Common OTT Terms & Acronyms
OTT – Over The Top – This is the no intermediaries, direct-to-consumer, web-based content distribution. Example: StarTalk All Access’s Roku app is the OTT hub for all technology.
VOD – Video On Demand – This is Video on Demand if the programming is not live and the consumer chooses the content to play. Example: Night Flight has some of the country’s best horror VOD.
APP – Application – These are the programs that you download from their respective stores to hardware and ecosystems. Example: Just pick up the App Store’s new Anthony Cumia app and start watching.
STB – Set Top Box – A device that runs OTT video connected to the internet. Example: Apple TV is one of the market’s most popular STBs.
AFTV – Amazon Fire TV: Amazon’s content streaming set-top box. Example: Take the remote, it’s time to watch some AFTV Global Citizen.
tvOS – Apple TV Operating System – This is the Apple TV set-top box program. Example: Do you have the new tvOS updated yet? I hear some functionality added by Apple.
OVP – Online Video Platform – Uploading, storing and distributing content online for users. Example: The key to finding the right OVP for your business is to monetize and scale it up.
PS4 – Playstation 4 / Gaming – media device from Sony.
DTC – Direct To Customer – If the product goes over the intermediaries and goes to the customer directly.
AVOD – Video on Request Ads – Use ads as a means of monetization. Example: Hulu’s tiered AVOD system seems to work well for them, I’m not sure that I know anyone who’s been commercial-free for more money.
SVOD – Video on Request Subscription – Use subscriptions as a means of monetization. Example: Netflix viewers have risen since Stranger Things are a success, so this quarter their SVOD platform is doing very well.
TVOD – Transactional Video on Request – Uses payments as a means of monetization (purchases, leases, etc.). Example: the iTunes Store helps me to own or rent movies, making money from the TVOD service.
MVPD – Multichannel Video Programming Distributor – This is something like a cable service provider — a service that delivers TV channel services. Example: Comcast is one of the industry’s leading MPVDs, selling packages over 200 channels
CDN – Content Delivery Network – Proxy servers in multiple data centers to deliver high-quality, high-performance content to the audience. Example: Amazon provides a powerful CDN option through AWS with its Amazon CloudFront.
AR/VR – Increased Reality / Virtual Reality -Recent ways of viewing content, usually using technologically advanced goggles or headsets, or using the camera on mobile devices. Example: The VR headset for Playstation is the least expensive AND has a lot of content ready to go.
EST – Electronic Sales For – free streaming, this is when you purchase content online. Example: That fee is called an EST when you bought Die Hard from iTunes.
CMS – Content Management System -This is the backend software that you use, like WordPress, to manage your content. Example: The dashboard of Zype is a single-pane glass CMS that allows you to control everything from distribution to monetization and analytics.
IPTV – Internet Protocol Television – Delivering your content or internet programming in “IP packets” encoded. Example: IPTV is changing how we watch TV — directly through the internet.
RTMP – Real Time Messaging Protocol – Adobe has since purchased and partially released it for everyone, originally proprietary tech for sending audio / video / data between Flash players and a server. Example: I would consider looking at RTMP if you want high-quality VOD and live media.
MSO – Multiple system operators – Companies owning or operating two or more cable television systems. Example: AT&T owns Uverse and DirecTV, which makes them an excellent MSO.
VBR – Variable Bitrate – Some kind of bitrate used in sound / video encoding, but for each time segment the files vary the output data. Example: It may be slightly slower, but during your streaming, a VBR will give you great quality.
CBR – Constant bitrate – CBR is the constant data output of a codec when compared to the “variable” bitrate. Example: CBR handles audio faster than VBR, but you don’t get great storage and quality optimization like VBR.
DRM – Digital rights management – This is digital media copyright protection. Example: The DRM is super strong in this video, I can only watch it on my own computer, signed into my own account, so I can’t share it with anyone else.
CPM – Cost Per Thousand Impressions – A commonly used form of measurement in advertising, denoting the price of 1,000 advertising impressions on one webpage. Example: The CPM is about $2 per 1,000 impressions for that ad.
DAR – Digital ad rankings – Including Nielsen’s TV ratings, what you market online or phones. Example: One of the simplest ways to measure ROI advertising is to use Nielsen’s DAR to figure out how the advertisements are conducted the next day.
RAF – Roku Ad Framework – Roku set-top box advertising. Example: The RAF wants to help you monetize by putting video ad features right into your SDK.
MRR – Monthly Recurring Revenue – How much money a company can predict to earn every 30 days or every month. Example: We really started in 2016: our MRR was close to $16,000!
VAST – Video Ad Serving Template – A standard for ad and video player communication requirements. Example: The video player needs to initiate a request to a VAST ad server before an ad can be delivered.
VPAID – Description of Interface Supporting Video Player Ad / A common interface between video players and ad systems. The ads can then be in-stream interactive. Example: VPAID stacking on top of VAST gives you a more stable ad experience as VPAID helps you to execute an ad.
VMAP – Video Multiple Ad Playlist – If the video player or transmission source is not managed, VMAP is an XML framework that can be used to set up the ad insertion “structure”.
IMA – Interactive Media Ads – Video-based ads, like banners, that may be linear or nonlinear. Example: Google IMA should support us mid-roll linear ads, while consumers seem to be comfortable with normal ad-breaks such as on TV.
RSS – Real Simple Syndication – Many packaged stream formats that are often used to publish things, such as forums, news headlines, audio, video, etc. Example: Feedily eat all your favorite RSS feeds and pose them in a readable and convenient fashion for you.
MRSS – Media Real Simple Syndication – This is an RSS extension that syndicates RSS feeds to multimedia files such as audio, video, and images. Example: You can import videos to Zype using MRSS.
SDK – Software Developers Kit – This is what applications are written by programmers. Usually, the programs include ways to edit and test how new apps and features work. Example: The new Android SDK makes the creation of apps super easy, but it also makes it easy to side-load the new OS updates.
HLS – HTTP Live Streaming – The video messaging protocol from Apple is part of QuickTime, OS X, macos, and Safari. Example: if you had to choose between HLS and RTMP which one you would pick?
HTML5 – Hyper Text Markup Language 5 -This is the third and latest edition of HTML, the language used to display things on the internet to the world. Example: All YouTube videos are now shown by default using their HTML5 players.
API - Application Programming Interface - it represents a set of procedures, routines, and tools that allow anybody to incorporate platform features into their own applications. Our API enables you to use our technologies to serve video to your audience online.
Aspect ratio - A basic manner of expressing the width of a video in relation to its height, usually represented as a percentage. The 4:3 ratio refers to the proportion of four units width to three units height on older TVs. The 16:9 aspect ratio is the HD video standard, however there are a variety of other popular ratios listed below.
Compression - Preparing your media files in an appropriate format, often reducing file size.
Conversion rates are the proportion of users that complete a desired action. On a platform Dashboard, the sales conversion refers to the percentage of site visitors that purchase content.
Dashboard - When you log in to your OTT account, the first thing you'll see is the Dashboard. It's your site's major focus of activity and sales. Platform analytics, settings and functions are all available to view.
Downloading - Transferring data from the internet to a device is known as downloading. When a consumer buys a product, they have the option to download it and watch it offline.
Statements - A statement is a monthly report of your sales. Reports will be available to view on the web, or you can download PDF or CSV reports with all transaction details.
Streaming - Viewing a video over the internet without having to download it. SVOD networks and rentals videos are only available via streaming.
Subscriptions - Customers are charged a monthly or annual fee for unlimited streaming of your videos. Video content is not downloadable and it is the expectation that the seller would be adding new content each month.
Subtitles - Captions that translate a videos narrative in another language. Our OTT platform allows you to upload SRT and VTT files with your videos.
Transaction - A sale, subscription, redemption, or fulfilment of your material on OTT platform is referred to as a transaction. It's simply whenever a consumer has access to see your movies.
Transcoding is the process of converting video files into Internet-ready versions.
Uploading refers to the process of transferring files from your computer to your OTT platform. Content such as video, subtitles, and supplementary resources can all be published to a website.