Citation
Baker, B.F. (2001), "Digital Video The Killer App for Internet2?", Library Hi Tech News, Vol. 18 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/lhtn.2001.23918aac.014
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2001, MCB UP Limited
Digital Video The Killer App for Internet2?
Bradley F. Baker
Digital Video The Killer App for Internet2?
The session title for this program promised a glimpse at cutting-edge Internet video applications and it did not disappoint. Ted Hanss, Director, Applications Development, Internet2, drew a full house of EDUCAUSE attendees to hear his status report on pilot projects under way making use of video applications over Internet2 (I2). This presentation, as well as dozens of his other recent presentations on Internet2 to the higher education community, are available at http://apps.internet2.edu/talks.
Hanss highlighted several reasons for the variety of high-end I2 video applications under way. Equipment on both the production and delivery side is getting cheaper while hardware and software are getting easier to use. The move to IP-based video delivery (versus ATM) is clear, according to Hanss, and we are seeing dramatic improvements in video quality being pushed over Internet2. The Research Channel at the University of Washington, for example, is now successfully transmitting HDTV video signals over Internet2 with a bandwidth stream of 200 megabits per second. We will continue to see a range of options and choices being explored with I2 until standards are more fully developed and accepted.
Hanss provided a high-level summary of the major video projects under way in and among Internet2 universities. Individual research and instructional projects reviewed include
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the American Sign Language (ASL) Poetry project at Georgetown University;
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the Music Teaching Over I2 project at the University of Oklahoma;
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the Remote Instrument Observation and Control project based in Hawaii; and
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the on-demand C-SPAN access project at Northwestern University.
A particularly notable application is the Visual History Foundation (www.vhf.org) database of over 50,000 interviews with Holocaust survivors being made available as over 250,000 hours of MPEG1 video.
Videoconferencing and other applications to enhance real-time communications between and among institutions received somewhat more in-depth coverage. Hanss demonstrated some of the videoconferencing technologies being used in the Internet2 Megaconference project (www.mega-net.net/megaconference), which provides a virtual track for attendees at Internet2 member meetings. At the other extreme, the Telecubicle project is experimenting with three-dimensional, full-screen videoconferencing to further shrink distances between individuals.
Hanss then turned to an overview of some of the products and standards for video applications available now for use with the Internet and Internet2. The H.323 standard has tremendous potential to open up videoconferencing in that it does not require multicast translators. Hanss demonstrated this technology in the conference room using a portable Polycom H.323 unit, which does a good job with room-based video conferencing over IP. At a step up, the MPEG2 standard can support "broadcast-level" videoconferencing with bandwidth streams of 15 megabits per second. Sony's DV over Firewire technology is another option that can support 30 megabits per second streams in each direction using very affordable Firewire boards.
These new technologies present several options and questions for digital library developers in selecting standards to use for video on demand. MPEG1 continues to be attractive in that it does not require hardware decoders, while all higher-level MPEG standards do require decoders that could limit access. QuickTime remains an attractive option for streaming in that it too can be delivered without special boards. Developers also must decide whether to use Dublin core metadata or MPEG7 standards. Hanss noted that more progress is needed in the standards arena to provide more extensions for audio and video.
Bradley F. Baker is University Librarian, Northeastern Illinois University, Chicago, Illinois. b-baker@neiu.edu.