Scott Stewardson
TORONTO— The CBC English Services produces 18 HD television channels and 74 unique radio channels and streams up to 10,000 hours of radio and television content per year to serve 13 individual provinces or territories in five time zones. We’re on air 24 hours per day, seven days a week, with some form of live television or radio programming.
To provide our audiences with content that delivers true value, we required the best-in-class technology that would enable us to deliver tailored content, whatever the platform, wherever it’s needed. The key is to have a playout system that has the flexibility to tailor content so that it arrives on the right device, in the right way, when, how and where our viewers and listeners want it.
The technology that has enabled us to achieve this is Miranda’s iTX IT-based playout platform.
DIDN’T WANT ‘JUST GOOD ENOUGH’
When we begin investigating playout technologies, we found all kinds of familiar marketplace “solutions,” but providing only the familiar “old school” capabilities. We wanted a technological partner who fully understood the changes we envisioned and could work with us to implement those changes and realize our vision.
We wanted flexibility, relatively low per-unit costs and the ability to handle different kinds of content, all within an integrated environment. Considering those factors, it soon became clear that there was only one solution, and that was Miranda’s iTX.
As we have individual channels that include a lot of clips mixed with live content, there are a lot of moving pieces to assemble. iTX’s ability to integrate both clips and live content is unique in the sense that everything goes through the same box on a single platform. This means that we don’t need any downstream boxes, and thus minimize the number of potential points of failure.
INSTALLATION WAS A BREEZE
Our project implementation team really enjoyed working with Miranda and the iTX product, as it’s so flexible and so easy to work with. You install some servers, some software, make sure that the network and power are robust and it’s basically all done.
As we build our capabilities over time, we’ll be more effective, quicker to market with more product, and also see a reduction in costs Scalability is very important to us—we’re always looking for opportunities to repurpose our linear content and repackage it for VOD or nonlinear services. iTX is made for that kind of repurposing, which we expect to continue to do even more in the future.
Our working relationship with Miranda has been really good, and that’s been essential to what we needed to achieve. New and better ways of performing certain tasks are now typically incorporated within hours, rather than in the days or weeks formerly required. That’s unheard of in my experience, but we’ve been able to create that relationship with Miranda. It’s a relationship that’s coupled, aligned, efficient and, most of all, effective.
Scott Stewardson is responsible for the CBC Radio, TV and Digital Media Presentation Center located in Toronto. He has been with the CBC for 27 years. He may be contacted atscott.stewardson@cbc.ca.
For additional information, contact Miranda Technologies at 514-333-1772 or visitwww.miranda.com.
