Description
An over-the-top media service is a streaming media service offered directly to viewers via the Internet. OTT bypasses cable, broadcast, and satellite television platforms, the companies that traditionally act as a controller or distributors of such content. Most of these services are owned by a major film studio. Some streaming services started as an add-on to Blu-ray offerings, which are supplements to the programs watched.[1]
Streaming is an alternative to file downloading, a process in which the end-user obtains the entire file(s) for the content before watching or listening to it.
A client end-user can use the media player, computer, mobile phone, and smart TV to start playing digital video content before the entire file has been transmitted. Users will need an Internet connection to stream or download video content. Users lacking compatible hardware or software systems may be unable to stream or download certain content.
An over-the-top (OTT) media service is a media service offered directly to viewers via the Internet. OTT bypasses cable, broadcast, and satellite television platforms: the types of companies that have traditionally acted as controllers or distributors of such content.[1] It has also been used to describe no-carrier cellphones, for which all communications are charged as data,[2] avoiding monopolistic competition, or apps for phones that transmit data in this manner, including both those that replace other call methods[3][4] and those that update software.[4][5][6]
The term is most synonymous with subscription-based video on demand (SVoD) services that offer access to film and television content (including existing shows and movies for which rights have been acquired from the content owner, as well as original content produced specifically for the service).[6]
OTT also encompasses a wave of “skinny” television services that offer access to live streams of linear specialty channels, similar to a traditional satellite or cable TV provider, but streamed over the public Internet, rather than a closed, private network with proprietary equipment such as set-top boxes.[7]
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