Why Are Media & Entertainment Studios Hesitant to Embrace the Cloud?

Jason Shah, Mediafly’s CTO, recently spoke at the Cloud Developers Summit and Expo 2014 in Austin, Texas.

While the adoption of cloud-based solutions (aka software-as-a-service/SaaS) is accelerating in most industries, many large media & entertainment studios are still hesitant to fully embrace the cloud. At quick glance, the production, post-house, and broadcast/theatre distribution stages of the current lifecycle are fairly efficient. But when it comes to distributing pre-production content to an individual reviewer/approver, that is where efficiency is lost. Why is there a hesitancy expressed by IT leaders within M&E to roll out cloud solutions and work towards digitizing all of the production lifecycle? With the hope of shifting the mindset of IT leaders, Jason expressed three main reasons why M&E companies are experiencing challenges in this area and why embracing the cloud could help.

Security Teams Don’t Trust The Cloud and SaaS

Security demands for SaaS products are greater than internal demands. While no system is guaranteed to be 100% safe, cloud-based software comes with slightly stronger security protocols, making it harder to adopt but ultimately safer in the long-run.

1. SaaS products have quarterly security, network and DRM audits VS. Internal products usually require an audit at launch, and then only one additional audit a year later.
2. SaaS products have session-based forensic watermarking. VS. Internally you may only have a single distribution watermark.

These two factors indicate that SaaS solutions adhere to more stringent security parameters making it a safe.

Sunk Costs Win

A ‘Sunk Cost’ refers to money that has already been spent and cannot be recovered. Sunk Costs contrast to prospective costs, which are funds allocated for future investments that have not been spent yet. In the interest of security, technology owners sometimes think that the best way to demonstrate value is to continue to make incremental investments in the original technology/solution, instead of pivoting to a new solution that may be more effective and less costly in the long-term.

During his presentation, Jason quoted a studio executive who shared, “maybe it’s not about investing in the security of the system, but more about layering more things into their data center to validate the sunk cost of the original technology.” Get the picture? Throwing money at a security system does not necessarily strengthen it, nor does it validate the money that has gone into the system in the past, but investing in a new system may save more money and time in the long term.

It’s Easier To Stay The Course

Pivoting is hard. Really hard. Once someone is set in their ways in can be very difficult to change their thinking. The media & entertainment industry hasn’t yet accepted that the “old way” is not always the “best way,” and getting them to switch over to a cloud-based SaaS is challenging. In the minds of most, DVD equals safe and cloud equals risk, while the opposite is true.

Currently, a studio executive receives an average of 50-100 DVDs a week of pre-release content. These DVDs are then ripped onto their personal iPad by their assistants. DVD does not equal safe and in copying the physical DVD the risk element is compounded. The perception is that this process has been working so far so why change it, but in reality it hasn’t been working like many assume it has. Pirated content is on the rise. Leaks are becoming more commonplace and IT is being tasked making content more secure.

What Does Embracing the Cloud Really Solve?

Even though some major players in the media & entertainment industry are lagging behind, we can help advance their thinking. There are several things we can do to overcome the lags that are occurring in the media & entertainment industry.

• First, we must have a SaaS solution that creates measurable value. A solution is no good if it can’t give you something in return.
• Second, security should become your number one priority. A single vendor leak may wipe out years of progress across all vendors; while security teams don’t trust the cloud and SaaS, the current way of doing things isn’t necessarily the best practice. There is no 100% guarantee with any method, but cloud and SaaS can offer you better security and more control than DVDs floating around content on insecure sites.
• Lastly, you should be ready to adapt to custom business processes. To stay in the game and keep your information safe, incorporating industry best practices into your company will keep you from lagging behind your competitors. Be ready to adapt.

This recap of Jason Shah’s speaker session is just a brief insight into why media & entertainment industries are lagging in some areas, despite the acceleration of cloud-based SaaS. You can watch Jason’s full presentation below.