Widespread Metadata Use Is Almost Here, but How Far Is 'Almost'?

“我们到了吗??"

How many parents have heard that phrase, while driving, during a recent summer vacation? 比平时多出数百万人, 一个嫌疑犯, given the rise of staycations that see us driving distances short and long instead of jetting off to more exotic locales. Every parent who hears this question, especially the one driving, knows just what to say.

“我们快到了."

There is a sense in the streaming industry that metadata -- that less-than-exciting-but-altogether-necessary functionality layer that's never exposed to mere viewers -- is "almost there" when it comes to widespread usage.

By "almost" I mean in one of the two ways that parents use the phrase with their children on a long trip. Either it's a really long way and we say "almost" to appease them in hopes they won't notice the next 2 hours of driving, or we really are sort of close to the destination but don't have a good sense of exactly how long it will take.

Which of the two is it for metadata usage in the streaming industry? 我认为两者都有.

(从克莱尔到这里)有很长的路要走. 有一种感觉, despite the progress made in metadata usage for on-demand services such as premium movie viewing, there's still a long way to go when it comes to widespread adoption of metadata for the average viewer.

It's nice to see a search bar functionality in Netflix or other on-demand movie streaming apps, and it's even nicer to see a list of similar movies after one has chosen to view a movie. But for the average lean-back viewer who's using a Google TV or Apple TV set-top box, those recommendations are after-the-fact choices that might have changed had the search or recommend capabilities been more robust and easier to access.

除了, we've only really scratched the surface of nontext searches, an issue the industry has struggled with since its inception: I remember, 12年多以前, having a consulting session with the CEO of an early indexing-search-retrieval (ISR) company in which I challenged the executive team to think beyond text, only to receive feedback that they couldn't think of any way to search without requiring text input.

它(有点)非常接近. 然而，就ISR而言，我们也“几乎达到了目标”, 甚至是终端用户的元数据使用, in that we now have a set of disparate tools available -- if we can get them into the same toolbox.

认为, 例如, of how simple it would be to use a smartphone camera to scan a QR code at the cineplex for a reminder to watch the movie again when it's available online. Or, 就此而言, to do the same to a DVD cover at a local big-box retailer, which adds it in to the instant queue of your on-demand streaming service.

更好的是, think about being able to capture an audio sample of a song while you're on vacation, 你可能在电影里听到过, then request that a list of known movies the song's been in be waiting at your set-top box for purchase or on-demand viewing.

This kind of metadata or ISR usage isn't rocket science. 今天就可以买到, at least if the human operating the apps and set-top boxes can provide the missing link between all the devices.

There are additional signs that we may be getting even closer. YouTube has introduced the option to right-click and save not just the URL for a YouTube clip but to save a URL that will begin playing at the exact spot where the cursor is placed when the URL is created. 目前, 它的效果不像宣传的那么好, since on some short videos playback will still start at the beginning and videos with preroll advertisements won't skip the preroll, but it sure looks like an "almost there" feature to remove the tedium of watching through an entire hour-long lecture just to find a few key points.

[This article appears as "Almost There" in the August/September 2012 issue of 流媒体 杂志.]