How Video Works, 3rd Edition

21Streaming Media

The delivery landscape of broadcast television has expanded from the traditional digital terrestrial, satellite and cable television methods to include streaming media. With streaming media, consumers don’t have to be tied to the TVs in their living rooms or the rigid time slots dictated by broadcast television to savor their video entertainment. They are free to time shift or watch shows at a later time, or to place shift by watching from a different location, or device shift and watch shows on devices other than a TV such as a mobile phone, tablet, or computer. To provide this abundance of flexibility, there is format shifting, where media files are converted into different formats to satisfy the needs of the specific playback ...