This article originally appeared in the IABM Journal, Issue 105, and can be viewed here
ABU’s Digital Broadcasting Symposium
Kuala Lumpur, 4 March 2018
Overview
The ABU Digital Broadcasting Symposium 2018 opened in Kuala Lumpur on 4 March, with the concurrent exhibition – with 52 media companies participating with booths – running 6-8 March. About 50% of the exhibitors were IABM members. The 2018 conference theme was ‘Enhancing Multiplatform Content’ and the exhibition layout was revised this year, something that seemed beneficial both in increasing footfall and enhancing useful conversations around the booths.
Though he undertook much of the local planning, IABM APAC Director, Peter Bruce, was representing IABM at Convergence India, so IABM Head of Training, Andrew Jones, attended to run the IABM booth as well as presenting four IABM Masterclass sessions, speaking on ‘Packets for Pictures: Live IP-based Production’ at the conference and contributing to a panel chaired by Ideal Systems’ Fintan Mc Kiernan. IABM also worked with our Singapore-based training partner AV8 on the High Dynamic Range masterclass complementing the SMPTE ST 2110 and live IP standards content. These were small components of the ABU-DBS conference, which had technical breadth and globally relevant content. Monday was devoted to the DVB and WorldDAB conference, high-power digital broadcasting being a strategic element in the geographically larger countries of the region, as are advanced cross-over technologies like DAB Hybrid radio.
The world-class conference lived up to its theme with multiple streams including broadcast business-needs evolution, cloud- enabled workflows and content delivery, Artificial Intelligence, Future Technologies for production and delivery, OTT and IBB tech, AR, VR, 360 Video and Cyber Security. These were all very appropriate to the many use-cases, business and technical experience weaved through with the parallel masterclass program. The diversity of APAC in terms of culture, technology, geography and almost every other respect never fails to impress me, and ABU is right to be proud of its DBS success in bringing the best in the world to meet the very broad range of needs and interests which its diverse audience and membership implies.
[bctt tweet=”The Broadcasting Symposium lived up to its theme with multiple streams including broadcast business-needs evolution, cloud- enabled workflows and content delivery, Artificial Intelligence, and more – IABM Journal 105″]
Lifelong learning – the key to your success
People are born to learn. You’ve been doing that as long as you’ve been breathing and certainly wouldn’t be reading this unless you’d learned something. Put that learning into action by trying something new, and build on that learning based on what worked, and what didn’t, along the way.
[bctt tweet=”People are born to learn. You’ve been doing that as long as you’ve been breathing and certainly wouldn’t be reading this unless you’d learned something – IABM Journal 105″]
Lots has been written about how people learn, how we develop knowledge and skills, and what ‘Learning styles’ are most effective. I’m not going to try to add to that here – what I will say is that, because it’s so vital that we were born to do it, helping people learn is rewarding, both personally and to your business. Against that, the cost of ignorance – the cost of not learning and gaining as much knowledge as possible from what you do – is huge.
If learning is so universal how can IABM help with any of it? Obviously, I’m going to highlight the fact that we offer advice on learning and development plans and we design, run and re-sell training courses both face-to- face, which are inherently interactive, and online courses, mostly in the form of eLearning.
People in your business will be learning so the trick is to help them develop knowledge, attitudes and skills that are beneficial to business, to encourage and motivate them to learn and do things they need to be effective in their job while giving customers the sort of experience that makes them happy to buy your products and services. Investing in people by building a development plan with them that includes industry-focused ‘external’ training from IABM and other relevant providers, mixed with what you can do ‘in-house’ and what they can find and source themselves, is transformational.
[bctt tweet=”People in your business will be learning so the trick is to help them develop knowledge, attitudes and skills that are beneficial to business, to encourage and motivate them to learn – IABM Journal 105″]
The Internet ‘shrank the globe’ via almost ubiquitous low-cost connection to information – providing you can find it and trust it – so IABM is producing and partnering with others to offer more eLearning material. We’ve learned from some of the production problems of lengthy, difficult to maintain monoliths and changed to a shorter, more agile, style. We’ve just added ‘Introduction to Broadcast Media Workflows’ to our eLearning portfolio and will add ‘The Basics of Video Formats’ next month, soon to be followed by basics of media transport such as SMPTE ST 2110 and 2022 as well as the basics of audio of course. You can find all of these in the ‘Technical’ section of our website /www.theiabm.org/training-courses/.
We’re maintaining our face-to-face courses, as well as the masterclasses and short sessions we run at trade- shows, and the white papers, webinars, videos and slide-decks that you’ll find in the members area of www.theiabm.org, which now includes a classified and searchable Knowledge Vault. We’ve also been adding to our media jargon-buster www.iabmglossary.com, so however you like to learn there’s something for you.
People learn in all sorts of different ways from all sorts of sources, so ‘learning’ extends well beyond training. As I said at the beginning of this piece people are born to learn from the outset, so in some ways the biggest barrier to learning can be yourself and the thought that you “know it all” already, something that can afflict people of all ages! I have occasionally come across managers who restricted learning in their team, either because they felt they didn’t have time to allow it or because they thought that if people learned too much, they’d be more able to leave for a ‘better’ job. Few consider the dire business consequences of restricting learning opportunities so that people are forced to stay with the company!
While all the buzz is happening around AI, don’t neglect the human intelligence and learning needed to build and capitalize on the artificial variety. Learning is part of being alive, and lifelong learning is a key survival technique for individuals and for companies.
[bctt tweet=”While all the buzz is happening around AI, don’t neglect the human intelligence and learning needed to build and capitalize on the artificial variety – IABM Journal 105″]
Never stop Learning; IABM is here to help.
IABM training dates
| Engaging with the Broadcast & Media Industry
Available on-line as an e-learning package |
|
| Introduction to Broadcast Technology | |
| Available on-line as an e-learning package | |
| IP and File Based Workflow | |
| Available on-line as an e-learning package | |
| Advanced IP Networks for Engineers | |
| 17-18 July
8-9 November |
Singapore London, UK |
| Audio & Video Fundamentals for Engineers | |
| 24-25 October
20-21 November |
London, UK Dubai, UAE |
| Broadcast Technology Workflows | |
| 28-29 August
22-23 October 22-23 November |
Singapore London, UK Dubai, UAE |
| High Dynamic Range & Wide Color Gamut | |
| 30 October | London, UK |
| IP Multicast for Stream RTP Media | |
| 5-7 July
19-20 July |
London, UK Singapore |
| IP Network Essentials for Engineers | |
| 30-31 August
6-7 November |
Singapore London, UK |
| IP Overview for Technical Sales | |
| 5 November | London, UK |
| Understanding File Formats | |
| 26 October | London, UK |
