Flash Communication Server 2 announced

FlashComm 2 is announced and with it a name change to Flash Media Server 2. With support for the new Flash 8 Vp6 Codec, automatic player detection, authentication, Edge and Origin servers and more, expect to see a lot more sites swithching to Flash video

FlashComm grows up with this release. The first version broke new ground by enabling new things never seen. The 1.5 update fixed some important issues and also added new bits of functionality. With this version, Macromedia are clearly saying that they are aiming broader than Flash Developers and early adopters. Now they are ready to take on the competition.

The new video codec is just brilliant and rivals what both Microsoft, Real and Apple can offer. New Player detection features will offer smooth playback to all end users and the new authentication features are perfect for pay-per-delivery video and subscription services. Flash Media Server 2 (FMS2) now has support for Edge Servers that allows you to stream from the server cluster closest to the end user. The shorter the video stream travels, the less chance it is that it will be interupted/disturbed by other network traffic. This is a very important feature for professional video deployment. The backend now has support for Remoting, File objects, and XML objects, sockets and streams - including support for Jabber XML streams. FMS2 also offers a number of ways to integrate with Application Servers and media asset management systems for retrieval of meta-data information.

"The Flash Platform is the best way to deliver web video and rich media applications to the widest audience on the Internet," said Tom Hale, senior vice president and general manager, Macromedia. "For streaming video integrated into the web experience, there is no better choice than Flash Media Server 2." We couldn't agree more.


You've seen this and similar dialogues on so many major sites. It's annoying and unneccesary for the end users and it forces the site to encode each video to several formats. We'd bet that if it wasn't for the $4500 price per 2 CPUs, most of the major sites would switch to Flashcomm within a year. Sites such as iFilm, CNN and others have already paid a lot for their existing video delivery systems. Unless Macromedia offer something like competetive upgrades, takeup will be slow despite the superior quality and end user experience.

A public Beta will be available later this month.
Read more at macromedia.com

 

 

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