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The current implementation of the Viametrix Virtual Network™ (and Vivian™) supports streaming of both live and pre-recorded audio and video. Since we don’t store any audio or video files on any end user’s PC we do not currently support Video-on-Demand (VOD) streaming using our networking technology.

Video-on-Demand can be closely simulated utilizing multiple concurrent Vivian™ broadcast channels operating as a broadcast network however with staggered broadcast start times allowing viewers/listeners to select a broadcast based upon a posted schedule.  This provides a more effiicient use of broadcast bandwidth than traditional VOD solutions.

Vivian™ broadcasters needing to serve concurrent audiences will find that the the Vivian™ solutions far exceed the cost/benefit ratios of Video-on-Demand (VOD) solutions. This is due to the fact that Vivian provides the most efficient utilization of bandwidth available rather than VOD which can quickly bog down virtually any network with numerous concurrent users.

However, we do provide the on-line browser-based tool to create your own synchronized multimedia VOD presentation that mirrors what is delivered using our streaming delivery. These presentations can be delivered from your web site on a VOD basis or distributed via CD/DVD as needed.

We believe your personal attributes and activities are your business, not ours. We utilize standard Internet/networking attributes, e.g., bandwdith availability, browser type, plug-in identification, IP address and ports used only for the purpose of managing and maintaining the Viametrix Virtual Network™ when you are connected and watching a broadcast channel.  Vivian™ does not include any "spyware" or "adware".  See the Viametrix Privacy Policy for details. Any Vivian™ broadcaster is free to collect the personal information desired of its audience membership and such information and collection is governed by each broadcaster's privacy policy - not Viametrix' policy.

Better Network Technology The Viametrix Virtual Network™ is a software-based self-healing, self-sorting and self-organizing network array of personal computers that allows a media organization (audio/video broadcaster) to stream its audio or video to a very wide audience for a fraction of the costs incurred utilizing first generation solutions. It is not a traditional or simple peer-to-peer network because of the artificial intelligence-driven, massively distributed dynamic network array management deployed. Implementation of our application on the media broadcast server and for each client is very simple and straightforward. Our solution maximizes the amount of network bandwidth for distributing media - not managing the network.

Lower Cost Because Vivian™ is a software-only solution, there are no proprietary hardware requirements beyond those necessary to encode a live stream using any industry standard hardware. Viametrix’s solution drastically lowers the bandwidth costs of the streaming media broadcaster without limiting the number of prospective end users or negatively influencing the quality of service. Viametrix provides the lowest total cost of ownership available in the commercial marketplace.

Controllable Cost Because the pricing of Vivian™ is a simplified, easy-to-understand and control streaming organizations can set budgets and plan their future delivery costs with great ease and accuracy.

Scalability No other streaming solution can scale with the ease and efficiency of the Viametrix Virtual Network™. The unique distributed management inherent in our technology places virtually no management load on the originating broadcast server or any other member of the network. This is the fundamental difference between our patent-pending technical sophistication and that of simple peer-to-peer companies seeking to utilize a first generation software solution.

Viametrix offers multiple audio and video streaming products and hosting services.  This enables us to best meet our customers’ needs. The variables that need to be considered in determining the cost of use for our streaming products/services include:

• the maximum bandwidth requirements of the terminal stream to end users
• the total number of concurrent end users desired by the broadcaster per station 
• the minimum PC hardware requirements to install and run the Microsoft Media Encoder
• the minimum PC hardware requirements to install and run the Vivian™ Broadcast Broadcast server and number of station licenses of your choice (only applicable if licensee/contractee is hosting vs. Viametrix)
• license fee payable to Viametrix, Inc. to broadcast using Vivian™
• the cost of the broadcaster's bandwidth, i.e., bandwidth of stream desired to be delivered to each end user (terminal stream)
• any royalties or other payments due to the streamed content owner/licensor (if any)
• any specialized add-on features needed by the client (you will be pleased with the standard features that are a part of every Vivian Broadcast license)
• content production costs

Vivian™ provides the absolute lowest total commercial cost of media delivery options available while providing a high level of quality of service (QOS) experience for your audience.

Absolutely not.  The client software installed (Vivian™) to access the Viametrix Virtual Network™ is provided solely by Viametrix, Inc.  See the Viametrix Privacy Policy.

Depending on your CPU speed, Vivian™ will use anywhere from 0% of your CPU up to about 2% - only while you are listening to/watching a broadcast.  If you are not watching or listening to a broadcast, Vivian™ is not running and does not use any of your system resources.

You will be able to receive broadcasts at bandwidth speeds equal to or less than the lesser of your available inbound OR outbound Internet connection.  There are a number of factors which will impact your actual Internet connection speed.  If other Internet activity is occuring at the same time you are participating in a Vivian™ broadcast, e.g., file transfers on your Internet connection, your actual available bandwidth will be shared.  This means that you may not have enough bandwidth to perform both operations at the same time.  You will need to choose one or the other.  The following are other possible causes:

• Reboot your Cable/DSL modem and router. Some models build up errors and periodically need to be cleared out.
• After rebooting your Cable/DSL modem and router, please recheck your speed (particularly your UPLOAD speed) using the speed test site of your choice. There are several well-publicized web sites offering assistance in determining the quality of your Internet service and getting the best performance from your PC. Although we don't endorse any changes to your computer configuration (neither do we suggest that that make any changes to your PC's configuration) you may wish to check out one or more of the following:
  • www.dslreports.com
  • www.pcpitstop.com
  • www.speedguide.net
• If you are unable to receive the upload/download speed that you have been promised by your ISP, please contact your ISP's Technical Support.
• Consider upgrading your Internet service or changing ISPs.

The Viametrix Virtual Network™

• Automatically scales to meet your changing demand requirements
• Automatically supports software multicasting
• Automatically manages each of its members to ensure a high quality of service to all network members
• Automatically traverses many firewalls
• Automatically utilizes the least amount of bandwidth for delivery to all network audience members

We have worked very hard to provide a very high level of quality of service for Vivian users.  Ensuring a consistent level of service starts with Viametrix Virtual Network™ (VVN).  The patent-pending technology employed in the management of the network ensures that it is the most scalable, most robust and most bandwidth efficient available.  The Vivian™ client application is continuously monitoring its own quality of service which ensures virtually no dropped frames and a very consistent user experience.

Vivian broadcasts are accessible to prospective broadband audience members around the world who have the free Windows Media Series 9 Player (over 50m copies have been downloaded so far) and the bandwidth required for your broadcast. Although Vivian broadcast solutions are targeted at broadband users (over 40m Internet users now have broadband access in the United States) the ActiveX control that each audience member needs is well under 200K in size. As enhancements are made available by Viametrix, the ActiveX control is automatically updated when audience members access any Vivian broadcast - ensuring that your audience members have access to new features and functionality as soon as they are available.

Unlike file sharing networks, no media files are stored on Vivian users' PCs and no PC resources (e.g., CPU, RAM, bandwidth) are utilized or required unless the user is actually viewing or listening to a Vivian broadcast. CPU and RAM requirements for Vivian are virtually non-existent. Vivian broadcasts are targeted to support broadband audiences as opposed to dial-up.

Audience member privacy is important to Viametrix. We don't collect any personally identifiable data from audience members. Please see our Privacy Policy.

Delivering a high quality experience to audience members is of significant importance. Vivian constantly monitors the bandwidth availability and adjusts the network automatically for each audience member to ensure the highest quality experience. Our technology also ensures the fastest available media delivery startup.

For audience members with questions or Vivian technical support needs, Viametrix provides 24*7 access to Frequently Asked Questions and our Support Knowledgebase.  Support for audience members is also available via email.

In keeping with Viametrix' philosophy of giving Vivian™ broadcasters as much control as possible over their content and broadcast at the lowest cost, a browser-based online broadcast management center is an integral part of broadcasting with Vivian™.

This facility provides Vivian™ broadcasters with the ability to manage all aspects of their Viametrix account, all of their broadcast stations and get technical/customer support from any PC with access to the Internet 24*7.

Streaming media, by its very nature, does not store any media files on any audience-member's PC. If audio and video files are not stored, they cannot be re-broadcast by audience members.

As a standard feature for all Vivian™ broadcast stations, the broadcaster can establish a password which must be provided by prospective audience members prior to accessing the station.

Each Vivian™ broadcaster can limit access to the broadcast by providing the password only to those who have paid for access using the broadcaster's own PayPal or other merchant account of the broadcaster's choosing. This may be changed 24*7 as often as the broadcaster chooses via the Vivian™ Broadcast Management Center.

Viametrix may provide a more robust DRM solution or support third party DRM solutions in the future.

Every computer connected to the Internet has a unique identifier called an IP address. Many times the IP address is consistently assigned (static) to a computer. On other networks, a random IP address is assigned each time a computer connects to the network. This is referred to as a dynamic IP address. If a computer address is dynamically assigned, the IP can change frequently. Anyone trying to access that computer from the Internet would be unable to do so consistently without dynamic DNS support.

Because there are many more Internet users than there are publicly accessible IP addresses, many broadband service providers only include dynamically-assigned (only while a user is actively connected to the Internet) IP addresses in their basic service offerings. They may charge extra to permanently allocate one or more specific public IP addresses to their subscribers.

Viametrix provides dynamic DNS support for Vivian broadcasters as a standard feature. This also means that Vivian broadcasters are NOT required to maintain a web site or own a domain name to broadcast audio and video over the Internet.

The patent-pending Viametrix Virtual Network™ creation and management technologies are the foundation components that enable the most efficient network node management and bandwidth use. By using artificial intelligence in each network node, a dynamic content delivery network is created and maintained automatically for each Vivian™ Broadcast Station. This also ensures that the maximum amount of network bandwidth is available for media delivery (not network management), enabling the network to scale reliably on demand.

The Vivian™ client application continually monitors the available bandwidth, media buffer and upstream and downstream media delivery quality. If a deficiency is identified, the network node automatically responsitions itself to ensure continuity of the media delivery. There is no need for the broadcaster to evaluate Internet performance - the network manages itself and provides real-time audience connectivity statistics. Several levels of automatic network and media stream recovery are employed to maximize the quality of each audience member's experience, even if its own Internet connection is sub-par or erratic.

Due to our technology implementation each media stream starts very fast with the absolute minimum "buffering time".

Seeing is believing. Compare our streams delivered at 100Kbps and others running up to two or three times that amount of bandwidth.

If you are already streaming media you can use Vivian to broadcast your own stream in minutes.P>

To ensure that all Vivian broadcasters always have the latest features available, no-charge updates are available throughout the paid license/contract term.

Reducing costs while providing a high quality of service is important to everyone. Vivian™ solutions are your answer to the best available Return-on-Investment (ROI).  Using Vivian™ broadcasting solutions is not only fast and easy, it is also incredibly inexpensive. Vivian promotional offerings and pricing is very clear, concise and uncomplicated.

There are basic requirements that must be met for streaming media - with many solutions for each. Viametrix provides a highly integrated feature set to meet many of these requirements.  The chart below can be used to provide a basic methodology to compare Vivian™ Broadcast Solutions to others. It won't take long to see the phenomenal economics of our solutions.

Vivian™ Broadcast Stations can be implemented literally in minutes by non-technical personnel. See our current promotions and configuration options here.

Note: Entities that currently stream may actually be able to take existing equipment out of service/redeploy when switching to Vivian broadcasting solutions. This is particularly true of those who utilize multiple PCs for encoding purposes.

Before audio or video can be broadcast, it must be encoded. Currently, Vivian™ broadcast offerings support the free encoder available for download from the Microsoft web site here.

Once audio or video has been encoded it may be stored and broadcast one or more times. You may also choose to encode and broadcast live and save the encoding for later re-broadcast.

Please be sure to pay special attention to the hardware requirements from the Microsoft web site here for Windows Media Series 9 encoder. Encoding is a CPU, RAM and disk-access intensive process. Skimping on the encoding process will directly (negatively) impact the quality of your broadcast.

Viametrix' broadcast solutions controlled by Playmagix allow broadcasters to deliver interactive text, graphics, etc. files along with their streaming media to a global audience. This functionality is most popular with enterprise and distance learning streaming requirements. However, there are many more uses of multimedia presentations that are not being fully exploited due to the cost and implementation difficulty of non-Vivian solutions.

Rather than just delivering audio / video and streaming ads, Vivian broadcasters can easily implement additional information/audience interactivity using the integrated, browser-based Playmagix, e.g.:

• For each audio/video stream as it is played
  • Support interactive shopping, e.g., coordinated E-Commerce links to purchase the song/CD/video subject
  • Coordinate the presentation of anything that can be delivered in a browser using standard HTML including:
    • HTML links to obtain interactive feedback from individual audience members
    • Text/graphic ads accompanying streaming media
    • Text-based closed captioning 
    • Spreadsheet presentations
    • Adobe PDF files
• Play individual audio/video streams
  • In a specific order
  • For a specified amount of time
  • In order or randomly selected from broadcaster-specified groups of streams
• Change multimedia content to be delivered without re-encoding audio/video 
• Display a schedule of content that will be broadcast at specified times

Using the ability to deliver specific web pages to your audience at specific times, you can easily create the ability to ensure that your audience members are not only watching your broadcast as it happens by having them personally respond to web pages delivered with the media stream.  This is an incredibly easy and efficient way to gain implement audience member accountability - something that other multicast systems simply cannot do.

Live Audio/Video

Video cameras and microphones and related media production equipment is required to create any live streaming media.

Pre-Recorded/Encoded Audio/Video

Audio/video which has been previously stored in a file can be encoded for broadcasting also. The ultimate broadcast quality is highly dependent upon the best possible original media capture and encoding process.

Streaming media, by its very nature, does not store any media files on any audience-member's PC. If audio and video files are not stored, they cannot be re-broadcast by audience members.

As a standard feature for all Vivian™ broadcast channels, the broadcaster can establish a password which must be provided by prospective audience members prior to accessing the station.

Each Vivian™ broadcaster can limit access to the broadcast by providing the password only to those who have paid for access using the broadcaster's own PayPal or other merchant account of the broadcaster's choosing. This may be changed 24*7 as often as the broadcaster chooses via the Vivian™ Broadcast Management Center.

Currently, only the Microsoft Media Series 9 media player is supported.  It is available as a free download from: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/players.aspx.  If you do not currently have the latest version installed, please click on the link above and install it before attempting to view/listen to a Vivian broadcast.

If your PC has been configured to only allow a system administrator/someone with those rights to install applications, you may need to contact your internal LAN Administrator for assistance.

Broadcast Channel refers to a broadcast station (either TV/video or radio/audio) for a single channel that has the capacity to have a program schedule of 24 hours per day.

A Broadcast Network is a collection of broadcast channels managed by one or more Station Managers.  A channel is managed in its entirety by a Broadcast Station Manager.  A Program Manager may be used to manage the playlist of one or more channels.