KLCS Pilots Data Broadcasting of Educational Materials with Triveni Digital
Nearly One Million Students and Teachers in the Los Angeles County School District to Benefit from a Comprehensive Digital Content Distribution Model
LAS VEGAS — April 19, 2004 — NAB2004, Triveni Digital Booth #SU11936
Triveni Digital was selected by KLCS for its project to provide teachers and students in the Los Angeles County School District (LAUSD) with rich instructional digital media content. The project aims to place the educational materials directly in each classroom or at library computers via video/data streaming, thereby allowing individualized, tailored learning to occur.
Using Triveni Digital’s SkyScraper™ system, the content for the schools is inserted into the digital broadcast stream. The technique, also known as datacasting, increases the resources available to the schools by delivering them where they are needed - on site. The SkyScraper system provides various methods for packaging, distribution and accessing of the content. Age and audience appropriate user interfaces can easily be designed and implemented.
KLCS is transmitting four streaming channels at 1 Mbps directly to school sites from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. during school days while also broadcasting their regularly scheduled programming. These channels, a replication of KLCS’ main channel, a Primary School Channel, a Secondary School Channel, and a Professional Development Channel are coordinated with the curriculum calendar, providing teachers with an easy means to access rich media without leaving the classroom.
Additionally, teachers can browse the contents of KLCS’ and LAUSD’s digital repository and order content-on-demand. This content is sorted by grade level, subject matter, state standards and over 40 other metadata fields. Teachers can browse low-resolution copies of the material over any type of connection, even a 56KB modem. When they find the material they wish to order, they simply click on "Add to Cart". The order is sent to the SkyScraper system, which transmits the high-resolution copy to the school’s edge receiver and cache. Upon receipt the teacher is sent an e-mail with a hotlink directly to the content. A click on the hotlink opens the media on any computer in the school. Material is not limited to just video. It can include PowerPoint presentations, documents and lesson plans; virtually any material that can be delivered in a digital form. The system is operating system independent and works equally well with either Macs or PCs.
"The team at Triveni Digital has done a fantastic job ensuring their product was integrated with our asset management database," said Alan Popkin, Director of Engineering at KLCS. "SkyScraper has proven to be a solid product. It provides us with the tools and flexible architecture that we need for our ever-expanding project."
"KLCS has defined an extremely ambitious project that validates the notion that DTV enables rich new services," said Mark Simpson, President and CEO of Triveni Digital. "It was an honor to be chosen for this groundbreaking project, which we expect will pave the way for other advanced education content distribution systems."
KLCS Datacasting Maximizes Use of Its DTV Bandwidth While Providing Access to Its Media Rich Content
Data broadcasting via digital TV offers an efficient way for KLCS to deliver rich multi-media content to many recipients simultaneously by using their excess DTV bandwidth. Distributing education materials -- such as videos, slide shows, electronic books and magazines, together with associated teaching materials -- in the form of physical tapes and paper requires reproduction, packing, shipping, unpacking, and other hidden costs. While many of these costs can be avoided by making the content available on centralized web sites for on-line access, that approach calls for expensive, high bandwidth Internet connections to the schools. Instead, it’s more economical to deliver the content via datacasting to servers within the schools, where it can be accessed on demand over a local area network (LAN).
The SkyScraper data distribution system allows broadcasters like KLCS to offer new services by delivering various types of digitized content through their DTV signals. Features include receiver targeting, encryption and support for multi-station networks. A flexible architecture facilitates innovative application development, while allowing broadcasters to manage datacasting bandwidth and support multiple content providers. In the case of KLCS, the SkyScraper system provides the scalable delivery system required to grow from their pilot project of less than a dozen schools to a district with more than one million students and faculty.
About KLCS
KLCS-TV/DT -- The Education Station -- is a noncommercial educational television station licensed to the Los Angeles Unified School District and is a member of the Public Broadcasting Service. A multiple Emmy® Award winner, KLCS broadcasts on analog channel 58 and digital channel 41 to over sixteen million viewers throughout Southern California. KLCS is also carried on DirecTV, Dish Network, and most cable systems. The daily school audience potentially includes 900,000 LAUSD students in schools and centers, and a staff of over 100,000 dedicated full and part-time employees. KLCS classroom instructional television (CITV) programming reaches over 150 school districts throughout Southern California. Visit www.klcs.org for more information.
About Triveni Digital
Triveni Digital, Inc., a subsidiary of LG Electronics, develops solutions that provide for the management and distribution of data and metadata in digital television systems. Triveni Digital's products for ATSC PSIP, DVB SI, data broadcasting, stream analysis and monitoring are renowned for their ease of use and innovative features. Working with leading industry partners, Triveni Digital employs an open and standards-compliant approach to the digital television market.
EDITOR’S NOTE – When referring to Triveni Digital, please use the complete company name "Triveni Digital" and not just the word "Triveni". Product and company names used here are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
