International organisation for standardisation organisation internationale de normalisation

Transport of MPEG Media

At this meeting, MPEG had planned to issue a CfP on MPEG Media Transport (MMT). Due to the reduced number of participants, it was not possible to reach a meaningful consensus within the group on the final scope of the call. Input from several national bodies was diverse. Therefore, MPEG decided to address short term needs of the industry with a first call related to HTTP streaming and to delay the CfP on the long-term needs to the 93^rd meeting.
Several liaison statements were sent to inform interested parties on this decision: N11351 Liaison Statement to DVB, N11352 Liaison Statement to 3GPP, and N11353 Liaison statement template on http streaming. In N11350 Responses to National Bodies, the Requirements Group thanks the AUNB, CNNB, GNB, and UKNB for their input.

1. HTTP Streaming of MPEG Media

With substantial help from remote experts, MPEG issued four documents related to the Call for Proposals on HTTP Streaming of MPEG media: N11337 HTTP Streaming of MPEG Media Context and Objectives, N11338 Call for Proposals on HTTP Streaming of MPEG Media, N11339 Uses Cases for HTTP Streaming of MPEG Media, and N11340 Requirements on HTTP Streaming of MPEG Media.

MPEG will evaluate the call on the weekend prior to the 93^rd MPEG meeting. This evaluation will be organized by N11346 Adhoc on HTTP Streaming. The time line for this standard is as follows:

• 
  Publication of CfP: April 2010
  
• 
  Submission and study : July 2010
  
• 
  Committee Draft : October 2010
  
• 
  Final Committee Draft: January 2011
  
• 
  FDIS: July 2011
  

This short timeline was selected in order to satisfy current market needs quickly. Furthermore, the area of HTTP streaming is already well defined and MPEG will most likely provide a solution that is to a large extend based on current technology.

2. MMT

The area of work for MMT (Figure 1) might include adaptive progressive transport (download/stream), cross layer optimization, hybrid delivery and conversational services. It is foreseen that MMT will also provide adaptive streaming support for mp4 files. Naturally, MMT will provide some kind of interworking with HTTP Streaming of MPEG Media.

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Figure 1 - Networks of interest in the context of MPEG Media Transport

The initial design goals for an architecture were confirmed at this meeting. These include compatibility and efficiency which is measured in terms of rate, functionality and quality. A choice of three architectures with different implications is considered (Figure 2, Figure 3, Figure 4).

Figure 2 - Potential architecture for MMT over TCP/UDP and http/RTP

Figure 3 - Potential architecture for MMT over TCP/UDP

Figure 4 - Potential architecture for MMT over IP with interfaces for cross layer optimization

A set of documents required for the Call for Proposals in July was updated: N11341 Draft Requirements for MMT (Modern Media Transport), N11342 Draft Call for Proposals on MMT, N11343 Draft Modern Media Transport (MMT) Context and Objectives, and N11344 Draft use cases for MMT. They are still in a draft status and require significant work until the next meeting. The Adhoc group N11347 Adhoc on MPEG Media Transport will carry out the work. A meeting is planned on the Thursday and Friday prior to the next MPEG meeting.

The current time line for the MMT standard is as follows:

• 
  Publication of CfP: July 2010
  
• 
  Submission and study : October 2010
  
• 
  Committee Draft : July 2011
  
• 
  Final Committee Draft: January 2012
  
• 
  FDIS: October 2012
  

This timeline was selected in order to give time for the substantial work required. Furthermore, the outcome of HEVC can be taken into account when finalizing the standard.

MPEG is considering combining the upcoming standards for HVC, Audio and MMT into one package.

6. Royalty-free Codecs

For several meetings, MPEG had discussions on Royalty-free codecs. Especially small companies consider the per-stream licensing fees as cumbersome. No clear conclusions could be drawn from the diverse responses. Furthermore, neither MPEG nor ISO can guarantee that a standard developed with the goal of being RAND or royalty-free will actually be RAND or royalty-free since the analysis of patents is outside of the scope and competence of ISO and MPEG.
At its 91^st meeting, MPEG issued document N11221 Possible future actions on standardization with Type 1 licensing where the legal issues are summarized and discussed. Type 1 licensing refers to option 1 of the joint patent declaration form, where an intellectual property holder can indicate that he will not charge for his IP. Laymen refer to this type of licensing as royalty-free.
MPEG believes that 20 years after its publication some technology will become royalty-free. Since parts of MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 are still updated, candidates are a MPEG-2 Part 2 baseline profile carved out of MPEG-2 Part 2, MPEG-1 Part 3 Layer 2 baseline profile carved out of the MPEG-1 part 3 Layer 2, a MPEG-1 Part 3 Layer 3 baseline profile carved out of the MPEG-1 part 3 Layer 3, and a MPEG-2 Part 1 baseline profile carved out of the MPEG-2 part 1. These candidates would be compatible with existing equipment. Alternatively, MPEG may define a new set of standards which are believed to be RF provided such standards provide sufficient differentiation to be successful in the market place.
In order to finalize the discussion MPEG issued a resolution related to royalty-free video codecs. MPEG wishes to inquire of National Bodies about their willingness to commit to active participation (as defined by Section 6.2.1.4 of the JTC1 directives) in developing a type-1 video coding standard. At the 93^rd meeting MPEG will consider the responses when deciding whether to request approval for a new Work Item Proposal. In case insufficient support is observed, the issue will not be reopened in the near future.

6. 
   - Systems report
   

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