optimum user experience. StageCraft provides automated ingest, transcoding and encryption of content. - See more at: http://mesalliance.org/blog/2013/08/22/saffron-digital-delivers-stage-ott-platform-to-ibc-in-amsterdam/#sthash.iRnmHj5C.dpuf
Saffron Digital, which recently joined Akamai’s NetAlliance Partner Program, has leveraged its relationship with the leading cloud platform provider to launch a comprehensive end-to-end UltraViolet (UV) solution. The new solution will enable retailers, content owners, operators and device manufacturers to take advantage of the business opportunities presented by UV. Using a common file format (CFF), UV aims to engage consumers with the ultimate value proposition for premium video content: buy it anywhere and play it on any device you own. Saffron Digital, which has been offering UV-like digital locker services since 2009, has integrated its secure online video platform with Akamai’s Sola Media Solutions and global CDN to create an “out-of-the-box” UV solution that simplifies and shortens time to market. As part of the relationship, Saffron Digital will develop UV storefronts that have its proprietary CFF player at their core.
Further reinforcing the digital content ecosystem’s roster of technology support, Motorola Mobility’s SecureMedia content protection has been approved by the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) for streaming UltraViolet content. Now, service providers using SecureMedia can offer subscribers ready access to their UltraViolet digital entertainment collections anytime, anywhere and on any device.
SecureMedia is extending the purchasing, collecting and sharing content in the cloud experience to consumers’ favourite connected devices by giving service providers a way to encrypt and process UltraViolet content in compliance with DECE’s specifications for streaming content protection.
Rovi Corp.’s DivX streaming format has been approved by the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) for streaming use with UltraViolet. DECE is the industry-wide consortium behind the digital locker service. The approval allows DivX Plus Streaming to be used by UltraViolet retailers to deliver over-the-top video streaming video that adjusts itself based on available bandwidth, and supports 1080p, subtitles and multiple language tracks.
castLabs, a leading mobile video technologies and services company, today announces that the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) has selected the castLabs UltraViolet Download Service Provider (DSP) for use in the UltraViolet Compliance Verification Programme (CVP). As implementations of UltraViolet-licensed devices and media players (“UltraViolet Players”) become ready, DECE will use castLabs’ reference DSP to verify UltraViolet Players’ specification compliance.
At first glance, I thought UltraViolet was just what I needed to put my movie collection online. I was wrong. UltraViolet sounded good. "UltraViolet is DVD for the Internet. Just as the DVD logo means that you can buy a DVD from any seller and expect it to play in any player with a DVD logo (DVD players, DVD PCs, DVD entertainment systems in automobiles, and so on), the UltraViolet logo means you can buy UltraViolet movies from any seller, keep track of your 'online locker' or 'virtual collection' of movies, and expect them to play on anything with the UltraViolet logo (PCs, tablets, smartphones, Blu-ray players, cable set-top boxes, and so on)." Oh well, lots of things sound good at first.
It appears that Microsoft is picking up the pace on the addition of video streaming apps for the Xbox 360. After it took months for many of the more anticipated apps from the first wave like HBO Go, Verizon and Comcast to arrive, a new app from Paramount has been released just days after it was part of the next wave announced at E3. The Paramount Movies app is a console based version of its Ultraviolet service already unleashed on the PC and iOS, letting users stream digital copies from their cloud libraries.
The upcoming Academy on UltraViolet, set for May 16 at the Luxe Hotel on Sunset in Los Angeles, is a unique chance for the home entertainment industry’s key stakeholders to come together to determine how to ensure the success of UltraViolet technology. The Academy will also explore the marketing challenges and opportunities of the technology, in addition to what it takes for UltraViolet to ultimately reach the end consumer. SEE WEBSITE : http://www.ultravioletacademy.com
The Hybrid Broadcast Broadband TV (HbbTV) consortium has reacted quickly to the growing momentum behind the recently published MPEG-DASH HTTP adaptive streaming standard by incorporating it within the latest version of its specification. The consortium believes that, with the HTTP adaptive streaming support, it now has all the key ingredients for deployment of hybrid TV services combining broadcast with web content and interactive services. This is significant not just because it enables broadcasters to deliver content at higher quality over the Internet as part of hybrid services based on HbbTV, but also because it increases options for content protection. MPEG-DASH uses the Common Encryption Scheme (CENC) specifying standard encryption and key mapping methods that can be used by one or more Digital Rights Management (DRM) systems. It operates with a common format for the encryption related metadata necessary to decrypt the protected streams, therefore enabling content to be encrypted just once for handling in principle by any DRM. This support for multiple DRMs is a key requirement for multi-screen services deployed to a variety of device platforms that may have different protection mechanisms for content.
Slow uptake, technical problems, and poor user reviews bring UltraViolet's future into question. If UltraViolet fails to gain traction, it may jeopardize DASH. On the other hand, looking back two years from now, we may find the only vestiges of UltraViolet left are the common file format and common encryption schemes that DASH has adopted.
Via Olivier NOEL
Amazon says it has signed a deal with a major Hollywood studio for UltraViolet rights; Netflix pulls out of DECE.
Amazon has put its weight behind Ultraviolet (UV), the DRM/authentication system that gives users unlimited online access to movies once they've purchased a DVD.
It is the largest retailer to have joined the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) and gives the initiative a significant boost - just as Netflix has pulled out.
During a CES press conference updating its progress and future roadmap, the DECE consortium revealed it has 750,000 UltraViolet accounts in U.S. households since its launch in October. It predicts that number to dramatically rise during 2012
Interactive TV technology provider Rovi is using the CES show in Las Vegas to unveil an update to its Rovi Entertainment Store, the company’s white-label product for over-the-top storefront creation and management.
This new version will offer software development kits to streamline customer storefront launches, features including DivX Plus Streaming to help enhance the consumer viewing experience, and support for companies that wish to introduce UltraViolet-compatible services.
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Meanwhile Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE), the consortium behind the cloud-based Digital HD service UltraViolet, is looking into adding support not just for 4K but for higher dynamic range and related features. Blu-Ray Discs with 4K support could be a reality by the end of the year, according to the Blu-Ray Disc Association’s global promotions committee chair Victor Matsuda. Talking to THR at CES, he noted that the BDA board recently approved work to extend Blu-Ray to include 4K and will be exploring the best possible technical blueprint.
The latest MPEG-DASH insights from Akamai, castLabs, Digital Primates, Dolby, Fraunhofer, Microsoft, MPEG DASH Industry Forum, Unified Streaming & Wowza...
2009 Master’s Thesis by Muhammad Rizwan Asghar
Deluxe Digital Distribution is expanding its video catalog service, which encodes videos to enable viewing across multiple devices, to cover the needs of over-the-top (OTT) video providers and to enable use with UltraViolet. Deluxe On Demand provides access to tens of thousands of pre-encoded and pre-encrypted movie and TV titles in more than 50 formats, allowing users to access content on set-tops, PCs, Apple and Android devices, gaming consoles and connected HDTVs.
Digital Rights Management (DRM), at its most basic level, has traditionally been considered as the strategic use of technology to monitor and enforce intellectual property licensing agreements by controlling access to digital content as it is being distributed, protecting it from unauthorized use or downright theft. In the modern world, however, the notion of "broadcasting video" now includes over-the-air terrestrial signal distribution, along with cable, satellite, Internet, and mobile/data network broadcasting of content to, seemingly, an unlimited number of viewing devices. In that universe, the DRM label represents a constantly evolving, often proprietary, network of technologies and protocols used by broadcasters to secure the links of a content chain wherever those links are heading.
It is possible to overstate the complexity of multi-screen video, but the absolute number and types of display devices are indeed increasing, which means that efforts to promote standards and greater simplicity address a live concern. A current initiative, playing out within the MPEG-DASH Industry Forum, among other places, to enable digital rights management (DRM) interoperability is a case in point. Building his case for a common downloadable DRM framework that is independent of but compatible with CE devices of all shapes and sizes, Tranter (VP at NDS, now part of Cisco) names three standards that could play a foundational role, namely: * Simulcrypt—the long-standing DVB protocol published by ETSI used to enable multiple key management systems; * MPEG-DASH—Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH), which became an ISO standard in late 2011; and * UltraViolet—an authentication and cloud-based rights system deployed over the past few years by a consortium of studios, manufacturers and service providers.
With EDC Private Cloud, Jeff Malkin, president of Encoding.com, says his company has solved the problem of premium content, finally bringing cloud encoding to major players. The solution includes fast and secure file ingest and upload (with partner Aspera), high-end processors, and vast storage. One key advantage is EDC Private Cloud's ability to move files quickly: Malkin says it can move files five to six times faster than Amazon can from S3 to EC2. EDC Private Cloud offers Dolby Surround Sound audio, Widevine DRM, and UltraViolet compatibility. Besides winning on speed, Malkin asserts that EDC Private Cloud, which uses an automated workflow, also wins on price. In its beta period, he says, it won RFPs with Synacor and Midwest Tape, turning in prices that are 20 percent of current market pricing.
The UltraViolet initiative has given a boost to the notion of cloud-based digital lockers as the route to secure multiscreen on-demand availability. But does the concept make sense for pay TV operators? Anna Tobin reports. Keeping your content in a virtual ‘cloud’ that can be accessed any time, any place on any audiovisual device is no longer the stuff of pipe dreams. It can be done. The technology is there; and it’s now so intuitive that it won’t take long for consumers, whatever their age, to find their way around it either. What everyone is trying to work out is how it can be done securely and therefore profitably. And, in most cases, it’s content rights that are causing the problems. Unless it’s his or her own content, the consumer only owns or has the right to view the content he or she buys for ‘anytime, anywhere’ viewing with restrictions. They can only access their ‘cloud library’ on a set number of authorised devices and in authorised territories. And too many restrictions will slow down the mass-market roll out of ‘whenever, wherever’ initiatives and make things incredibly messy.
DTS, Inc. will showcase its premium audio technology in the South Hall at the 2012 NAB Show, April 16-19 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Visitors to booth SU7619 will experience an array of exhibits showcasing DTS' end-to-end solutions and high-quality audio integrations into content authoring tools for UltraViolet, IPTV, and digital delivery. Specifically, the DTS booth will feature: - Tools in support of the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem's (DECE) UltraViolet standard: * Digital Rapids Transcode Manager 2.0 powered by Kayak * Elemental Server from Elemental Technologies-transcodes file-based content to DECE Ultraviolet CFF format * Rovi TotalCode Professional encoding solution-integrates DTS Express with output files including MP4 and UltraViolet CFF * DTS-HD MediaPlayer enables audio and video quality control playback of UltraViolet compatible CFF files - Tools for digital delivery and broadcast IPTV...
At NAB2012, Elemental will demonstrate features and functionality recently implemented in Elemental’s software engine: - Encoding of multiple video streams using the new MPEG-DASH streaming protocol, with support for both ISO FF and MPEG-2 profiles (VOD and live content) - DECE Ultraviolet asset creation for secure and ubiquitous digital content distribution - Audio loudness management that enables compliance with the CALM Act (VOD and live content) - Advanced decoding functionality for professional codecs including J2K, ProRes, and AVC-I - Decoding and encoding for 4K TVs, the Retina screen on the new iPad, and other devices capable of greater than 1080p display - Expanded support for closed captioning and subtitles including teletext, DVB subtitles and TTML
A panel at this week’s CES show in Las Vegas yielded two pieces of positive news for the DECE/UltraViolet standard, after a launch several months ago with Warner Bros. and its Flixster subsidiary that could charitably be called “premature.” Of the two news items, one is a nice to have, but the other is a game-changer.
With the number of devices supporting IP video continues to expand, content creators are seeking ways to reach consumers on as many screens and as many devices as possible. That’s the impetus behind cable’s TV Everywhere initiative, as well as Hollywood’s new UltraViolet video format. In order to cater to these customers, Akamai is rolling out new capabilities to its HD Network for video distribution that will make it even easier for content owners to securely distribute content to nearly any device.
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