Objectives of the meeting
The first Concertation Meeting within the FP6 era was held in Brussels on
March 11th - 2004, organized by AVISTA Project in association with the European
Commission D2 Unit (Networked Audiovisual Systems and Home Platforms - NAVSHP)
and supported by BIP project.
The meeting was chaired by David Wood (EBU). The Concertation meeting were
the following:
· To provide general information from the European
Commission.
· Election of the Concertation process chairmanship.
· Presentation of the draft overall NAVSHP projects portfolio analysis.
· Brief on the launch of the NAVSHP New Media Council.
· Presentation of the draft concertation structure of NAVSHP and working
procedures.
· Presentation of the EU-China workshop on in-home networks and platforms.
· Information to projects about newsletter and website facilities
· Definition of Coordination Groups.
· Election of chairmanships for the Coordination Groups.
· First sessions for the 3 first Coordination Groups.
· To define further Concertation work
· To inform about upcoming conferences, exhibitions and demonstrations
· To plan future meetings and venues
Structure of the Concertation Meeting
The Concertation Meeting was held with the following structure:
· Concertation Plenary
· Proposed Concertation structure in the FP6 era
· Coordination Group parallel streams
· Concertation Meeting Summary and Conclusions
Attendees
The meeting was attended by 81 projects representatives, including EC officers.
Representatives from the following projects attended the meeting:
Main issues addressed
1. General information from the Commission. (Joao Da Silva)
On behalf of the Commission, Joao Da Silva, D2 Head of Unit, made
. Mr. Da Silva introduced the context of
the NAVSHP strategic objective as well as the relevant aspects of the transition
between the FP5 and FP6.
Regarding Concertation issues, Mr. Da Silva remarked that the Concertation process
should be neither an obligation to projects, nor a technology watch/call opportunity
watch arena only, but a way of identifying relevant technical, regulatory and
market aspects for the projects. Concertation process must be dynamic, active
and participative and the support of AVISTA and BIP projects is very important
to achieve the Concertation goals. AVISTA and BIP projects will assist to facilitate
the implementation of FP6 and the Concertation Mechanisms, supporting EC work
and projects in this respect.
Mr. Da Silva informed about the planned regular publication of the D2 Newsletter
additional to the AVISTA Newsletter. The D2 Newsletter will publish the main
news and key issues of the Unit and will have a wider coverage, being distributed
even outside the NAVSHP field.
Future perspectives of the Networked Audiovisual Systems and Home Platforms
strategic objective were introduced:
- Near term perspectives: continuity of existing elements and instruments
and developing new ones, good international cooperation opportunities, etc.
- Longer term perspectives: adoption of the EC Growth Initiative (December
2003) and the EC Financial perspectives (January 2004).
As a result of these expected perspectives the first orientations to the Seventh
Framework Programme (FP7) will be addressed during the next months by pointing
to Technology Platforms (TPs) concept, still under study. Main RTD efforts should
be aimed to Technology Platforms as well as the traditional medium size actions
using the FP6 types of instruments.
A final reflection was made in the name of the Commission: Is there scope for
a Technology Platform in the NAVSHP field? Can the NAVSHP New Media Council
(N2MC) be it? These questions would be addressed on March 12th during the N2MC
Preparatory Meeting.
2. Election of the Concertation process chairmanship.
Mr. Christoph Dosch (IRT) was proposed as the Chairman for the Concertation
process and he was elected by acclamation, wishing a prompt recovery of his
wife (the reason for him to not being able to participate in this meeting).
The Chairman of the Concertation process acts as the moderator and the coordinator
of the main Concertation activities planned, in order to achieve the best
complementarities between the FP5 and FP6 NAVSHP projects.
Special gratitude was expressed to David Wood twofold: for his continuous
assistance and guidance to NAVSHP projects during last years, his dedication
to conduct concertation activities as well as for his availability to chair
this meeting on behalf of Mr. Dosch.
3. Presentation of the draft NAVSHP projects portfolio analysis.
A draft overall NAVSHP . Also, a focussed draft NAVSHP projects portfolio on in-home networks
and platforms was introduced by Mr. Roger Torrenti (BIP Project).
Mr. Gerhard Stoll introduced the current state of the projects portfolio
analysis carried out by AVISTA. The analysis has been already made for those
projects which facilitated to AVISTA and BIP projects a public version of
their Technical Annexes, and is still pending for the remaining projects.
A call was made to these projects to encourage them to deliver this public
version as an important input to the portfolio analysis. An example of the
analysis made was introduced for the INSTINCT project. Missing documentation
from the following projects: COHERENT, MCDN, METACAMERA, MHP-CONFIDENCE, OLGA,
SIVSS, UNIVERSE.
The analysis carried out has taken into account the layers model proposed
by AVISTA in the previous Concertation meeting held in Cannes. It means a
3 layers scheme (content, transport and terminal) with different sub-layers
included in each layer to reflect the main technical aspects of the NAVSHP
value chain.
All the FP6 projects were previously and tentatively positioned in several
sub-layers within the overall layers model. Some projects have explicitly
indicated their own wishes to be identified within specific sub-layers (TIRAMISU,
DANAE and TEAHA) whom allocation was showed as they required. The remaining
projects were invited to criticize the allocation proposed and to self-allocate
in the layers model.
Some potential sub-layers' coordinators had been previously identified, since
TEAHA and TIRAMISU projects had previously expressed their interest to coordinate
some of the following sub-layers:
- TEAHA for 'Access Systems', 'Home Networks', 'Terminal middleware (for
OSGi)' and 'Terminal hardware (for residential gateway and connected appliances)
- TIRAMISU for 'Interoperable DRM'
Additional volunteers as sub-layers' coordinators were asked by Mr. Stoll. It
was also suggested that IP projects would be very welcomed.
The importance of the projects collaboration with AVISTA and BIP was strongly
remarked. This collaboration is relevant in order to allocate correctly the
different technical issues (sub-layers) dealt by each project.
As a second step in the projects portfolio analysis, the very first incorporation
of Coordination Groups (CGs) was presented. Three CGs had been created and some
other topics were identified. The three coordination groups set up are: CG-1
(Digital Rights Management - DRM), CG-2 (End to end QoS in a convergent environment)
and CG-3 (In-Home Networks and Platforms). Future CGs would be able to be created
and suggestions from projects were asked. Some projects' representatives proposed
the following thematic areas as potential additional CGs: scalable media formats,
convergence broadcasting, broadband and mobile, etc.
Mr. Roger Torrenti introduced the current state of the focused on in-home networks and platforms
carried out by BIP. He explained the main reasons for the projects analysis
and the first results were presented with an example for TEAHA project. Next
steps in the analysis were also presented after remarking the relevance of the
availability of public versions of the projects' Technical Annexes in order
to carry out an efficient analysis.
The final analysis will constitute a deliverable of AVISTA and BIP projects
which is extremely relevant for all the FP6 projects and ongoing FP5 projects
because it will be an useful tool to find complementarities and synergies among
NAVSHP projects, to implement the grouping, to identify focused and thematic
specific areas relevant for projects and to identify potential events for Concertation.
4. Brief on the launch of the NAVSHP New Media Council
Mr. David Wood (proposed as Chairman of the High Level Committee) announced
the Preparatory Meeting of the NAVSHP New Media Council (N2MC) that would
be held the day after this Concertation Meeting. The N2MC will consist on
a group of opinion formers who will interact with the Concertation process
in the NAVSHP strategic objective. It will be a group of highly qualified
experts on the NAVSHP area to create a permanent consulting and advisory body.
Mr. Wood commented on the NAVSHP New Media Council objectives:
- To assist the effectiveness of the FP6 activities in multimedia tools
and technologies
- To increase the influence of the projects
- To obtain the maximum added value from the work
Finally, the possibility of the N2MC becoming a Technology Platform was addressed
as a way to foster effective public-private partnerships and a mechanism to
bring together all interested stakeholders in the NAVSHP field.
5. Presentation of COPRAS Project
Mr. Bart Brusse introduced the more relevant aspects of the . This project intends to contribute to the standardization
not only in the Networked Audiovisual Systems and Home Platforms but in a
wider range. More than seventy organizations are involved in the project with
the main goal of creating an ICT Standards Board.
COPRAS project is an important reference to the FP5 and FP6 projects because
this project pays special attention to promote the projects and their results,
regarding the standardization issues.
6. Presentation of the EU-China workshop on in-home networks and platforms
Mr. Roger Torrenti (BIP Project) introduced the EU-China workshop on in-home
networks and platforms which will be held in Beijing on April 27th, 2004.
The Euro-China Workshop will be organised within the framework of the BIP
IST project and under the aegis of the European Commission and of the Chinese
authorities. This workshop is open to any European or Chinese organisations.
This event aims at giving European and Chinese organisations active in this
field a unique opportunity to meet and network, exchange information and visions,
and possibly initiate or strengthen cooperation projects. During the workshop,
presentations will be made by European and Chinese organisations. Presentations
from European organisations will essentially focus on the status and perspectives
of ongoing FP5 and FP6 projects included in the portfolio of the D2 Unit of
DG Information Society.
FP5 and FP6 projects were invited to attend the event and some reasons to
show the relevance of the workshop were given: Asian markets in general, and
Chinese market in particular, constitute huge and booming market with a lot
of opportunities to European projects, companies and organizations.
7. Information to projects about newsletter and website facilities
Dr. Julian Seseña (AVISTA Project) informed to the projects about two
other deliverables of the Communication Plan to be carried out by AVISTA:
the website and the newsletter.
The AVISTA website
intends to be a meeting point for the NAVSHP FP5 and FP6 projects by gathering
relevant information and news concerning the strategic objective. The website
will be an efficient tool for the exchange of information among projects.
Projects' progress, findings and main results can be also shown in the web
that will also serve as a standardization information repository. Dr. Seseña
offered to the projects the possibility of publishing on this website all
information they consider relevant to the NAVSHP strategic objective.
The AVISTA newsletter (No. 0 is already available in the AVISTA website)
will be published every 4 months, maybe every 2 months if the information
to be published is abundant. IST Program general information, links to main
available documents, dates or agendas of relevant conferences and workshops,
information on standardization, IPR, regulatory issues, EU policies, etc.
will constitute the key contents of this NAVSHP newsletter. Dr. Seseña
asked for suggestions from the NAVSHP projects and remarked the need of projects'
protagonist: projects' news, development and results. Dr. Seseña also
reminded that e-mails of additional people interested to receive the NAVSHP
newsletter were very welcome.
8. Coordination Groups parallel streams
Three Coordination Groups have been created so far:
The three Coordination Groups discussions worked in parallel sessions.
9. Summary of Coordination Groups discussion
The closing session of the plenary meeting was aimed to summarize the work of
the 3 parallel streams in order to allow all the Concertation meeting attendees
to access to an overall vision of the achievements obtained in the different
Coordination Groups.
An e-mail reflector was agreed to be created for each Coordination Group including
e-mail addresses of all the CG session attendees as well as other e-mail addresses
of individuals potentially interested in the Coordination Group.
Mr. Leonardo Chiariglione (CG-1 Convenor), Mr. Denis Abraham and David Hutchison
(CG-2 Convenors) and Mr. Roger Torrenti (CG-3 Convenor) summarized the main
issues of each particular stream.
During the CG-1 (DRM) session 4 presentations of projects were introduced, allowing
time for an interesting open discussion aimed to identify the main requirements,
goals and expected developments on DRM issues on each project.
However, during the CG-2 (QoS) and CG-3 (In-Home) sessions a lot of projects
presentations were introduced and the time to discuss were more reduced. More
focus discussions will be pursued at future meetings.
Next Steps
1. Events, conferences and exhibitions
A list of events, conferences and exhibitions related to the NAVSHP field was
showed to the attendance in order to inform the projects and to identify those
more relevant to the FP5 and FP6 projects. To consult this list, please visit
the AVISTA website.
2. Future Concertation Meetings and venues
The next Concertation Meetings planned are the following:
- Barcelona (Spain), June 7th, 2004. (hosted by Telefonica I+D)
- Nice (France), December 3rd, 2004. (hosted by BIP project and association
to Net@Home conference)
3. Each project shall provide to AVISTA staff ()
information and comments as regards the following topics (deadline: March
26th, 2004):
· Opinion about the areas defined for the Concertation ('Layers model'
and 'Focused and Thematic Specific Areas')
· Projects positioning in the Layer model.
· Suggestions on additional themes for Coordination Groups.
· Suggestions on new events for Concertation.
· Proposition of projects key people as oordinators of new Coordination
Groups.
· Key experts to participate / animate any of the identified areas
for Concertation.
· Interest to participate in national or international events (Conferences,
workshops, trade shows, specialized events, etc.)
· Suggestions for the AVISTA website.
· Suggestions for the AVISTA Newsletter.
· Missing public documentation from projects: COHERENT, MCDN, METACAMERA,
MHP-CONFIDENCE, OLGA, SIVSS, UNIVERSE
Final note: During the meeting, it was known information on the brutal terrorist
attack in Madrid against innocent people and workers. The Chairman expressed
solidarity and condolences to the victims.
. Mr. Da Silva introduced the context of
the NAVSHP strategic objective as well as the relevant aspects of the transition
between the FP5 and FP6.