Introduction

Streaming can be broadly defined as delivering multimedia content, such as video and audio, over the Internet. The end user's terminal is usually a PC with media player software, although many new home entertainment devices capable of receiving streams have also started to appear. As opposed to downloading, streaming allows the playback of media files before the entire file is received by the user. Streaming requires special servers that deliver the streams to users using protocols such as IP multicast, UDP, and RTSP, whereas standard Web servers and the HTTP protocol can be used for downloading. The biggest Internet streaming technology providers are RealNetworks and Microsoft.

By and large, mobile streaming means the delivery of multimedia content over mobile networks such as GSM, GPRS and W-CDMA. The end terminal is a mobile device, such as a PDA or smart phone that is capable of receiving streams. The streaming servers can be same that are used for the Internet streaming and therefore technology from RealNetworks, Microsoft and Apple can be used. Other companies, focusing only on mobile streaming, include PacketVideo, Emblaze, and Philips. Since mobile devices have small screens and data bandwidths in current mobile networks are rather limited, the content must be compressed much more than with delivery for PCs connected to the broadband Internet. Also, network delays and reliability issues cause more challenges than with pure Internet streaming.

Publications

• Packet Switched Streaming Service White Paper. November 2003.
• MPEG-7 White Paper. October 2003.
• Plaza Future User Interface 2002: New Broadband, Mobile, IP Datacasting and Animation User Interfaces, Platforms and Services. Tekes USIX Final Seminar, Helsinki, Finland, Jan 28, 2003.
• Overcoming the Technical Challenges for Mobile Video and Multimedia. IBC's 2nd Mobile Imaging & Video conference, London, U.K., Nov 14-15, 2002.
• The Future of Comms Devices and Customer Interfaces. IIR's 5th European ISP Forum, Amsterdam, Netherlands, Oct 22-24, 2002.
• Business and Revenue Sharing Models for Mobile 3G Content Services in Japan. MarcusEvans' Interactive Entertainment Forum, Copenhagen, Denmark, Oct 14-15, 2002.
• Understanding NTT DoCoMo's Rollout Strategy for its i-motion Services. What Lessons Can Be Learnt for Other Mobile Streaming Players? IIR's 4th Streaming Media & Digital Content Delivery Conference, Amsterdam, Netherlands, May 13-15, 2002.
• Plaza Future User Interface. USIX Annual Seminar 2001, Tampere Hall, Finland, Nov 5, 2001.
• A Vision on the Future of Mobile Information Services. EADP 2001 Conference, Cannes, France, May 3-4, 2001.
• Developing Mobile Multimedia Services To Enable Streaming To Wireless Devices. IIR's Third Media Streaming Conference, Amsterdam, Netherlands, Mar 19-21, 2001.
• Sonera brings CNN international and MTV live to its broadband customers. May 30, 2002.
• RealNetworks introduces RealSystem Mobile. February 19, 2002.
• Worldwide wireless leaders working with RealNetworks mobile digital media technology. December 10, 2001.
• Sonera Plaza delivers new streaming multimedia services for Microsoft Pocket PC 2002. October 8, 2001.