Linear and Non-Linear Video and TV Applications E-Book

Daniel Minoli

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Wissenschaft und neue Technologien
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 644

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

Provides options for implementing IPv6 and IPv6 multicast in service provider networks

New technologies, viewing paradigms, and content distribution approaches are taking the TV/video services industry by storm. Linear and Nonlinear Video and TV Applications: Using IPv6 and IPv6 Multicast identifies five emerging trends in next-generation delivery of entertainment-quality video. These trends are observable and can be capitalized upon by progressive service providers, telcos, cable operators, and ISPs.

This comprehensive guide explores these evolving directions in the TV/video services industry, including worldwide deployment of IPv6, IPTV services, web-produced video content, and the plethora of different screens available, from TV to iPad. It offers practical suggestions as to how these technologies can be implemented in service provider networks to support cost-effective delivery of entertainment, and how new revenue-generating services can be brought to market.

Important topics include:

• Evolving video consumption habits and possible network implications
• An overview of IPv6 address capabilities, protocols, quality of service (QoS), and more
• Process descriptions of IP multicast and IPv6 multicast approaches and challenges
• A detailed overview of IPTV systems and technologies, including architectural requirements, QoE and QoS, security and content protection, networks, and more
• Internet-based TV technologies: streaming, content distribution networks, P2P networks, and cloud computing
• Non-traditional video content sources and their implications

Linear and Nonlinear Video and TV Applications: Using IPv6 and IPv6 Multicast is indispensable reading for planners, CTOs, and engineers at broadcast TV operations, Cable TV operations, satellite operations, Internet and IS providers, telcos, and wireless providers.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Cover

Title page

Copyright page

Dedication

PREFACE

1 Evolving Viewing Paradigms

1.1 OVERVIEW OF THE EVOLVING ENVIRONMENT

1.2 NEW CONTENT SOURCES AND SINKS

1.3 TECHNOLOGY TRENDS (SNAPSHOT)

1.4 REVENUE-GENERATION TRENDS

1.5 GENERAL INFRASTRUCTURE IMPLICATIONS FOR SERVICE PROVIDERS

1.6 SCOPE OF THE INVESTIGATION

APPENDIX 1A BACKGROUND STATISTICS AND FORECAST

2 An Overview of IPv6

2.1 OVERVIEW AND MOTIVATIONS

2.2 ADDRESS CAPABILITIES

2.3 IPv6 PROTOCOL OVERVIEW

2.4 HEADER COMPRESSION SCHEMES

2.5 QUALITY OF SERVICE (QoS) IN IPv6

2.6 MIGRATION STRATEGIES TO IPv6

APPENDIX 2A IPv6 RFCs

3 An Overview of IP Multicast and Multicast Principles

3.1 MULTICAST ENVIRONMENT

3.2 BASIC MULTICAST CONCEPTS AND PROTOCOLS

3.3 IP MULTICAST ADDRESSES

3.4 INTERNET GROUP MANAGEMENT PROTOCOL (IGMP)

4 IPv6 Multicast Approaches

4.1 OVERVIEW

4.2 IPv6 MULTICAST ADDRESSES

4.3 MEDIA ACCESS CONTROL (MAC) LAYER ADDRESSES ASPECTS

4.4 SIGNALING

4.5 ROUTING

4.6 RENDEZVOUS POINT (RP) APPROACHES

4.7 MULTICAST LISTENER DISCOVERY (MLD)

5 Evolving Traditional and Nontraditional TV Services

5.1 BASIC SERVICES

5.2 ADVANCED SERVICES

6 IPTV Systems and Technologies

6.1 OVERVIEW AND STAKEHOLDER UNIVERSE

6.2 IPTV ARCHITECTURES AND ARCHITECTURAL REQUIREMENTS

6.3 QoE AND QoS

6.4 SERVICE SECURITY AND CONTENT PROTECTION

6.5 IPTV NETWORKS

6.6 END SYSTEMS AND INTEROPERABILITY ASPECTS

6.7 MIDDLEWARE, APPLICATION, AND CONTENT PLATFORMS

6.8 IPTV STANDARDS: A COMPREHENSIVE PROCESS

APPENDIX 6A NEXT-GENERATION NETWORKS (NGN) AND IP MULTIMEDIA SUBSYSTEM (IMS)

APPENDIX 6B IPTV PROTOCOLS USED BY IPTV TERMINAL DEVICES

7 Technologies for Internet-Based TV

7.1 STREAMING

7.2 CONTENT DELIVERY NETWORKS

7.3 P2P NETWORKS

7.4 CLOUD COMPUTING

7.5 CORE INTERNET TECHNOLOGIES

7.6 STORAGE TECHNOLOGIES TO SUPPORT IBTV

7.7 SERVICE PROVIDER STRATEGIES FOR NTTV

APPENDIX 7A A PERSPECTIVE ON THE FUTURE

8 Nontraditional Video Display and Content Sources

8.1 NTTV TRENDS

8.2 NTTV DISPLAY UNITS

8.3 NTTV CONTENT SOURCES

GLOSSARY

Index

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Copyright © 2012 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

Minoli, Daniel, 1952–

 Linear and nonlinear video and TV applications: using IPv6 and IPv6 multicast / Daniel Minoli.

p. cm.

 Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 978-1-118-18658-9 (hardback)

1. Internet television. 2. Digital video. 3. Multicasting (Computer networks) I. Title.

 TK5105.887.M58 2012

 621.388'07–dc23

2011049650

For Anna

PREFACE

Today anyone with a broadband Internet connection can see live or near-live TV from over 2,250 channels from over 140 countries, and the list is growing monthly. Tonight I can watch the nightly news from Luxembourg at http://www.rtl.lu or the whole “Doc Martin” series on http://www.Hulu.com from a boat marooned in the Chesapeake Bay or select from thousands of other programming choices.

New technologies, new viewing paradigms, and new content distribution approaches are about to take the TV/video services industry by storm. Five emerging trends related to the next-generation delivery of entertainment-quality video are observable, which can be capitalized upon by progressive service providers, telcos, cable operators, and ISPs. These trends are: (1) the (gradual) worldwide deployment of IP Version 6 (IPv6); (2) the (gradual) deployment of streaming and IPTV services; (3) the gradual migration of consumer viewing habits from watching linear (real-time) programming to nonlinear (on-demand/stored/time-shifted) programming (whether from a local or networked Digital Video Recorder [DVR]); (4) the greater interest and reliance on web-produced video content; and (5) the plethora of screens upon which video can be consumed: the TV screen, the personal computer screen, the tablet screen (Kindle/iPad, and so on), game consoles, and the cell/smartphone screen.

Indeed, in the developed world, at the consumer end, not only do the viewers have a variety of output devices to display video content, but also their viewing habits are changing. Nielsen found that time shifting usage with DVRs (also called “nonlinear viewing” or “Television On-Demand” by some) was up 40 percent year-over-year in recent years, with U.S. consumers playing back more than 8 hours per month (against a total TV screen-based viewing of 153 hours a month). The term “TiVo it” has entered the vocabulary just like the term “google it.” Online video watching is beginning to grow as consumers upgrade their PCs to support increased video handling and as broadband connectivity to homes becomes more pervasive. In 2009 in the United States, home consumers enjoyed over 29 hours per month of Internet-based video. Nielsen also found that mobile video viewing has grown at a rate of over 50% per year in recent years. A transition from broadcast to multicast, and even to low-density narrowcast—these last two either in linear or time-shifted/on-demand—is afoot.

Over the next few years, these changes are expected to have tidal impacts on the infrastructure used to deliver content, from broadcast TV to IP-based networks operating over fiber, to satellite delivery, to 3G/4G wireless networks, to server-based, on-demand content distribution systems. Major sectors of the video distribution industry worry if the greater reliance on DVRs and Internet-based video streaming by consumers means an erosion or shifting of advertisement revenues. Infrastructure providers need to be keenly aware of the impact that these evolving viewer paradigms will have on their networks and even their revenue stream. An understanding of where the technology is going may empower providers to position themselves, in fact, to take advantage of these new trends.

This book is aimed at exploring these evolving trends and offering practical suggestions for how these technologies can be implemented in the service provider networks to support cost-effective delivery of entertainment, especially considering the shifts in viewing habits, and suggestions for how new revenue-generating services can be brought to the market. Chapter 1 discusses some of the evolving video consumption habits and the possible network implications. The chapters that follow cover enabling technologies. Chapter 2 provides an overview of IPv6. Chapter 3 discusses IP multicast and multicast principles, while Chapter 4 focuses on IPv6 multicast approaches and challenges. Chapter 5 describes evolving video services that are of interest to consumers, especially for service-provider environments. Chapter 6 is an overview of IPTV, which is considered to be the platform of choice for service provider–based, packetized video delivery, although it is not the only platform for IP-based video delivery. Chapter 7 looks indeed at the other platforms, such as streaming, Content Delivery Networks, Peer-to-Peer systems, cloud computing, and Internet backbones and access networks. Chapter 7 also looks at the implications of these technologies and the evolving viewing habits in terms of the kind of network evolution that may be required to optimally support end-of-decade video services. Finally, Chapter 8 describes some of the new content sources. Note, however, that the examples of commercial services and service providers identified in Chapter 8 and at various points throughtout this text are intended only to depict what we believe to be persistent technical/usage trends. Some of these services, products, or providers may disappear; some providers may sunset initiatives or offerings over time; yet others will emerge. Thus, we believe that the general trends discussed here, as a whole, will persist and prevail.

This is believed to be the first book on IPv6 multicasting and/or IPv6 multicasting with applications to linear and nonlinear video distribution. This work will be of interest to planners, CTOs, and engineers at broadcast TV operations, Cable TV operations, satellite operations, Internet and ISP providers, telcos, and wireless providers, both domestically and in the rest of the world. Also, it will be of interest to set-top box developers, storage vendors, content developers, content distribution outfits, and content aggregators. This compilation is not intended to be exhaustive. Rather, it is a summary survey of generally available materials synthesized to punctuate evolving industry trends and the need for service providers to enhance their infrastructure and networks as required.

DANIEL MINOLI

1

Evolving Viewing Paradigms

1.1 OVERVIEW OF THE EVOLVING ENVIRONMENT

Many industry observers share the view that “The television sector is facing a challenging and an unprecedented period of transformation … Television [is] at Crossroads.”1 A number of forces are expected to reshape the video distribution and consumption environments during this decade. Major drivers for this evolution include (1) new viewing habits, such as time shifting for nonlinear and on-demand content consumption, (2) new distribution channels (effectively, new content providers, especially Internet-based, along with new transport mechanism, such as streaming), (3) new technologies, and, (4) standardization of Internet Protocol (IP)-based delivery, especially in conjunction multicast-based IP Television (IPTV) networks and/or with web-based content downloading (streaming) and social networks.

New viewer paradigms are evolving related to consumption of entertainment video and TV programming that can be summarized as “anywhere, anything, anytime, any platform”; namely, “from any source, any content, in any (encoded) form, at any time, on any user-chosen device, consumed at any location.” Many new TV sets that now have Ethernet networking connections built directly into the set and require no additional equipment or set-top boxes (STBs) for directly accessing the Internet; also, many high-end TVs already come with the ability to conduct video calls. In the view of some industry observers, these viewer habits, technologies, and approaches will play a part in eventually supplanting broadcast and cable television with Internet programming and distribution. While these predictions may not come to such a full dénouement in the immediate short or medium term, say, mid-decade, it is worth, nonetheless, to consider what the potential implications are for all stakeholders for the end-of-the-decade and beyond.

In this work, we refer to this new paradigm as Nontraditional TV (NTTV). New viewer approaches include, but are not limited to the following:

Watching entertainment/news using the Internet (such as a TV show, a movie, or a short clip).

Watching a multicast (rather than broadcast) entertainment/news program.

Watching a video on-demand (VoD) program (such as a movie or pay-per-view event; VoD is also known as content on-demand [CoD]).

Watching time-shifted TV (TSTV):

utilizing home-based hardware; or

utilizing network-based hardware.

Watching entertainment/news with a mobile smartphone, a PDA (personal digital assistant), a videogame console (e.g., the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony PlayStation 3), a tablet screen (e.g., Amazon Kindle Fire/Apple iPad/B&N Nook), or a device in a car or boat.

Watching user-generated content (UGC), particularly utilizing social networks.

In this work, time shifted implies the capture of (what was) a live-TV program, either by a customer device or a user-programmable network-resident device, for playback within a relatively short time (up to a few days). Time shifting does not include, in our definition, VoD downloads of a commercially packaged video clip from a Cable TV provider or from an Internet site. Some other related definitions are in order as follows:

Internet television

(also known as Internet TV, online TV) is a television service distributed via the Internet by streaming, as exemplified by services such as Hulu (for U.S. content) and BBC iPlayer (for U.K content). The content is typically commercially produced TV material, but the “transmission/distribution” channel is the Internet; the “transmission/distribution” also includes network-resident storage (supported by video servers). Internet TV content is delivered over the open Internet as the term implies (not over a dedicated IP network). Content providers can reach consumers directly, regardless of the carrier or carriers providing the Internet backbone connectivity or Internet access. Video content is accessible from any Internet-ready computer device and is accessible around the world—a consumer does use STBs, although increasingly TV sets and STBs have direct Internet connections themselves. Video content is now increasingly available on the Internet. In the past, Internet TV has suffered from low quality; this limitation is now being progressively overcome due to greater bandwidth availability in the Internet core and in the consumer’s access. Some approaches also use peer-to-peer (P2P) protocols.

Web television

(Web TV, also known as web video) is a genre of digital entertainment distinct from traditional television: in Web TV, the content is created specifically for first viewing on the Internet (via broadband access and/or on mobile networks.) Web television shows, or Web series, are original episodic shorts (2–9 minutes per episode at press time, although longer episodes may appear in the future). Some notable series include

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

,

The Guild

, and

Prom Queen

. Web television networks included the following at press time (however, some of these also post TV-originated material): The WB.com,

2

MySpace, YouTube, Blip.tv, and Crackle.

Time-shifted TV

is a service or capability that allows the consumer to watch a TV program originally as a broadcast-, cable-, satellite-, or IPTV-transmission, that has been time shifted. The time shift service has two flavors. In a basic flavor, the user can preplan the recording of a scheduled TV program (using a local user-owned device, a local cable-provided device, or a remote network-based device); the user can watch the program any time later while still being able to pause, rewind, and resume the playout. Some systems allow the user to skip commercial advertisements during playback. In a more advanced flavor, the service allows a user to halt a scheduled content service in real time and allows the user to continue watching the program later, by providing buffering for pause, rewind, and resume functions. Some refer to time-shifted TV as “catch-up TV,” being that it allows consumers to watch a broadcaster’s program at their own convenience.

IPTV

is a framework and architecture that when instantiated in an actual network supports efficient distribution of (targeted) multimedia services, such as television/video/audio/text/graphics/data. The content is delivered over IP-based networks (these being IP Version 4 (IPv4) based and/or IP Version 6 (IPv6) based, instead of being traditional cable-based) that are tightly managed to support the required level of quality of service/quality of experience (QoS/QoE), security, interactivity, and reliability. Its services are provided to customers via a subscription mechanism very similar to traditional Cable TV service.