With the introduction of OTT and digital broadcast services now established, key themes at this year’s CASBAA Convention held in Hong Kong focused on creating quality and relevant content, as well as localization, agile distribution and protection of content.
Piracy of content was on the agenda with Mark Mulready of Irdeto showcasing just how difficult it is to distinguish legal from illegal content sites. The Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit example from the United Kingdom, where an infringing website list of illegal websites is published and flagged to advertising brands, was considered a great initiative to disrupt pirate sites.
Then there is the issue of regulation where Ajit Pai from the US Federal Communications Commission and R.S. Sharma from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India both agreeing that governments should take a less restrictive approach to regulation to allow new business models to take shape.
Audience measurement was a hot topic, with much discussion on how best to assess audience demographics and behaviors. There was a general consensus that “joint industry committee models” worked as they represented the majority of stakeholders, bringing robustness and validity to data but by their nature, they could be slow and cumbersome.
Targeting viewers with specific advertising was also discussed, with David Downey from INVIDI introducing the firm's addressable advertising model. Addressable advertising aims to eliminate the wastage of TV advertising by about 70%.