<TITLE: System Components for Video on Demand: Architecture and Implementation
ACADEMIC DOMAIN: technology
DISCIPLINE: information technology
EVENT TYPE: doctoral defence presentation
FILE ID: UDEFP080
NOTES: continued in UDEFD080

RECORDING DURATION: 20 min 50 sec

RECORDING DATE: 3.6.2004

NUMBER OF PARTICIPANTS: unknown

NUMBER OF SPEAKERS: 1

S1: NATIVE-SPEAKER STATUS: Romanian; ACADEMIC ROLE: research student; GENDER: male; AGE: 24-30>


<S1> <USES POWERPOINT> in my presentation today i would like to introduce you to video on demand in future problem that make the (future distant) and solution that (xx) (so far) , so what is video on demand er this is the user (interface) you see the contents on your TV and you have your remote control and you you select a movie to watch with your remote control and then you select it there is some some form of payment (going on) and then the movie starts immediately we see immediately these (xx) or whatever er this is a very close as concept in the movie rental shop of today so this i think that this partly partly may be even will be based to kind of movie rental shop , so why er why this work is done because er actually most people would choose video on demand over going to movie rental shop if their price would be the same or similar because i think it's much more comfortable to just sit in your couch in front of your TV and er , decide in ten seconds that you would like to watch a game and just maybe 20 seconds after that you select the game and you already er watch it rather than having to go to this movie rental shop and er and try to select a movie from there and er today there is no video on demand in our homes and er this work intends to bring video on demand closer to our present , er to go forward forward from this point er i introduce you to digital TV and internet , er common digital TV er it's er a combination of several things it (usually stands for co-overt) modulated (xx) er to watch digital TV today you need a demodulator which is different for several different kind of depending how digital TV is er transmitted to to the home and you also need an MPEG-2 decoder , the common solution to this is a so-called set-top box which is something that actually sits near your TV and it has inside this demodulator and the MPEG-2 decoder and er there are also some additional components and they have the the benefit of digital TV you have to have decryption module er conax is used all over in finland and there is electronic program that which makes you see what er what's er er er if they don't see some information about the current show but about the upcoming er shows and er we have multiple audio tracks maybe it's original track maybe it's something in local language and you have er multiple subtitles and the the last (one look) very similar with the the feature that are not currently (used) , how digital TV comes to home currently there are four possibilities you can have a er digital er a satellite link so the then the digital TV comes from the satellite and for to receive this you need a dish antenna and a satellite set-top box and there is er terrestrial for which you need the terrestrial antenna and terrestrial set-top box er it came came on the same cable as analogy TV for this you need er cable set-top box which connect to to the to the the wall socket and then it can also come over phone lines using er ADSL technology and it's usually carried over by I-P and for this you you need the DSL modem and I-P set-top box and these two can be also in the same box , er example of such thing is a er is a i think that one of the best in europe is in france where you can get the phone service and one megabyte per second internet access plus TV with about 30 channels , and then there's also mobile er this is a slightly different thing because er the the receiver is different and many many concepts are quite different there , er , today we have er four types of delivery channels this requires actually four types of set-top boxes which is not a very convenient thing and er it's quite confusing for the customers , and i think that in the future maybe in five years or so er most TVs will have some demodulators inside and er er there will be also MPEG-2 decoders or digital decoders and maybe (going to the also) I-P connection so i will say that maybe set-top box to receive digital TV it's not going to be needed anymore but set-top box will be needed to support interactive TV , what is interactive TV interactive TV is basically digital TV and applications combined and we can er have two categories of applications er we can have the (help) services that do not require er communication from the set-top box (xx) the server with er something which is called return path and er an example of this will be er horse race where the application allows you to place bets but because these bets are not communicated to er to anybody if you win only your TV will know that you have win and maybe the TV will congratulate you but in interactive services er the the application makes use of this communication which will be er return path and if you place these bets if you win the application server will know about it and er er this will mean that the broadcaster will know that you win and maybe you can get some money , so the the natural question is that is there a link between V-O-D digital TV and interactive TV and er i would say that such a link does exist and even if traditionally V-O-D is not regarded as an interactive TV application er i would say that V-O-D will come (to cater) after interactive TV , so we can see V-O-D as an interactive TV application so what what does this require this require V-O-D requires basically two two important things er it requires a network with er high bandwidth which is dedicated to each client because er in theory each client receives a different one , and it also requires a two-way communication because you you have to make known your choice to the server , and er the best on the on the current er medias for delivering digital TV we can say that some are better for video on demand than others and i would say that from my study the TV cable network are much better than satellite and terrestrial because they they fulfil both requirements needed by video on demand which is high bandwidth and two-way communications and in in satellite and in terrestrial er there is not so high bandwidth that er sending something to each client would be er would be cost-effective and also er return channel may be quite (big) to (protect) , so currently we are we are here and i would say that digital TV will grow more and more as a percentage of population and that one day we are going to be here and probably not everybody will have er interactive TV i would say that most people will have digital TV in their homes but and maybe something like 70 80 per cent of them will have digital TV and interactive TV and maybe a great part of these people will also have V-O-D , er this is what (i've been thinking) that are going to be er the killer applications for interactive TV so i would say that er V-O-D games and er advertising are going to be the killer applications for TV and V-O-D and games are er it er (make) the interest of the users so they will they have this thing and advertising will (make) the interest of the industry because currently the advertisement is not so effective than it used to be and er maybe er (well) nice application is going to be interface (reality TV) , i would say that e-mail and web browsing are not going to be killer applications people will not go to interactive TV just to have e-mail web browsing , er this is my my opinion about the fight for the interactive interactive TV set-top box so currently there is the there is some (thought) of competition who will bring the interactive TV set-top box to people and er i think that in this competition there are several players several industries which which are are going to to dominate the fight and er from from one side the interactive TV set-top box is going to to change from current game console and er current companies in this business are sony microsoft and (xx) nintendo and er because games will be probably a killer application to to the interactive TV it would be very easy for game console to add to their er current platform to add the decoding for digital TV and er to to add communication but microsoft already has communication embedded in their X-box but it's it's not used , and this er application programming interface each of the game console has its own own platform for development , then er in the last years er it emerged the concept that er media-centred PC which is something that stays in your living room and connect to your TV to your er very nice audio systems and it's able to to have er DVD playback and it's er able to , to have er to to play your erm digital music files and er currently it's also able to to decode er digital TV so it has many many services which are related with the that actually use your TV and your audio audio systems , and then er there are the traditional digital TV industry consumer electronic industry will push for their bottom solution the digital TV set-top box to interactive TV and here there are many (xx) so they show on TV media highway (xx) microsoft did it so we can also see that on on this side also the the there are many many problems , and i would say that er each of these industries has advantages and disadvantages , and for game console the advantage is that they are coming far more (xx) very very dynamic market with clear application so when people buy a game console they know exactly what they are buying they know exactly for what they are (xx) they expect to change their er game console every say two years and buy a more powerful one after that , er for er er interactive TV coming from media centre PCs the advantage is also coming from a clear dynamic market with clear applications so when you have your PC basically you you know what applications you are using and the the market is also dynamic because you are expecting to to change your er PC every few years , er the disadvantage in game console is that er games are not appealing to everyone so that er they will never have let's say er a market share above some per cent and the disadvantage for media centre PCs are that they are basically quite expensive and they require also some PC-related knowledge , er the advantage for interactive TV set-top boxes coming from digital TV set-top boxes is that maybe this is the the cheapest solution and maybe it's going to be simplest to use from all but the the disadvantage is that the the benefits are not clear for everybody not not everybody buying a digital today digital TV (similar) today has er has a clear concept of what interactive TV means and people do not see the the benefits of going from digital TV to interactive TV , and the the market here is not dynamic so you don't expect to buy a new set-top box every two years so to make this market dynamic somehow the interactive TV need to really to to change this (perception) that we buy something related to TV once and it stays there for many years , and er then there is also quite much infrastructure to develop so what these people would need to develop the different operating system and some applications and maybe there's not enough experience to do this and on the on the other side here the they are coming from linux and windows (place) quite much experience both about the operation system and about the possible application and in game console er there are quite many games which would (need) the application for the X-box er and playstation platforms , some conclusions about the interactive TV , i think there are going to be many platforms and many (xx) and this is going to be a (niche) in the beginning until maybe one of these will actually emerge as as a winner and then there are going to be probably many (xx) so MPEG-2 will not disappear in the next ten years maybe and there's also MPEG-4 but then it will (xx) and windows (need to unite) and it can be that due to er economic reasons er set-top box at some point it's would need to support all these things and then there are many communications protocol there is er transport stream I-P related protocols and er then so many things and er there are and there will be many (xx) vendors for all these things , this is quite a price dependent market because er people will not pay so much for TV and i think that the adoption of interactive TV is going to de- depend quite much on marketing strategies , so er based on these conclusions i would say that there are some problems in interactive TV and V-O-D and er , i would say that to the to many (products) from the previous (xx) it means that there will be compatibility issues and er i will say that price is a very impor- important factor here because nobody will spend hundreds of euros on TV every month even if it's interactive and er maybe critical applications are not available on all the competing interactive TV platforms today and er the the user interface in interact- interactive TV has to be something simple to use and that meaning something that you can actually use from your couch so this is maybe no typing and no kinds of pointing device to use , and er also heterogeneous systems will have to be managed in a effective manner , so all this to all these problems there are solutions (in my thesis) . <READING ALOUD> now i ask you professor <NAME S2> and professor <NAME S3> as opponents appointed by the department of information technology to make such remarks concerning my dissertation that you consider pertinent </READING ALOUD> </S1>
