"IPTV Character Series" Bao Ran: IPTV and OTT will inevitably merge

As an industry expert, Bao Ran has been tracking and paying attention to the development of iptv's industry since he joined China Digital Television magazine in 2004 and interviewed BesTV's pilot in Harbin. It has been 13 years.

Biography

Bao Ran, currently working in the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology Interactive Media Industry Alliance, the leader of the digital culture working group, the expert committee member, the three-network integration industry expert; Secretary-General of China Intelligent Multimedia Terminal Industry Alliance (CIMC); Founder and CEO of Yimuwei (Beijing) Culture Communication Co., Ltd. Member of the Network Video Professional Committee of the China Film and Television Technology Society.

Five years and five years iptv has been bumpy and bumpy along the way

In 2004, Bao Ran first came into contact with IPTV, when he, like other early IPTV practitioners, was excited and looking forward to the fact that finally an interactive TV could be launched. He optimistically decided at the time that in five years, it would only take five years for IPTV to develop. However, five years and five years, until 2014, the number of IPTV users began to grow rapidly. Looking back at his optimistic predictions in the early days, Bao Ran said that at that time, he was mainly based on this judgment in three aspects: national policies, the speed of radio and television digitization, and the power of telecom operators to intervene in the video field.

In 2003, the State Radio and Television Department began to carry out the transformation of digital television, which is also a type of digital television. At that time, Bao Ran believed that the national policy would soon be liberalized, because at that time the State Council had begun to propose and take the lead, and the two major departments of radio, television and industry and information technology (Ministry of Information Industry) were negotiating many policies.

At the same time, telecom operators have also begun to implement bandwidth upgrade plans, and the digitalization of radio and television is also in full swing. Bao Ran believes that the better the digital development of radio and television, the lower the resistance to IPTV.

But then the development of IPTV in 5-6 years was unexpected by Bao Ran. The first is the policy restrictions, and the second is that the various dissatisfactions in the process of local radio and television digitization have made its resistance to IPTV strong, and the infighting between the licensing parties issued by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television has also led to the slow development of IPTV.

Bao Ran sighed that iptv's initial five years were very difficult, but even so, BesTV also developed about 8 million users by 2010, which made an indelible contribution to the development of IPTV.

Finally, in 2010, the State Council issued Document No. 5 on Promoting the Integration of the Three Networks and announced the first pilot list. This incident left a deep impression on Bao Ran, who believes that the most important historical significance of Document No. 5 is to justify the name of IPTV, which has become a representative business of the integration of the three networks.

However, the subsequent implementation of Document No. 5 was not very smooth, mainly due to the obstruction of radio and television in various places, and these fragmentary obstructions, which Bao Ran defined as the street battles of the city. He said: "The great river flows eastward, and the green mountains cannot cover it." Document No. 5 has clearly pointed out 3 stages, pilot stage, promotion stage, comprehensive stage, this timeline is very clear, radio and television mantis arm as a car, it is impossible to block iptv. ”

Barriers are broken, but the passion is no more

After Document No. 5, IPTV has achieved relatively rapid development, but there have also been new hidden worries.

Bao Ran believes that part of the reason for this is the unreasonableness of the licensing system. "CCTV is the general platform, its operating body is in love with TV, nominally BesTV also accounts for 49% of the shares of love TV, the general manager is sent by BesTV, the chairman is sent by CCTV, it seems that everyone can share the interests equally, but in fact, many things in China may not be done in accordance with the rules and regulations, and the interests of BesTV will inevitably be greatly encroached upon." If any market is just an exclusive monopoly, it cannot guarantee the vitality of the market, so in the past three or four years ott has risen rapidly. ”

In Bao Ran's view, the biggest problem with IPTV at this stage is that the market vitality is declining rapidly, which is mainly due to the lack of competition in the market. He said: "The most passionate time for IPTV to live is when there is a blockade after the chase, the radio and television people are pulling their hind legs in the back, and cable operators everywhere are desperately blocking, and at this time, it is the most vigorous development." But now iptv has no obstacles in policy, there are fewer cable resistance in various places, and the license side is monopolized by CCTV, I am worried about it, and its vitality has rapidly decreased. ”

Although the number of iptv users surged in 2016, Bao Ran believes that this is also its last pulling force - telecom operators, if there is no telecom operator pull, the future of this market stock is still there, but its innovation will definitely decrease. He stressed that IPTV must follow the three-fold strategy of TV: "watching TV", "using TV", and "playing TV", which has been talking about since the first day of IPTV's birth, and it is also a topic that the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television especially likes to mention.

"If iptv is just a substitute for 'watching TV' in the end, it is a failure." Bao Ran said, "But at present, IPTV mainly stays on the alternative to watching TV, and on 'playing TV' and 'using TV', the user experience of IPTV is far inferior to that of Internet TV." ”

From watching TV to using TV and playing TV

Since the birth of IPTV, all practitioners have tried to make it a level of "using TV" and "playing TV", but it is still not allowed. Later, people gradually discovered the biggest feature of IPTV - it cannot be called the overall conversion of the whole conversion.

Bao Ran said that almost no users take the initiative to handle IPTV, mainly rely on operators to collect, with the promotion of broadband a large number of gifts, the vast majority of users are with the expansion of broadband popularization, which leads to the biggest problem in the terminal. Until last year, the collection of boxes of the three major operators began to gradually tilt towards smart boxes, and the boxes of the past were essentially faster than the boxes of cable TV, but they were very limited, and they were even less than the boxes of Internet TV. Most importantly, up to now, telecom operators still collect boxes, and the Internet TV market has fully shifted to the whole machine.

Bao Ran analyzed that for Internet TV, whether it is to do the whole machine or a box, it needs only a decoder and a network cable, the more IPTV is promoted, in fact, the more Internet TV competitors have been buried for themselves, because promoting an IPTV is a broadband household, and the boxes that are given away have a lifespan, for users, is it to upgrade IPTV or change TV? Bao Ran said: "If you choose to change TV, there are too many Internet TVs on the market now, not only cheap, but also rich in content, it doesn't matter if you can't watch live broadcasts, there is always a cable interface, cut to the cable to watch live channels on the line." IPTV has buried a big pit for itself, which is why the three major telecom operators have begun to attach great importance to ott in the past two years. ”

In Bao Ran's view, the three major telecom operators should turn to the TV set in the next two or three years, because the box only deals with the market of TV stock.

In fact, operators have indeed begun to actively prepare for ott: first, since last year, a large number of smart boxes have been purchased; Second, we have begun to prepare a large number of collection and production machines; Third, independently carry out Internet TV business, such as WoTV. Bao Ran introduced that WoTV originated from Guangdong Unicom, originally a video business on mobile phones, and has now been upgraded to a network-wide operation, which is actually Internet TV. Guangdong Unicom has improved the user experience while promoting a surge in the number of users through free traffic fees and iQIYI.

Bao Ran believes that at this stage of iptv development, the biggest bottleneck is no longer policy, but user experience. In order to improve the user experience, although China Telecom has begun to build an application center, its flexibility has always been inferior to that of Internet companies. "As long as telecom operators grasp the traffic, other open door cooperation is the most profitable, do not try to monopolize themselves, it has long been not the era of mobile Monternet."

At this stage, whether it is IPTV, ott or cable TV, in isolation, it cannot provide users with the most complete user experience. Internet TV does not have live broadcasting, IPTV experience is not good, there are not many applications, and cable TV has more shortcomings. Bao Ran stressed that open cooperation is the best, the main body is their respective subject, and everyone is integrated in the business on an open platform.

Telecom operators will take over ott across the board

Bao Ran said: "Personally, I think that in the future, IPTV, ott, and cable digital TV will not show a three-legged situation, iptv, ott will converge, and the ultimate form must be ott, not IPTV." Ott is the real gravedigger. ”

Bao Ran analyzed that the ott market is currently driven by terminal hardware manufacturers, but the ultimate driver in the future will be telecom operators, because it has now fully entered the era of mobile Internet, and traffic is in the hands of telecom operators. Just like Unicom WoTV, telecom operators launch a metro-scale mobile network video service that can definitely attract a large number of users.

Bao Ran concluded that in the next 5 years, telecom operators will fully take over the dominance of Ott. There are two key words in this, one is content, the other is traffic, the content is handed over to the enterprises in the industry, and the traffic, except for the operator, no one can do it.

On the other hand, the confluence of IPTV and OTT will be a huge blow to cable TV. Bao Ran believes that at this stage, IPTV has only achieved a substitute for "watching TV", and it is actually very difficult to further upgrade to "using TV" and "playing TV". But ott is not the same, Internet TV inherits the mobile Internet application store, is the amplification number of the mobile phone, the current Internet TV users "with TV" and "play TV" The proportion has not been low, habits are being formed, and Internet TV is easier to connect with mobile phones, even if you do not do basic communication, by scanning the two-dimensional code can also be achieved. This will lead to cable operators being further squeezed, the basic "watch TV" business is replaced, desperately want to do "use TV" and "play TV" is not pk Internet TV, and Internet TV and IPTV are controlled by operators, cable operators have a worrying future.

"I think the radio and television department will definitely be split in the future, and cable network companies will be dismantled and thrown to telecom operators as negative assets and burdens for restructuring, and TV stations will vigorously carry out content cooperation with telecom operators." At that time, only in terms of video business, it was really done. It doesn't matter which kind of TV you are watching, in short, there is a TV when you turn it on. You can watch TV channels, and a little broadcast, you can also play games, and you can also go online, which is called the completion of the integration of the three networks in the true sense. Bao Ran said, "There is a conclusion that the integration of the three networks will eventually integrate the telecommunications network and the broadband power grid, and it will take about ten years to achieve this goal." ”

Perhaps because he was founded and worked for China Digital Television magazine for many years, Bao Ran has a fondness for the term "digital television". He believes that this is a global concept, strictly speaking, there is no IPTV, there is no Internet TV, they are all digital TV. "In the future, iptv, ott, and cable TV will eventually be unified, all of which will be classified as Internet TELEVISION, and it will finally become a real digital TV."

Streaming.com is launching a series of IPTV personalities, stay tuned!

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