What’s in a name?
The term Media Asset Management (MAM) has
caused much confusion in the broadcast and media
industries – and some of this at least can be attrib-
uted, quite simply, to the proliferation of TLAs (three
letter acronyms) used to describe the management
of broadcast media content. MAM has been joined
by DMM (digital media management), DCM (dig-
ital content management), DAM (digital archive
management), ECM (enterprise content manage-
ment). …and the list goes on.
However, all these names refer to just part of the
overall issue of media management. It is not
surprising, therefore, that they will in turn offer just
part of the overall solution. To overcome this
inadequacy or shortfall, we really need to be tackling
the concept of ‘
doing business with media
’. After
all, this is exactly what every single broadcast
organisation has to deal with every day of their
business life.
Doing the business
We need to move on from the original belief that
media management is a technical problem looking
for a technical solution. This is most certainly no
longer (if it ever was) the answer. Media
management is about the business. Nothing more
and nothing less. In fact one could argue quite
convincingly that the more technologists can be kept
away from trying to manage the media, the better it
will be for the business.
Thus with business-orientated objectives firmly in
mind, systems for media management must be
capable of managing content within the full context
of the organisation’s standard business processes.
Islands of technology and information – which are
prevalent in the broadcast industry – need to be
brought together with the aim of making content
management not just one component of a media
enterprise workflow, but the foundation on which
the workflow is constructed.
There are key business elements which make up the
basis of all broadcast and media operations. These
must be incorporated into the ‘doing business with
media’ concept for the successful design of any
system:
• Media – in all its formats, such as video,
audio, graphics, subtitles, audio description,
digital files and much more.
• Processes – media has no value unless it can
be put through a process or a workflow which
ultimately delivers it to the consumer or end user
• Resources – both human and equipment-
based resources are needed to carry out the
workflow processes.
Total Media Management
The phrase ‘Total Media Management’ is most appropriate for
describing a solution which brings together these three business
elements into a system which enables an organisation to efficiently
and effectively handle its media.
• Total – this covers the entire lifecycle of the media assets to
be managed from initial concept through all the ensuing
processes including acquisition, ingest, library, production,
delivery and archiving. It relates each media object intimately
to the workflow processes that are applied to it.
• Media incorporates both analogue and digital, and recognises
that media organisations need to be able to manage content and
assets in a multiplicity of formats ranging from videotape, film,
audio recordings, vinyl, photographs and paper to digital media
files on disk and tape.
• Management is far more than simply cataloguing and tracking
media items. For most media-centric businesses, the content is
the business. Without total control of the content combined with
complete visibility of the resources expended on processing it
and an accurate assessment of its cost and value, a media
business cannot be effectively – or profitably – run.
‘Total Media Management’ enables media enterprises to do business
better in a number of significant ways.
• It enables organisations to make better sense of the sweeping
changes which are affecting their industry as a result of the
convergence of digital technologies and changing patterns of
consumption.
• It recognises that the vast majority of media enterprises are
in almost permanent states of transition as new tools,
technologies and media formats appear – and that any new
management system must cater for this situation.
• It empowers organisations to address critical business issues by
bringing
together
the management of individual media items
and
the other elements of the process or workflow applied to them.
The Mediaflex approach
With more than twenty years experience in the design, development
and implementation of systems for the broadcast industry, TMD
conceived Mediaflex specifically to serve the needs of broadcast
and media organisations competing in this global market. Designed
to provide a model of the entire enterprise and its workflow, Mediaflex
takes under its management, not just the media objects and their
metadata but also the workflow components that surround them. Thus
it provides the ability for a media-centric business to control both its
content and the processes which it applies to that content throughout
its entire lifecycle.
Mediaflex comprises three key components:
• a Central Metadata Repository (Mediaflex MetaServer) stores
core database information common to all applications and uses.
• a Workflow Layer provides dynamic status driven
management of the processes which are applied to media objects.
• various basic Application Services (library, resources, rights
and contacts) are integrated with the Metadata Repository and
the Workflow Layer. Other enhanced services are available to
meet specific business needs including ingest, facilities and
resources management.
Managing the Media
It is becoming widely accepted that broadcasting companies need an active policy of managing
their media assets.So what is
Total Media Management
?
TonyTaylor,
Chairman of TransMedia
Dynamics,
describes the development of Mediaflex, a solution that has been designed to
handle the ever-changing challenges which are part of everyday life for those working in
the broadcast and media sectors. Mediaflex has been installed for a number of media
organisations including ITFC, a leading facilities house, the BBC, for an ingest solution, and
Britain’s Channel 4, for an ingest and archive application.
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