Microsoft Offers Cloud-Based Video Delivery

Microsoft jas unveiled a cloud capability, Windows Azure Media Services, for delivering video to clients, including devices.

Windows Azure Media Services is a PaaS (Platform as a Service) for building and delivering media solutions to customers, said Scott Guthrie, Microsoft corporate vice president in the Microsoft Server and Tools Business, in a blog post on Monday. Users can build media workflows in the cloud. "It offers a bunch of ready-to-use services that enable the fast ingestion, encoding, format-conversion, storage, content protection, and streaming (both live and on-demand) of video. It also integrates and exposes services provided by industry leading partners -- enabling an incredibly deep media stack of functionality that you can leverage."

Streaming formats are supported, including Smooth Streaming, HTTP Live Streaming, and Flash Media Streaming. Services can be delivered to HTML5, Silverlight, Flash, and Windows 8 clients as well as to Apple iPad and iPhone, Google Android, and Xbox and Windows Phone devices.

"One of the unique aspects of Windows Azure Media Services is that all of its features are exposed using a consistent HTTP REST API," Guthrie said. "This is true both for the media services we've built, as well as the partner-delivered media services that are enabled through it. This makes it incredibly easy to automate media workflows and integrate the combined set of services within your applications and media solutions."

Interested persons can sign up to access a preview version by emailing mediaservices@microsoft.com. Like with the rest of the Windows Azure cloud platform, users of Media Services pay only for what they use. Media Services offers cloud-based versions of existing technologies from Microsoft Media Platform and media partners