Aiming to improve the quality and reliability of streaming video, Disney Streaming and Lumen Technologies have entered into a collaboration to produce standardised CDN configuration metadata and application programming interfaces (APIs) for the streaming video industry.
Working under the auspices of the Streaming Video Alliance (SVA), the companies say there are attempting to simplify and increase the efficiency of streaming video delivery as bringing high-quality video content to billions of screens worldwide is a complex series of processes that requires careful cooperation between content publishers, content delivery networks (CDNs), and internet service providers (ISPs).
The project will attempt to develop standardised metadata will allow content providers to use a common metadata model and a single API to publish CDN configurations to vendors. Without this standardisation, warns the SVA, organisations must separately model and publish metadata within each CDN vendor’s proprietary API or management portal. It adds that for large organisations with multiple brands, proprietary APIs are inefficient, error-prone, and costly – issues that negatively affect the customer experience.
With contributions and leadership from Disney Streaming and Lumen, the SVA recently published the first version of the Configuration Interface Specifications – the technical specifications document that will serve as the streaming industry’s guide for standardisation. Version two is underway, and work is expected to be completed by the end of the year.
“We believe all streaming providers will benefit from standardisation across commercial CDN providers and the Open Cache industry, which is why we’ve led the charge, working alongside companies like Lumen, on evangelising this important work,” explained Michael Fay, vice president, software engineering, Disney Streaming. “Hundreds of millions of subscribers already engage with Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+ and Star+, and as demand increases for our direct-to-consumer platforms, we believe standardisation will be a key driver in maintaining our reputation in delivering a high-quality viewing experience for subscribers at scale.”
“Lumen operates one of the largest CDNs in the world via the Lumen Edge Platform…Developing standards that reduce complexity for our media customers is key to our shared success, now and in the future,” added Pierre-louis Theron, Lumen vice president of product management for content delivery services. “We will continue to contribute significant work and insight to the standardisation effort, relying on the deep expertise we have gained from years of experience building and operating our own CDN.”
“Commercial CDNs and open caching systems have many common requirements when it comes to defining and publishing configuration metadata,” said Glenn Goldstein, Lumen CDN product strategist and lead editor of the SVA’s Configuration Interface Specifications. “We knew we could help the industry leverage those commonalities while still helping every company achieve its own interests. We started by agreeing upon a set of drivers that benefited all industry participants. These included standardising feature definitions, providing for DevOps-friendly automation, and allowing technology vendors to differentiate.”