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December 2021

Business

Why Hollywood studios love forensic watermarking tech

Access to fast internet and smart devices have expanded the video content industry in a big way, which explains the success of over-the-top (OTT) portals, like Netflix and Amazon Prime. However, this has also increased their headache due to video piracy. OTT platforms have traditionally utilized digital rights management (DRM) technologies to keep premium video content from being pirated. This is an advanced technology, which largely depends on always-on internet devices, and enables OTT service providers to manage their users, apply AES encryption to their video assets, and break video files into shorter content blocks to avoid piracy.

However, the piracy ecosystem has evolved over time and become more sophisticated, and some premium HD content is still leaked for unauthorized users to exploit, despite best attempts.

Pirates take advantage of an OTT system in which DRM protected content is transmitted using digital-analog duality, particularly at the client end, where each piece of video content must be decrypted and delivered as an analogue signal for viewing. Pirates use sophisticated programs to intrude at this point and attempt to grab the continuous video stream from the OTT server.

Hollywood studios are concerned about this leakage because they stand to lose big money in revenue from their premium content. The content production and DRM industries have attempted to close this gap by adding video watermarking to its arsenal of security tools. This is a more advanced function that embeds non-obtrusive text or codes in video frames that aren’t apparent to the human eye or easily identifiable by recording software, and, in this sense, stands at variance with visible watermarks that can spoil the user experience.

There are largely four parts to forensic watermarking technology: (a) copyright or ownership data which is encoded in (b) the host signal or video frame – a video file is a collection of static video frames – which is used in conjunction with (c) a secret watermarking key to create (d) a watermarked video frame. Even if the combinations of frames from the original video file undergo resolution, transcoding, copying, or distributive changes, the copyright message should stand strong during the whole life-cycle of the video frame in a comprehensive forensic watermarking architecture. Otherwise, the watermark cannot be called robust.

Hollywood studios expect OTT platforms to add not only multi-DRM measures to combat piracy, but also a powerful forensic-watermarking option so that their anti-piracy teams can readily discover how and from which users their premium content is pirated. OTT platforms find both services in multi-DRM SaaS vendors which also maintain a database of embedded watermarks.

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Business

3 Tips to Manage Your Digital Notes

You take in dozens of gigabytes of data daily in this internet age. Access to information from thousands of different sources is undoubtedly beneficial in numerous ways. However, this has also caused the average internet user to struggle because of the constant information overload. Your brain is not designed to take in massive chunks of information within a short time and process it accurately, then store it. Therefore, as you use your computer or smartphone, especially for business, it is necessary to organize all these ideas systematically.

Your computer is like your second brain and contains information that you need to run your business effectively. Hence, it would be best to have tools and tips that will help you categorize everything in an easy-to-understand format. If you struggle to organize your digital notes and files, here are some tips that will come in handy.

  1. Use an excellent note-taking app

The type of note-taking app that you use plays a significant part in how you’ll view your notes if at all you are even able to see these notes. There are several such apps, but most are basic and sometimes come pre-installed on your laptop or phone. While they may work for personal use, they are not always ideal for business use. You want to choose a note-taking app with beneficial features, including optical character recognition (OCR), tags, and folders. It is worth paying a small subscription fee to access them.

For instance, if you run a clean beauty business, you can have different folders for your brand product packaging and catalog design, suppliers, and advertising ideas. Some of these superior note-taking apps even offer collaborative note-taking.

  1. Organize notes into notebooks or folders

Folders, called Notebooks on some apps, are essential when organizing digital notes manually. They will come in handy in the future when you intend to look into a particular topic. For instance, you can have a folder on influencer marketing. The names you give each folder will depend on the notes you’ve taken and how you intend to utilize them. If you are undecided, you can begin with easy folders such as Inbox, Suppliers, Marketing, and Product list. Once you have named your folders, you can always rename them in the future after you figure out how you want to utilize each of them.

 

  1. Create shortcuts 

You will usually have folders accessed more frequently than others in your note-taking taking. Because they already receive more action, a helpful tip is to make them more accessible. You can either create shortcuts to these folders or mark them as favorites. It will then become easier for you to make changes to existing notes and add new ones.

The folders that you barely open as they are just used to hold notes in case a need arises in the future don’t need to be in the front or center.

It is easy to accumulate a lot of digital notes. Hence, it is essential to have them organized for ease of access. Having well-organized information and ideas will also make it easier for you to understand everything and put them to good use.

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Business

Three reasons why your business needs a virtual receptionist

With the technology and trends developing every day, as someone who owns a business, you need to know how to make your clients feel happier. There are uncountable ways in which you can improve the quality of your product and services as per your consumer’s preferences and likings. But, is it worth it if you can’t hear your consumers out?

This is when a virtual receptionist shows up to save the day. A virtual receptionist is quite similar to an offline receptionist in the way of working. The only difference is that instead of being in your office, they will be in some call center or somewhere else. Now you might think, if my receptionist is not in my office, how will my clients come to the office and ask their queries? The answer is that they won’t have to. They can get their answers from home itself while talking to your virtual receptionist.

Here are three reasons why your business needs a virtual receptionist today:

After-hours service:

It is not an unknown fact that the clients demand an answer to their query as fast as it is possible. If you are closed for even a day, a sense of dissatisfaction occurs in them. But if you have a virtual receptionist who answers all the queries on your behalf even in the after-hours of the office, your clients will be happy and full of satisfaction.

Appointment conveniences:

Having a virtual receptionist makes sure that none of your appointments are canceled suddenly. They keep up to date with whoever is supposed to show up by connecting them and in turn, keep you updated for the same.

Make an impression:

If a client calls and your virtual receptionist answers, it shows how you have a structural way of working. This makes a very good impression on potential clients as well.

Who doesn’t like to be heard, right? Be it a query or any dilemma, a consumer has the right to receive satisfactory communication from the business that invests in it. Now, think about it- are you able to answer every call with the dedication that it deserves without letting it impact your flow of work? If your answer is no, then you should get a virtual receptionist for your business today!

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