The IBC Conference is here again, and it's a good time to examine the changes in the media industry. Although nothing drastic has changed, there is just more-much more of the changes that started a few years ago.

I want to start with a small confession. I used to be addicted to reading; it's why I got my glasses. Seriously, the librarian in the city library knew me by name because sometimes I was reading a book per day. Now, I'm addicted to binge viewing because there are so many incredible videos out there. Also, the price to get them is so low that I can't resist anymore. If the appeal of the video got to a reading addict like me, it would get to everyone.

My story reflects the story of the media industry overall. Today, we need to produce more content, faster, cheaper, and better than ever for all these addicted people (like me).

We need to accelerate the path from ideas to the audience with faster and more efficient production workflows. Acceleration will come from better connections and better technology, but connecting people also will play a role. Media networks must provide the right conditions for acceleration to occur, and that's where Cisco comes into play. Nobody knows networks better than we do.

When you break down the transformation into concrete actions, you can see there are four key changes to make:

• Bring collaborative tools into real-time and in true form, to produce, review, markup, and edit content through the power of the cloud directly on-site:Shoot, Share, Edit, Retake, Perfect -On Set, in Real-Time.
• Transform to an IP network with a holistic approach that brings both the hardware and the software together to automate everything while preserving the operational experience: Unleash a more dynamic network -IP Fabric for Media.
• Take an orchestration platform that can seamlessly integrate public or private clouds within a virtualized environment to achieve full resource flexibility:A More Efficient Media Operation Starts Where? If You Said "In the Cloud," Take the Rest of the Day Off!.
• Use software-defined storage for an end-to-end media workflow; a workflow that can be geo-distributed and that can seamlessly integrate cloud resources:Active Media Demands an Agile Infrastructure.

Of course, network transformation involves more than these four areas. There's also content distribution, SD-WAN, and many other things you can do to accelerate your ideas to the audience.

Come visit us at the Cisco booth at IBC to learn firsthand from our team of acceleration experts. We'll be in Hall 1, stand F78.

See you there!