Prague

Terena is the European Federation of research and scientific networks (NREN), who - like SWITCH in Switzerland or SURFnet in the Netherlands offer services around the production, management and distribution of audio and video in an academic context. Within TERENA, a Task Force "TF Media" has now been established to foster the exchange of knowledge about these issues - so this should be related to the Opencast Community somehow, shouldn't it?

The fact that I'm blogging from the TF preparation meeting in Prague indicates that there is a small connection already. However, the talks I have with colleagues here and the impression I get from their presentations highlight the need for further networking: NREN and academic institutions (i.e. universities) are acting in the same sphere with changing roles and dependencies, but they haven't found a way yet to coordinate their various efforts. Both provide and use solutions for audio and video (let's start to call them video management systems), with some universities being customers to the NREN, some universities using proprietary systems and some universities collaborating to develop new solutions (yes, I'm talking about Opencast Matterhorn). Both produce, own or manage content, and the focus on lecture recording we typically see at universities is balanced by NREN managing large repositories with existing (broadcast) material. And they both share similar problems: Technical one (What formats to support?), legal ones (How can we publish content without checking for IPR issues?), organisational ones (Where do we get the names from all those presenters from?). And as they also share major goals like enabling the exchange of video content, they really should find a way to synchronize their efforts. I'll go back to the lobby now and do my bit.