FEED Magazine: Journey to Cloud Playout
Pixel Power divulges the practicalities, advantages and disadvantages of cloud playout in the latest edition of FEED Magazine.
The broadcast industry has a habit of lusting over the shiniest, newest thing and jumping for it without taking the necessary steps to get there beforehand. Right now, that shiny new thing is cloud playout, a flexible and scaleable solution for broadcasters wanting to spin up channels faster, deliver traditional and OTT content more efficiently, and ensure a low-cost, reliable disaster recovery strategy (just in case there's a pandemic or something).
But is it a destination all broadcasters need to go to? If so, how do we get there and what do we need to consider? Pixel Power, a Rohde & Schwarz company, answers these questions and delivers a comprehensive journey to cloud playout, with comments from CEO James Gilbert.
TECHNOLOGY EVOLUTION
Broadcast technology has evolved to the point where it's possible to deliver linear and non-linear content from the public cloud. Up until quite recently, a linear playout chain was built from separate pieces of dedicated hardware and controlled using serial or Ethernet cabling. Broadcasters could choose the different components from various manufacturers - a best of breed' approach - and would expect their chosen automation system to control them and make them work seamlessly together to deliver their required output. As general-purpose computing power increased and became more affordable, it became possible to implement certain functions of a hardware-built playout chain within software; creating channel in a box'playout devices, which were capable of collapsing several hardware functions into a single device. However, graphics, DVE and subtitling would still rely on dedicated hardware boxes, as these functions are more specialised and require extra computing power that goes beyond what an underlying general-purpose computer can provide.
Today, general-purpose computing power is continuing to increase and IP standards for video and audio streams are evolving fast. New integrated playout vendors have emerged with experience in areas like graphics and subtitling, and hardware devices have been completely replaced by software modules, with SDI transports replaced by IP streams. The dedicated hardware is gone, and the complete linear playout chain is pure software. This means that it can be virtualised and deployed in a private data centre or public cloud.
DATA CENTRE VERSUS PUBLIC CLOUD
Cloud means different things to different people. For some, it's a private data centre, made up of racks full of standard computer servers; for others, it's a public cloud provider like AWS, Azure or Google, which make their own computers, explains Pixel Power CEO James Gilbert. A private data centre invariably offers broadcasters more flexibility in infrastructure than a public cloud provider, since it may be possible to install dedicated hardware equipment or even some SDI infrastructure if needed. Public cloud implementation is different: there is no possibility of changing the infrastructure, so the solution must be able to work within the constraints of the specific cloud offering.
But there are many reasons broadcasters are considering deploying some or all of their content delivery in the public cloud. Gilbert says: If you're a media business, your focus isn't going to be on running data centres, it's going to be on creating content; content that inspires your viewers. You don't want to be concerned with building and maintaining a big infrastructure project. The public cloud can be purchased on a usage basis, so there's no need to invest up front in hardware infrastructure; it can be scaled up or down depending on changing market and business needs; and most public cloud vendors offer a range of different virtual machine types with varying degrees of computing power if more features need to be added. Furthermore, most public cloud vendors offer a wide range of locations, which may be useful for legal, commercial and practical purposes.
If there is a festival or sports event that a broadcaster wants to cover for a short amount of time, they can quickly and cost-effectively launch a new channel in the cloud and take it off the service line-up once the event is finished. In addition, cloud playout simplifies disaster recovery, since a broadcaster can contract a cloud back-up more cost-efficiently than an on-premises playout. This is because a cloud backup has the option to start up and create the operational cost only in the event of a disaster, whereas an on-premises backup needs a dedicated pre-investment for a disaster event. There are some disadvantages - the biggest one being cost. Certainly, for a 24/7 broadcaster, cloud deployment would cost more over a three-year period than hosting an equivalent infrastructure on their own premises. Gilbert explains: If you're running a 24/7 operation, you don't need the kind of flexibility that a public cloud provider would give you to start up a channel, run it for a few hours and then shut it down. It makes far more sense to invest in your own infrastructure, because it will be cheaper than renting it by the hour or reserving it for a year.
CONSIDERATIONS
When implementing a cloud-based playout, there are considerations that need to be made. For example, there are many ways to use public cloud infrastructure for your playout. You can rent it and be responsible for the software installing and operation yourself; or you can purchase a fully managed service through a third-party vendor who purchases the infrastructure from the cloud provider. Gilbert enthuses: For optimum cost reduction and greatest flexibility and control, running your own cloud-based infrastructure is preferred, provide
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FEED Magazine: Journey to Cloud Playout 
