#How much internet speed do I need for 1080p streaming?

[stream-academy]

"My stream looks bad."

This is a pretty common issue that creators face and it all stems from one common misconception: 1080p doesn't mean quality.

The above video is in fact 1080p, but as you can see there's definitely something wrong about it. Here's that exact same freezeframe but at 480p:

So what's happening here? Bitrates.

A Crash Course Through Video Compression

Computer video has historically been a really hard problem to solve. Computers used to be slow (Like, really slow). Computer scientists (read: nerds) figured out that the human eye is bad and have developed techniques that abuse this fact.

Dithering tricks your eye into "seeing" more colors than are actually present. Here's a monotone (two colors!) that appears to also have shades of grey even though there aren't any:

Pretty cool, eh? By using clever placement of the black dots an entire range of grays emerge even though there aren't any.

You can even throw out little bits of detail to save space and the eye will be none the wiser. These are the core principles behind video compression.

Why do we even need to compress video anyways?

The short answer: internet speeds still aren't fast enough. The long answer: distribution costs.

If you are a video site, such as Twitch or YouTube, it is in your best interests to save as much money as possible for every live stream. So, every platform places limits on bitrate.

Okay, get to the point already. What is bitrate and how do I get my stream to look good?

Video compression usually has two modes: constant bitrate (CBR), and variable bitrate (VBR).

For regular video recordings it's usually recommended you use variable bitrate (note that CRF/CQ is a form of variable bitrate). This allows you to save space where you can but increase usage where it's necessary to help maintain visual quality.

But for live-streaming you use constant bitrate (the reason is due to how networks actually operate and how celluar/mobile networks handle streaming. It's complicated). With CBR, you tell the encoder that you want the result to always be at X bits per second regardless of the resulting quality (good or bad). So that means that during moments of low movement (in game, in an IRL setting, or even on your desktop) the encoder doesn't have to work nearly as hard to fit the current frame into the allotted rate. During high movement moments the encoder has to work extra hard to find those visual shortcuts — such as dithering, detail removal, or macroblocks (shudders) — to keep everything within bounds.

Obviously, removing detail will hurt the quality of an image. And doing that repeatedly will result in that reduced image quality you saw in the first 1080p screenshot. For that screenshot, I encoded the video at 500kbps, which is obviously way too low (I did that for for clickbait). For the 480p screenshot I encoded it using a VBR technique called Constant Quality. The size difference between those two files paints a better picture: the 480p version is 12x larger than the 1080p version despite 1080p having 8x as many pixels as 480p.

Alright, so what do you recommend I use?

Well factors like resolution, framerate, your internet, and your computer's hardware all play a role in determining what's best for you.

Here's a table bitrates for resolution and framerate.

Just note that your internet upload speed needs to be large enough for that bitrate AND whatever else you may use the internet for at the same time.

And that's it! Your stream should look loads better! And that's it for this installment of Stream Academy. Feel free to ask us questions about streaming or for help with any problems you've been having along the way. If you're looking for widgets and alerts for your live-stream journey, then you should look into using Casterlabs (that's us! 😁)

Image Sources

Throneful (2021, January 8th). "Apex Legends (2021) - Gameplay (PC UHD) [4K60FPS]" [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPtoIy-oPWQ

Renderedartwork (2012, December 21st). "Michelangelo's David dithered using the Void-and-Cluster technique." [Image]. Wikimedia Foundation. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Michelangelo%27s_David_-_Void-and-Cluster.png

[okoyoko]

Speedpaint Tutorial

Hi i want to make a little tutorial of how to make a speedpaint/timelapse

I will talk about programs, music and editing, this will be a long post (kinda) so i will leave all the tutorial under the cut so it won’t take all the space on your screen

1-Programs

There is a lot of programs to record and editing, i personally use Camtasia Studio (both recording and editing) and OBS/Streamlabs OBS (recording)

Camtasia:

Camtasia can record the screen, microphone and the audio from your computer, plus, you can edit videos on there; is a little limited if you want to make really complex videos and can be laggy if your computer isn't powerful enough. Camtasia have a cost of $300 USD approx (one-time purchase), the license let you have the program installed in 2 devices at once, so you can split the license with a friend if both of you want them

Again, can be really laggy (Camtasia 8 work better) and the recording can be really heavy, 3 GB just for half an hour sometimes, that's why i would recommend you using this just for basic editing; for recording however i recommend:

OBS/Streamlabs OBS:

OBS is a free program commonly used for streaming, but it have an option for recording the screen Unlike Camtasia, OBS let you choose between record the whole screen or just record the program you are using, this can let you use other programs, navigate thru internet or just record specific parts and not worry about having to cut it out later, unfortunally OBS doesn’t have and option to pause the recording you have to stop it and press record again

Depending of how you configure the options on OBS, the recording can be really heavy so keep an eye on that

If you just want to make simple speedpaint videos:

I would recommend you to use OBS and Movie maker, both of them are free and don’t let a watermark on the video Despite of the reputation of Movie maker, is a good program for simple editing and for my knowledge is on the microsoft store so you can download there (i think, i have never use the microsoft store)

Please do not use VSDC

The program isn’t a malware itself, but gets hacked a lot So be safe and remain away from that program

2- Music

This point doesn't have too much mystery, basically:

If you dont care about copyright, you can use any song really, however depending of the song, the video can get limited in some countries on youtube/facebook/Vimeo

If you do care about copyright, here are some channels with copyright free music, just keep in mind that you need to put the credits on somewhere on the video or in the description

NoCopyrightSounds (channel on youtube)

BreakingCopyright — Royalty Free Music (channel on youtube)

Kevin Macleod (music author)

If you really want to use a song with copyright you can also use a remixed version, sometimes remixes don't get copyright claimed

3- Editing

Depending on the program you can have more or less options but

For the speed, it depends on how fast you want it to be, just pay attention on how it looks

For exporting i will recommend you to keep it between 480p-1080p

Neko-rina made a tutorial of how they export their videos, and even if it a good tutorial and show you how to export high quality videos, that can result in heavy videos that take some time in upload to youtube

Extra

You may see some timelapse videos on my accounts, that is an option of Clip studio paint, it record and speed up be itself and only lets you choose between 15, 30, 60 seconds or full timelapse that is between 60 seconds to 5 minutes approx

[mobiused]

Hi mobi! I tried using Stremio and I like it, but I don't have a super fast internet connection and my gf has complained that when I watch stuff on Stremio it takes all our bandwith. Do you know how to limit the uploading/ascending speed perhaps? I tried looking it up for the torrentio add-on since it's the one I use but it didn't give me the option 🧐 Apologies if that's out of your zone! And thanks for the share anyway, it's super useful.

Sorry! Left you hanging for a while.

So the official Stremio page suggests tweaking these settings, instructions provided in the link... but streaming and downloading will always be a little bit intensive on your connection, though usually a 1Mbps speed is enough to stream something in ~720px without it buffering, so you can try capping it around there, with some headroom depending on how much spare bandwith you actually have.

Also, if you increase the cache size (which is in Settings>Streaming>Caching), you can leave it to load a little longer and it can load whilst you, idk, wash your dishes if you have the download speed limit set, and it can load in the background without stealing too much bandwidth, to watch without buffering when you're ready. (usually, aside from 1080p+ movies, 2GB will be all you need, but make sure you have enough room on the drive that it'll cache on... accidentally let Stremio take up 30GB on my SSD a couple weeks ago)

[exxos-von-steamboldt]

I saw this earlier today and everyone was going hurr durr pornhub or focusing on the 9.52GB as if 1.31 was even close to okay.

Let me preface this with I remember having a computer with lots of games and applications that was a solid workhorse in 1998 that THE ENTIRE HARD DRIVE was 2GB. TWO. This right here is a huge swath of why things are the way they are. There is no optimization, no consideration for data usage, just a constant stream of bloat, laziness, and maliciousness. Every millisecond sharing sloppy data. Everything is buggy and crashing. Everything is pervasive and the data transfer ability so huge that they just do not have to care anymore. In 1998, an unoptimized buggy crash-prone POS did not sell to your 5 million customers and your company died.

In 2023, you are guaranteed hundreds of millions, possibly billions, of customers and you need 10 million to stay afloat, so to hell with making anything optimized or functional. If your shitty phone app takes4.5 TIMES more space than an entire computer has any reason to, you are not even good at making a malicious modern POS, you need to be punched in the throat and blackballed from ever touching technology again because you’re making things massively worse. I remember the internet back in 1998, how sites would take 20 minutes to load. But then when we got faster internet, you know what happened? Garbage. Lots of garbage. Instead of keeping a tidy internet, we started having video adverts and tracking and data mining always outpacing the speed of the connection. Today, often more than 95% of our internet usage is not even what we’re want, but the massive deluge of garbage.

Adblocking on youtube alone, removes 60%+ of the data transferred. Watching 1080p videos or higher, hours worth, and it cuts that much out?! I know I am an old man, but surely there is an overlap between old man ranting and just why can’t things be better on this front? We have massive amounts of technology, massive amounts of electricity, dedicated to maintaining the most unoptimized, bloated, malicious shitpile of a technological nightmare. And for what? Surely all of the assholes doing this could save money by making these things work better? 

Everyone suffers, even the perpetrators.

[madelineariah]

2023/April 14th - Creative

I have been a bit exhausted the last few days.

My sleep schedule got kinda messed up, though this is not entirely out of character for me when I get fixated on a new idea. I decided about a week or two ago that I would try to revitalize my interest in video production. I probably should preface this by saying that I tried running a YouTube channel back in 2020. Probably not the best time to get into it, but it was what it was.

When I did it, I was narrating some of the novels that I have written over the years. Writing is my passion, yet it’s not a compatible medium with many of the passions and interests of most people these days. People want interactive media – it’s why they turn to visual novels or YouTube videos or games to get their reading in.

The videos I made honestly never really felt like they were at their fullest potential. It felt like I didn’t have the proper tools to bring my words to life, and I became very frustrated by the outcome. While I reached 60 subscribers during that time period, I eventually became so bothered by the quality of my own content that I deleted all of it from existence and put the channel on hiatus.

Recently, though, I have had a change of direction in my life. I decided that because racing videogames have been a lifelong hobby of mine, I would like to do highlight videos surrounding my favorite racing games. As such, I’ve spent the last several days prepping videos for a May 1st debut. I have about seven completed already.

What I’ve noticed so far is that because I have better equipment now, that alone has given me more confidence in my abilities. In 2020, I was video editing on a Chromebook (which many of you might not think possible, but I assure you, it is). The videos were serviceable, but they lacked the kind of professional quality that I wanted of them.

Now, though, I have an enterprise-level Windows desktop with an enterprise-level GPU that I was using for CAD applications during my last round of college (see my post about going to college three damn times).

Since my drafting stuff is currently on hiatus, I figure that I should probably get my money’s worth from the machine, and it turns out that it can encode a 10 minute 720p video in about 45 seconds. Not bad. As far as the games, I am recording them on an Xbox One X which I have calibrated to record in 720p because Xbox DVR requires your clips be processed over the cloud, and my internet – while good in terms of download speed – is terrible at upload speed.

I learned recently that Xbox DVR files corrupt very easily. Audio sync issues are also very common. So… Not the best start.

Nonetheless, I do feel like the way I have things set up lends itself to my style of video production. What I’m doing is recording individual races and events in-game and then creating highlight reels from them. Some of these highlight videos have a story to them, even.

The audio sync is easy enough to fix using the video editing software. That said, I have lost a handful of good clips due to file corruption – which led to much sulking.

To prevent myself from going insane, I’m probably only gonna upload twice a week – Monday and Thursday. This gives me 2-3 days between videos to work on each one. So far, I’ve noticed it takes approximately 90 minutes to encode enough clips for a 10 minute video, and then editing takes two to four hours depending on storyboarding, effects used, and also needing to create the thumbnails for each video.

And of course, my videos are going to have overlays that show my channel name and eventually things like a Twitter link, Ko-Fi link, etc. If I ever decide to stream, those same overlays could be used to show stream-related info (I think that’s how it works). But getting that sophisticated is gonna take time, I guess.

For the first month, I figure I will use a compact overlay (just a banner, really). Then after, I will make a full-screen overlay in 1080p with the 720p gameplay footage in windowed mode. That’s the plan, anyway. There’s still so much I need to figure out, and I am doing all of this myself.

I would say that my goal is simply to attract people who love the same things I love and who I can share memories with. Like, as a gamer, I often play alone. I don’t really have “gaming friends.” I’d like that to change.

[karalahti-koko-elokuva-hd]

[MOZI⇈HD] Karalahti  julkaisee kokonaisen elokuvan indaVidea (English) 2021 HD

[MOZI⇈HD] Karalahti  julkaisee kokonaisen elokuvan indaVidea (English) 2021 HD

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TIEDOT:

Ohjaaja: Juuso Syrjä Käsikirjoittajat: Mika Karttunen, Joona Louhivuori Tähti: Jere Karalahti Tyylilajit: Dokumentti Maa: Suomi Kieli: Suomi | englanti Julkaisupäivä: 5.3.2021 (Suomi) Tuotanto Co: Solar Films

Synopsis:

Dokumenttielokuva suomalaisesta ammattilaisjääkiekkoilijasta Jere Karalahdesta. Dokumenttielokuvaa varten on haastateltu yli 50 henkilöä, kuten Jeren perhettä, valmentajia, toimittajia, kanssapelaajia ja lapsuudenystäviä. Syvällinen dokumentti koostuu haastattelujen lisäksi arkistomateriaalista ja dramatisoituista kohtauksista.

THE STORY 🔮

Like personal history, other than it is told more “from memory”, for example it truly is the way the individual by and by recalls and feels about their life or a phase in their life, more than the exact, recorded subtleties of that period. Despite the fact that diaries will in general be more emotional than life account works, journals are commonly still viewed as genuine works. Furthermore, there are some fiction works that imply to be the “diaries” of anecdotal characters too, done in a comparative style, nonetheless, they are in another classification from their verifiable partners.

A story that happens around the time steam power was first getting into utilization. The business transformation is a typical time setting for steam punk stories, and the steam innovation can regularly be in reality further developed contrasted with the genuine innovation of that time-frame (for instance, Steam Detectives highlights steam-controlled robots). The most quick sort of steampunk subculture is the network of fans encompassing the class. Others move past this, endeavoring to embrace a “steampunk” stylish through design, inside stylistic layout and even music.

Sadly, not everything is discovered to be unadulterated and strictly realistic in the film as I Still Believe gets overloaded with a few significant purposes of analysis and execution in the component. In what capacity? Regardless, the film feels somewhat fragmented in Jeremy Camp’s excursion. What’s introduced works (fairly), yet it doesn’t suffer, particularly becausae the Erwin Brothers have a troublesome us in making certain about the correct story way for the film to take. Obviously, the string of Jeremy and Melissa are the essential focal center (and legitimately so), yet pretty much all that else gets totally pushed aside, including Jeremy’s melodic profession ascend to fame and a few of the different characters and their significance (more on that beneath). This additionally makes the film have a particular pacing issues all through the film, with I Still Believe run us of 6 minutes (1 hour and 56 minutes) feeling longer than it should be, particularly with how much story that the Erwin Brothers skip from (for example a few plot pieces/sections are left unanswered or missing).

🔮 COPYRIGHT CONTENT 🔮

Copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to make copies of a creative work, usually for a limited time.[1][2][3][4][5] The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educational, or musical form. Copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself.[6][7][8] A copyright is subject to limitations based on public interest considerations, such as the fair use doctrine in the United States.

Some jurisdictions require “fixing” copyrighted works in a tangible form. It is often shared among multiple authors, each of whom holds a set of rights to use or license the work, and who are commonly referred to as rights holders.[citation needed][9][10][11][12] These rights frequently include reproduction, control over derivative works, distribution, public performance, and moral rights such as attribution.[13]

Copyrights can be granted by public law and are in that case considered “territorial rights”. This means that copyrights granted by the law of a certain state, do not extend beyond the territory of that specific jurisdiction. Copyrights of this type vary by country; many countries, and sometimes a large group of countries, have made agreements with other countries on procedures applicable when works “cross” national borders or national rights are inconsistent.[14]

Typically, the public law duration of a copyright expires 50 to 100 years after the creator dies, depending on the jurisdiction. Some countries require certain copyright formalities[5] to establishing copyright, others recognize copyright in any completed work, without a formal registration.

It is widely believed that copyrights are a must to foster cultural diversity and creativity. However, Parc argues that contrary to prevailing beliefs, imitation and copying do not restrict cultural creativity or diversity but in fact support them further. This argument has been supported by many examples such as Millet and Van Gogh, Picasso, Manet, and Monet, etc.[15]

🔮 ADAPTATION 🔮

Streaming media is sight and sound that is continually gotten by and introduced to an end-client while being conveyed by a supplier. The action word to stream alludes to the technique of conveying or acquiring media this way.[clarification needed] Streaming distinguishes the conveyance way to deal with the medium, as opposed to the medium itself. Recognizing conveyance strategy from the media disseminated applies especially to broadcast communications organizations, as practically the entirety of the conveyance frameworks are either characteristically streaming (for example radio, TV, streaming applications) or innately non-streaming (for example books, video tapes, sound tracks CDs). There are difficulties with streaming substance on the web. For instance, clients whose Internet association needs enough transfer speed may encounter stops, slacks, or moderate buffering of the substance. What’s more, clients lacking viable equipment or programming frameworks could be not able to stream certain substance.

Live web based is the conveyance of Internet content progressively much as live TV communicates content over the wireless transmissions by means of a TV signal. Live web streaming requires such a source media (for example a camcorder, a sound interface, screen catch programming), an encoder to digitize the substance, a media distributer, and a substance conveyance organization to circulate and convey the substance. Live streaming shouldn’t be recorded at the start point, however it regularly is.

Streaming is a choice to document downloading, a movement wherein the end-client acquires the entire record for this substance prior to watching or tuning in to it. Through streaming, an end-client can utilize their media player to begin on playing advanced video or computerized sound substance before the entire record has been sent. The expression “streaming media” can apply to media separated from video and sound, such as live shut inscribing, paper feed, and ongoing content, which are totally viewed as “streaming content”.

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[petazetafilms]

▷ Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist; Season 2 Episode 1 - (S2E1) - HD 720p

Watch Online Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist Season 2 Episode 1 in NBC Full Episodes Eng Sub / Sub English TV Series 2020 Premiere HD! ❖ Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist Full Episodes (HD): Full ✓ NBC TV Shows and Movies from Official Partners. ❖ Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Online ►► P.L.A.Y N.O.W

〘NBC | 4K UHD | HD-1080p | HD-720p | SD-480p | MP4〙

After an unusual event, Zoey Clarke, a whip-smart computer coder forging her way in San Francisco, suddenly starts to hear the innermost wants, thoughts and desires of the people around her through popular songs. ❖ Genre : Drama, Comedy ❖ Air Date : 2021-01-05 ❖ Network : NBC ❖ Casts : Lauren Graham, Alex Newell, Andrew Leeds, Michael Thomas Grant, Jane Levy, Kapil Talwalkar, Mary Steenburgen, John Clarence Stewart, Skylar Astin, Alice Lee Guest Star : Felix Mallard, Jee Young Han, Harvey Guillén

Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Live Stream Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Online Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Dailymotion Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Premiere Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 HD720p Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Free Online Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 English Subtitle Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Stream Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Full Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 HD1080p Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Full Recap Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Online Stream Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 HD Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Online HD Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Full Episode Watch Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist S2E1 Synopsis

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A television show (often simply TV show) is any content produced for broadcast via over-the-air, satellite, cable, or internet and typically viewed on a television set, excluding breaking news, advertisements, or trailers that are typically placed between shows. Television shows are most often scheduled well ahead of time and appear on electronic guides or other TV listings.

Livestreaming, what’s in it for us? Technology has advanced significantly since the first internet livestream but we still turn to video for almost everything. Let’s take a brief look at why livestreaming has been held back so far, and what tech innovations will propel livestreaming to the forefront of internet culture. Right now livestreaming is limited to just a few applications for mass public use and the rest are targeted towards businesses. Livestreaming is to today what home computers were in the early 611110s. The world of livestreaming is waiting for a metaphorical VIC-110, a very popular product that will make live streaming as popular as video through iterations and competition. Shared Video Do you remember when YouTube wasn’t the YouTube you know today? In 11005, when Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim activated the domain “www.youtube.com" they had a vision. Inspired by the lack of easily accessible video clips online, the creators of YouTube saw a world where people could instantly access videos on the internet without having to download files or search for hours for the right clip. Allegedly inspired by the site “Hot or Not”, YouTube originally began as a dating site (think 110s video dating), but without a large ingress of dating videos, they opted to accept any video submission. And as we all know, that fateful decision changed all of our lives forever. Because of YouTube, the world that YouTube was born in no longer exists. The ability to share videos on the scale permitted by YouTube has brought us closer to the “global village” than I’d wager anyone thought realistically possible. And now with technologies like Starlink, we are moving closer and closer to that eventuality. Although the shared video will never become a legacy technology, before long it will truly have to share the stage with its sibling, livestreaming. Although livestreaming is over 110 years old, it hasn’t gained the incredible worldwide adoption YouTube has. This is largely due to infrastructure issues such as latency, quality, and cost. Latency is a priority when it comes to livestreams. Latency is the time it takes for a video to be captured and point a, and viewed at point b. In livestreaming this is done through an encoder-decoder function. Video and audio are captured and turned into code, the code specifies which colours display, when, for how long, and how bright. The code is then sent to the destination, such as a streaming site, where it is decoded into colours and audio again and then displayed on a device like a cell phone. The delay between the image being captured, the code being generated, transmitted, decoded, and played is consistently decreasing. It is now possible to stream content reliably with less than 5 seconds of latency. Sub-second latency is also common and within the next 110 or so years we may witness the last cable broadcast (or perhaps cable will be relegated to the niche market of CB radios, landlines, and AM transmissions). On average, the latency associated with a cable broadcast is about 6 seconds. This is mainly due to limitations on broadcasts coming from the FCC or another similar organization in the interests of censorship. In terms of real-life, however, a 6 second delay on a broadcast is not that big of a deal. In all honesty a few hours’ delay wouldn’t spell the doom of mankind. But for certain types of broadcasts such as election results or sporting events, latency must be kept at a minimum to maximize the viability of the broadcast. Sensitive Content is Hard to Monitor Advances in AI technologies like computer vision have changed the landscape of internet broadcasting. Before too long, algorithms will be better able to prevent sensitive and inappropriate content from being broadcast across the internet on livestreaming platforms. Due to the sheer volume of streams it is much harder to monitor and contain internet broadcasts than it is cable, but we are very near a point where the ability to reliably detect and interrupt inappropriate broadcasts instantaneously. Currently, the majority of content is monitored by humans. And as we’ve learned over the last 50 or so years, computers and machines are much more reliable and consistent than humans could ever be. Everything is moving to an automated space and content moderation is not far behind. We simply don’t have the human resources to monitor every livestream, but with AI we won’t need it. Video Quality In the last decade we have seen video quality move from 7110p to 60110p to 4K and beyond. I can personally remember a time when 4110p was standard and 7110p was considered a luxury reserved for only the most well funded YouTube videos. But times have changed and people expect video quality of at least 7110p. Live streaming has always had issues meeting the demands of video quality. When watching streams on platforms like Twitch, the video can cut out, lag, drop in quality, and stutter all within about 45 seconds. Of course this isn’t as rampant now as it once was, however, sudden drops in quality will likely be a thorn in the side of live streams for years to come. Internet Speeds Perhaps the most common issue one needs to tackle when watching a live stream is their internet speed. Drops in video quality and connection are often due to the quality of the internet connection between the streamer and the viewer. Depending on the location of the parties involved, their distance from the server, and allocated connection speed the stream may experience some errors. And that’s just annoying. Here is a list of the recommended connection speeds for 5 of the most popular streaming applications:

Facebook Live recommends a max bit rate of 4,000 kbps, plus a max audio bit rate of 61111 kbps. YouTube Live recommends a range between 6,500 and 4,000 kbps for video, plus 61111 kbps for audio. Twitch recommends a range between 11,500 and 4,000 kbps for video, plus up to 660 kbps for audio. Live streams are typically available for those of us with good internet. Every day more people are enjoying high quality speeds provided by fibre optic lines, but it will be a while until these lines can truly penetrate rural and less populated areas. Perhaps when that day comes we will see an upsurge of streaming coming from these areas. Language Barrier You can pause and rewind a video if you didn’t understand or hear something, and many video sharing platforms provide the option for subtitles. But you don’t really get that with a live stream. Pausing and rewinding an ongoing stream defeats the purpose of watching a stream. However, the day is soon approaching where we will be able to watch streams, in our own native language with subtitles, even if the streamer speaks something else. Microsoft Azure’s Cognitive Speech Services can give livestreaming platforms an edge in the future as it allows for speech to be automatically translated from language to language. The ability to watch a livestream in real time, with the added benefit of accurate subtitles in one’s own language, will also assist language learners in deciphering spontaneous speech. Monetization One of the most damning features of a live stream is the inherent difficulty in monetizing it. As mentioned before, videos can be paused and ads inserted. In videos, sponsored segments can be bought where the creators of the video read lines provided to them. Ads can run before videos etc. But in the case of a spontaneous live stream sponsored content will stick out. In the case of platforms like YouTube there are ways around ads. Ad blockers, the skip ad button, the deplorable premium account, and fast forwarding through sponsored segments all work together to limit the insane amount of ads we see every day. But in the case of a live stream, ads are a bit more difficult. Live streaming platforms could implement sponsored overlays and borders or a similar graphical method of advertising, but the inclusion of screen shrinking add-ons like that may cause issues on smaller devices where screen size is already limited. Monthly subscriptions are already the norm, but in the case of a live streaming platform (Twitch Prime not withstanding), it may be difficult for consumers to see the benefit in paying for a service that is by nature unscheduled and unpredictable. Live streams are great for quick entertainment, but as they can go on for hours at a time, re-watching streamed content is inherently time consuming. For this reason, many streamers cut their recorded streams down and upload them to platforms like YouTube where they are monetized through a partnership program. It is likely that for other streaming platforms to really take off, they would need to partner with a larger company and offer services similar to Amazon and Twitch. What Might the Future of Livestreaming Look Like?

It is difficult to say, as it is with any speculation about the future. Technologies change and advance beyond the scope of our imaginations virtually every decade. But one thing that is almost a certainty is the continued advancement in our communications infrastructure. Fibre optic lines are being run to smaller towns and cities. Services like Google Fiber, which is now only available at 6 gigabit per second, have shown the current capabilities of our internet infrastructure. As services like this expand we can expect to see a large increase in the number of users seeking streams as the service they expect to interact with will be more stable than it currently is now. Livestreaming, at the moment, is used frequently by gamers and Esports and hasn’t yet seen the mass commercial expansion that is coming. The future of live streaming is on its way. For clues for how it may be in North America we can look to Asia (taobao). Currently, livestreaming is quite popular in the East in terms of a phenomenon that hasn’t quite taken hold on us Westerners, Live Commerce. With retail stores closing left and right, we can’t expect Amazon to pick up all of the slack (as much as I’m sure they would like to). Live streaming affords entrepreneurs and retailers a new opportunity for sales and growth. Live streaming isn’t the way of the future, video will never die, but the two will co-exist and be used for different purposes, as they are now. Live streaming can bring serious benefits to education as well by offering classrooms guest lessons and tutorials by leading professionals. Live streaming is more beneficial for education than video as it allows students to interact with guest teachers in real-time. The live streaming market is waiting to be tapped. Right now there are some prospectors, but in North America, no one has really found the vein leading to the mine. So maybe it’s time to get prospecting. The 2019–20 network television schedule for the five major English-language commercial broadcast networks in the United States covers the prime time hours from September 2019 to August 2020. The schedule is followed by a list per network of returning series, new series, and series canceled after the 2018–19 season.

❏ STREAMING MEDIA ❏

Streaming media is multimedia that is constantly received by and presented to an end-user while being delivered by a provider. The verb to stream refers to the process of delivering or obtaining media in this manner.[clarification needed] Streaming refers to the delivery method of the medium, rather than the medium itself. Distinguishing delivery method from the media distributed applies specifically to telecommunications networks, as most of the delivery systems are either inherently streaming (e.g. radio, television, streaming apps) or inherently non-streaming (e.g. books, video cassettes, audio CDs). There are challenges with streaming content on the Internet. For example, users whose Internet connection lacks sufficient bandwidth may experience stops, lags, or slow buffering of the content. And users lacking compatible hardware or software systems may be unable to stream certain content. Live streaming is the delivery of Internet content in real-time much as live television broadcasts content over the airwaves via a television signal. Live internet streaming requires a form of source media (e.g. a video camera, an audio interface, screen capture software), an encoder to digitize the content, a media publisher, and a content delivery network to distribute and deliver the content. Live streaming does not need to be recorded at the origination point, although it frequently is. Streaming is an alternative to file downloading, a process in which the end-user obtains the entire file for the content before watching or listening to it. Through streaming, an end-user can use their media player to start playing digital video or digital audio content before the entire file has been transmitted. The term “streaming media” can apply to media other than video and audio, such as live closed captioning, ticker tape, and real-time text, which are all considered “streaming text”.

❏ COPYRIGHT CONTENT ❏

Copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to make copies of a creative work, usually for a limited time.[1][2][3][4][5] The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educational, or musical form. Copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself.[6][7][8] A copyright is subject to limitations based on public interest considerations, such as the fair use doctrine in the United States. Some jurisdictions require “fixing” copyrighted works in a tangible form. It is often shared among multiple authors, each of whom holds a set of rights to use or license the work, and who are commonly referred to as rights holders.[citation needed][9][10][11][12] These rights frequently include reproduction, control over derivative works, distribution, public performance, and moral rights such as attribution.[13] Copyrights can be granted by public law and are in that case considered “territorial rights”. This means that copyrights granted by the law of a certain state, do not extend beyond the territory of that specific jurisdiction. Copyrights of this type vary by country; many countries, and sometimes a large group of countries, have made agreements with other countries on procedures applicable when works “cross” national borders or national rights are inconsistent.[14] Typically, the public law duration of a copyright expires 50 to 100 years after the creator dies, depending on the jurisdiction. Some countries require certain copyright formalities[5] to establishing copyright, others recognize copyright in any completed work, without a formal registration. It is widely believed that copyrights are a must to foster cultural diversity and creativity. However, Parc argues that contrary to prevailing beliefs, imitation and copying do not restrict cultural creativity or diversity but in fact support them further. This argument has been supported by many examples such as Millet and Van Gogh, Picasso, Manet, and Monet, etc.[15]

❏ GOODS OF SERVICES ❏

Credit (from Latin credit, “(he/she/it) believes”) is the trust which allows one party to provide money or resources to another party wherein the second party does not reimburse the first party immediately (thereby generating a debt), but promises either to repay or return those resources (or other materials of equal value) at a later date.[1] In other words, credit is a method of making reciprocity formal, legally enforceable, and extensible to a large group of unrelated people. The resources provided may be financial (e.g. granting a loan), or they may consist of goods or services (e.g. consumer credit). Credit encompasses any form of deferred payment.[2] Credit is extended by a creditor, also known as a lender, to a debtor, also known as a borrower.

[thecustomboxpackagingcom]

5 Ways to Wrench Over Your Internet Provider (ISP)

Internet providers are real bastards: they have captive audiences whom they squeeze for every last penny while they fight against regulation like net neutrality and donate immense amounts of money to keep on lawmakers’ good sides. So why not turn the tables? Here are 5 ways to make sure your ISP has a hard time taking advantage of you.

 1. Buy a modem and router instead of renting

 The practice of renting a device to users rather than selling it or providing it as part of the service is one of the telecommunications industry’s oldest and worst. People pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars over years for equipment worth $40 or $50. ISPs do this with various items, but the most common item is probably the modem.

This is the gadget that connects to the cable coming out of your wall, and then connects in turn (or may also function as) your wireless and wired router. ISPs often provide this equipment at the time of install, and then charge you $5 to $10 per month forever. What they don’t tell you is you can probably buy the exact same item for somewhere between $30 and $100.

The exact model you need will depend on your service, but it will be listed somewhere, and they should tell you what they’d provide if you ask. Look online, buy a new or lightly used one, and it will have paid for itself before the year is out. Not only that, but you can do stuff like upgrade or change the software on it all you want, because it’s yours. Bonus: The ISP is limited in what it can do to the router (like letting other people connect yes, it’s a thing).

 2. Avoid service calls, or if you can’t, insist they’re free

 I had an issue with my Comcast internet a while back that took them several visits from a service tech to resolve. It wasn’t an issue on my end, which was why I was surprised to find they’d charged me $30 or so every time the person came.

If your ISP wants to send someone out, ask whether it’s free, and if it isn’t, tell them to make it free or ask if you can do it yourself sometimes it’s for really simple stuff like swapping a cable. If they charge you for a visit, call them and ask them to take it off your bill. Say you weren’t informed and you’ll inform the Better Business Bureau about it, or take your business elsewhere, or something.

 3. Get deals from the installer

If you do end up having someone come out, talk to them to see whether there are any off the record deals they can offer you. I don’t mean anything shady like splitting cables with the neighbor, just offers they know about that aren’t publicized because they’re too good to advertise.

A lot of these service techs are semi-independent contractors paid by the call, and their pay has nothing to do with which service you have or choose. They have no reason to upsell you and every reason to make you happy and get a good review. Sometimes that means giving you the special desperation rates ISPs withhold until you say you’re going to leave.

 4. Complain, complain, and complain

 This sounds bad, but it’s just a consequence of how these companies work: The squeaky wheels get the grease. There’s plenty of grease to go around, so get squeaking.

Usually this means calling up and doing one of several things. You can complain that service has been bad outages and such and ask that they compensate you for that. You can say that a competing ISP started offering service at your location and it costs $20 less, so can they match that. Or you can say your friend just got a promotional rate and you’d like to take advantage of it, otherwise you’ll leave to that phantom competitor.  After all, we know there’s often little or no real competition.

What ISPs, and, more importantly, what their customer service representatives care about is keeping you on as a customer. They can always raise rates or upsell you later, but having you as a subscriber is the important thing.

 5. Choose your service level wisely

ISPs offer a ton of choices, and make it confusing on purpose so you end up picking an expensive one just to be sure you have what you need. The truth is most people can probably do pretty much everything they need on the lowest tier they offer.

A 1080p Netflix stream will work fine on a 25 Mbps connection, which is what I have. I also work entirely online, stream high-def. videos at a dozen sites all day, play games, download movies and do lots of other stuff, sometimes all at the same time. I think I pay $45 a month. But rates like mine might not be advertised prominently or at all. I only found out when I literally asked what the cheapest possible option was.

That said, if you have three kids who like to watch videos simultaneously, or you have a 4K streaming setup that you use a lot, you’ll want to bump that up a bit. But you’d be surprised how seldom the speed limit actually comes into play.

To be clear, it’s still important that higher tiers are available, and that internet providers upgrade their infrastructure, because competition and reliability need to go up and prices need to come down. The full promise of broadband should be accessible to everyone for a reasonable fee, and that’s still not the case.

[sofiejohn2]

Choose the Best Twitch Bitrate with these Steps

Want to find out the best Twitch bitrate for streaming? Follow this article to the end. One of the best ways with which you can stream your favorite games is Twitch. But before streaming a game, you should know how best you can tweak its settings to provide an enjoyable experience to your viewers. Bitrate is the quality at which you stream your video and audio by uploading it to Twitch. This totally depends on how much your PC and your internet connection can process.

What Streaming Bitrate Should You Use for Twitch?

It is vital to adapt a right streaming bitrate for your Twitch stream. But everyone can’t use a fixed bitrate. This is because of the different factors like the specifications of your system and your internet connection. Still, even after these factors, the Twitch Studio app offers a great way of finding out the best settings for your system. The users who do not want to use Twitch Studio app can stream at a recommended streaming point of 720P at 60FPS using a bitrate of 4,500kbps when they are playing a fast-paced game, and 30FPS and a bitrate of 3,000kbps while playing a slow-paced game.

The users who prefer using the Twitch Studio app need to open it and follow these steps:

After opening the Twitch Studio application, click on the Settings option that you will see in the bottom-right corner.

Click on Stream.

Then you need to click on Re-Optimize Settings and wait for the test to complete.

Once the test is complete, click on Apply Settings to select those settings for your system.

In case you want to change the settings manually, go to Stream Settings and set the desired settings.

How to Choose a Bitrate Based Upon Your Upload Speed?

Twitch recommends an upload speed of 3,000kbps which is around 0.4mbps for the recommended settings of 720p at 30FPS. In case you have a lower speed than this, then you need to change your bitrate accordingly, or you could call your internet service provider to arrange a higher upload speed if possible.

The upload speed plays a vital role to figure out the best settings for streaming on Twitch. So, always test your internet speed first to know your uploading speed. If your bitrate comes out to be 4,000kbps or lower than that, you will be able to stream at 720p and then at the maximum of 30fps. If your bitrate comes out to be around 5,000kbps, you will get a little boost, and you can stream at 720p with 60FPS. If you have a bitrate of 6,000kbps, you will be able to stream at 900p with 60fps. If you are a Twitch user, you can increase it to 1080p. There is no harm in experimenting as it is worth to see which option works best for you, and attracts more viewers. Sometimes lowering down the settings might often give you better results, even if you have the strength to stream at a higher rate.

Final Verdict

So, you can follow the instructions as mentioned above to select the best suitable bitrate for streaming on Twitch. You can also choose the bitrate according to your requirements. Try performing different experiments to know which one works best for your device.

I am Sofie John  a self-professed security expert. I have been making the people aware of the security threats. My passion is to write about Cyber security, cryptography, malware, social engineering, internet and new media. I write for webroot security products at webroot.com/safe.

Source :-  https://v1webroot.com/choose-the-best-twitch-bitrate-with-these-steps/

[wolfgabe]

The next generation of game consoles and my concerns

As you probably know soon the next generation of consoles will  be upon us. I am excited but I also can't help but be concerned about the upcoming next generation particularly concerning PS5 and the next Xbox. The purported specs for the PS5 sound insane based on what I have read and there are rumors the next Xbox could be even more powerful than that. This is what brings me to my main concern which is the cost. Considering the rumors and reports that Sony is intending to push 8K tech with the PS5, I can't help but worry we could have another PS5 situation all over again. To those of you who are not really aware much of Sony's financial troubles can be traced back to the PS3 because the thing was so bloody expensive to manufacture that it pretty much ate up all of Sony's PS1 and PS2 profits combined and it only just barely turned a profit due to the onset of the great recession. 

The biggest issue I see is that Sony is trying to push a technology that currently doesn't exist at least in a consumer friendly form not to mention 4K has yet to achieve true mainstream adoption. 4K in it’s current state is still relatively limited as far as mainstream cable and satellite TV is concerned right now being mainly limited to on demand movies, pay per view sports, and a select handful of premium channels. While streaming services such as Netflix do offer 4K content, the speed of most North American internet connections usually results in the picture quality being not much greater than your typical 1080p Blu Ray which brings me to the other thing with 4K in that you need a fairly large TV to really make out any difference from 1080p.

I am still unsure excactly if the PS5 will rely solely on SSDs for it’s storage or use an SSD HDD combo like what a lot of PCs these days often use. I hope it’s the latter because there is no way in hell I can see this thing using SSDs exclusively and not ending up with a relatively hefty price tag considering how large capacity SSDs are still much more expensive compared to standard hard drives.

Then there is the matter of ray tracing. While Ray Tracing has been commonly employed in film and television in those cases it has typically been done with large server farms and cloud computing. I suspect by the time the next consoles come out we might start seeing GPUs that support Ray Tracing natively start to enter the market but don’t expect them to be cheap. If Sony really plans to put such a GPU in the PS5 I can only imagine the potential cost.

I can't help but feel that Sony and Microsoft's emphasis on bleeding edge tech could come back to haunt them big time as there is currently a very high likelihood that video games will become even more expensive thanks to a certain president's trade war with China which is where a lot of electronics manufacturing is handled game consoles included.

[gamestreamingsetup]

Guide To Twitch Streaming

Who wants to sit and watch people play video games all day? Millions of people, it turns out. Live-streaming website Twitch is one of the biggest things in games, with 15 million daily viewers who come to watch the wealth of professional tournaments, gaming talk shows and casual solo sessions that the site's 2-million-plus broadcasters offer.

Twitch's biggest streamers are a new breed of Internet celebrity, with legions of dedicated fans who tune in daily to watch them dominate Fortnite matches or hilariously scream their way through horror games. Many of these personalities have a litany of sponsors and hundreds of thousands of social media followers — two traits more typical of a pro athlete than someone who plays video games for a living.

But while only a lucky few make it to the NBA or the NFL, anyone with a decent gaming PC or modern game console can be a Twitch streamer. If you want to take a shot at Twitch stardom, here's everything you need to know about how to become a Twitch streamer, from basic hardware requirements to tips from the pros on keeping viewers happy.

What You Need to Become a Twitch Streamer A Good Computer

Although there are a few exceptions I'll outline below, you'll likely be doing most of your streaming from a gaming laptop or gaming desktop PC. As far as specs go, Twitch recommends having at least an Intel Core i5-4670 processor (or its AMD equivalent), 8GB of RAM and Windows 7 or newer. (Don't worry; you can stream from a Mac, too.)

If you're streaming PC games, you'll need a graphics card strong enough to support whatever you're playing and, ideally, one that supports DirectX 10 and up. The faster your Internet connection, the better — you should probably aim to have an upload speed of at least 3MB per second, which should be attainable on most home Internet connections or even via mobile.

While we recommend streaming from a desktop if possible, going live from a laptop is totally doable with the right specs. If you want to go the mobile route, be sure to check out our guide to streaming to Twitch from a laptop.

One PC or two?

While Twitch's core system requirements are pretty forgiving, streaming and playing graphically intense games at the same time can put quite the load on your computer. Some popular streamers remedy this by using two PCs at once — one for gaming, and another for broadcasting. If that sounds too complicated, you can check out desktops such as CyberPower's Pro Streamer, which houses two complete PCs in a single body.

Fortunately, thanks to to recent strides made by Nvidia, creating a high-quality stream from a single PC is becoming more feasible. If you own a gaming desktop or laptop with one of Nvidia's new RTX graphics cards, you'll be able to take advantage of Nvidia's dedicated hardware encoder that's built into each card. This essentially relieves your CPU of having to do too much of the heavy lifting.

Open Broadcaster Software, which we'll touch on below, is optimized for the new Nvidia cards, meaning that it's quite easy to get a smooth single-PC stream going so long as you've got OBS as well as a system with an RTX 2060, 2070, 2080 or 2080 GPU.

A Twitch account

You can visit Twitch.tv to join for free, and you should probably add a custom avatar, banner and description so that viewers can learn a little bit about you. If you want to make sure that all of your broadcasts are temporarily archived for later viewing, you can head to Settings > Channel & Videos > Archive Broadcasts.

Streaming Software

The most essential part of any streamer's tool kit, broadcasting software lets you show your gameplay to the world. The two most commonly used streaming programs are Open Broadcasting Software (OBS), which is completely free, and XSplit, which has a highly intuitive interface but requires a paid subscription in order to use its key features.

Regardless of your choice of software, setting up your stream consists of the same general steps: picking your sources (such as your computer monitor, gameplay feed or webcam), laying out how they'll all appear for the viewer, and finally, syncing up your Twitch account and going live.

Microphone and Camera

While you can technically get by with a gaming headset, you'll want a dedicated microphone so that your viewers can hear you clearly. The $129 Blue Yeti is our favorite USB mic thanks to its crisp audio quality and adjustable pickup modes. If you're on a tight budget, consider the $36 Samson Go Mic; for something more portable, check out the $99 Blue Yeti Nano. For more on microphones, be sure to also check out our podcasting guide.

If you don't already have a webcam and want to show your face, the $49 Logitech HD Pro C920 is our top overall pick thanks to its sharp 1080p capture quality and wide field of view. The $99 Logitech C922 offers the same quality but with automatic background removal, which allows you to superimpose yourself onto your game without the need for a green screen. There's also the $99 Razer Kiyo, which is similarly sharp and offers a built-in ring light for illuminating your face.

Streaming from Consoles

If you're wondering how to become a Twitch streamer without any fancy PC hardware, both the Xbox One and PS4 let you stream directly from your console, without any extra devices or software. On Xbox One, you'll just need the free Twitch app; on PS4, you can go live right from the system's Share menu. Folks on Xbox can also stream directly to Microsoft's Mixer platform, which is just as easy to set up. While you won't get to customize your stream the way you would from your PC, console streaming is still a great way to get your feet wet.

If you want to stream from your Nintendo Switch or any other console (or just want more control over your broadcast), you'll need a capture card that records your console gameplay to your PC.

The most popular capture card option out there is the $129 Elgato Game Capture HD, which seamlessly records 1080p video from Xbox One/360, PS4/PS3, Wii U and just about any other system with an HDMI output. It also has a Component adapter, in case you want to stream from one of your dusty retro consoles. If you want smoother, 60-frame-per-second streams, you can step up to the $151 Elgato HD60.

Twitch is home to a growing stable of bona fide gaming celebrities who make their living broadcasting — but not just because they play the latest games or have a fancy stream setup. The top Twitch streamers are true entertainers; some are known for their incredible Call of Duty headshots, while others are famous for blowing through entire Zelda games in 20 minutes. But more than that, they're just great personalities.

"[Our top streamers] are humble, friendly, highly interactive and treat the people in their chat as if they are the stars of the show," said Chase (yep, just Chase), Twitch’s director of public relations.

If you're looking to get into the finer points of growing an audience, popular Hearthstone player Jeffrey "Trump" Shih's "Streaming 101" video is an excellent place to start. Shih neatly breaks down the core components of streaming into an acronym he calls OPTICS (Opportunity, Presence, Technology, Interaction, Consistency and Skill), noting that focusing on any number of these factors could help you make a name for yourself.

Grow big enough on Twitch, and you just might be offered a partnership, which allows you to get a cut of broadcast revenue and offer your viewers exclusive perks in exchange for a monthly subscription fee. No matter what level of Twitch stardom you're shooting for, here are tips from some of the streamers who do it best.

Find Your Niche / Games You Enjoy Playing

How do you stand out among Twitch's 2 million streamers? For Burke Black, all it took was a pirate hat and lots of patience. After two years of steady streaming, Black is now a partnered broadcaster with more than 23,000 followers that tune in to catch his late-night, swashbuckling-themed antics.

Fire up any of Black's broadcasts, and you'll see him in full brown-and-beige pirate garb, complete with a skull-and-crossbones bandana and an epic beard to match. The 36-year-old is the farthest thing from imposing, though, as he giggles and cheers his way through anything from Grand Theft Auto V to Pirates! (naturally) while enthusiastically chatting with his viewers.

"I consider it a show, not just some dude streaming games," Black said. "People come in because they like the atmosphere … [it's a] nice friendly environment where they can come and have a good time with some cheesy pirate stuff going on."

Becoming a pirate isn't the only way to stand out on Twitch. Perhaps you're exceptionally skilled at the world's most obscure platformer, or you have a really cute dog you can put in front of the camera while you blast through Counter-Strike matches. Find your specialty, and run with it.

Be Consistent

Consistency is crucial — just as people tune in to their favorite TV shows at the same time every night, they should know exactly when you'll be live on Twitch. Whether you broadcast in the afternoon or the wee hours of the morning, stick to your schedule, and make sure it's prominently displayed across both your Twitch page and social media sites.

"You will never get the same viewers if you stream at random times when you are just starting out," said That's Cat, a 26-year-old streamer that specializes in survival games and has almost 30,000 followers.

Make Some Friends

Sonja "OMGitsfirefoxx" Reid is one of Twitch's biggest stars, with more than 631,000 followers and her own merchandise store. While much of her success can be attributed to her unfiltered sense of humor and constant interaction with her viewers, one of her biggest breaks came from working with others.

"We started a daily Minecraft stream, with the idea of just playing some Minecraft with friends and hanging out," said Reid of "Mianite," a series in which she and other popular Twitch stars broadcast their daily hijinks in the popular crafting game. "It blew up, and turned into a huge series, which is going into its third season."

That's Cat also made a name for herself by playing with other broadcasters. In fact, the streamer had 500 Twitch followers before she even went live on her own channel, simply because she made plenty of friends beforehand.

"I ended up having over 80 viewers [on] my first stream, because of my presence in the community prior to streaming," said Cat, who got offered a partnership after just three months of broadcasting.

Be Very Interactive w/ Your Audience

What sets Twitch streams apart from other forms of entertainment is that the audience is almost always a key part of the experience. All Twitch broadcasts are accompanied by a chat room, which allows streamers to interact directly with the people who support them. The more you make your viewers feel like they're sitting on the couch with you while you play, the better chance you have at building a loyal following.

Reid affectionately refers to her fans as her "foxx family." Even with hundreds of thousands of followers, she makes sure to keep things personal.

"I get to know a lot of my [viewers], and remember what's going on in their lives and chat with them about it in stream," she said. "Having a community that really feels like a family is really important to me."

Audience interaction is a top priority for Black, who has a monitor dedicated solely to viewing his Twitch chat. Black also does frequent giveaways, which, according to the streamer, helps encourage fans to come back every night.

That's Cat's following has grown so loyal that she can count on having viewers no matter how obscure the game she's playing.

"I literally played Barbie's Dream house and still had my entire community cheering me on," she said.

Don't Stress About Your Gear (At First)

Just because your favorite streamer has a super-sharp webcam and a fancy green screen and streams from two high-end PCs at once doesn't mean you have to — at least at first. Twitch's system requirements are quite lenient, which means you should focus on growing an audience before you spend thousands turning your bedroom into an all-out studio.

MORE: The Best Gaming Keyboard You Can Buy

"I started streaming on an old HP laptop that overheated to the point of burning my hand, and an old foldout chair from Walmart," said Reid, who's been able to upgrade to a decidedly better setup as her channel grew.

Be Patient, and Have Fun!

As with any type of success, "making it" on Twitch takes lots of patience and hard work.

"If you're doing [this] just to make money, you'll usually fizzle out in the first three or so months," Black said. "For the first six months, it was just awful because I didn't know what I was doing. Try not to get discouraged, because everyone's been that way."

Black's patience is now paying off; the streamer is closing in on 24,000 followers, and his Twitter feed is full of pictures of loyal fans wearing T-shirts with his name on them. Black, who currently works in photography, is considering becoming a full-time streamer once he hits 500 paid subscribers.

Reid stressed the importance of relishing every viewer, no matter how few there are in the beginning.

"Even if you have three viewers, or 30 or 300, there are people that are choosing to hang out and watch you," Reid noted.

In the end, it's important to remember that we're all still playing video games. Whether it's a hobby or something you hope to make into a career, streaming should be fun — the more you enjoy yourself, the more everyone watching you probably will, too.

[dipulb3]

Epson Home Cinema 2250 projector review: Go big and go bright at home

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Epson Home Cinema 2250 projector review: Go big and go bright at home

Epson’s Home Cinema 2250 is an excellent projector, creating an impressively bright image with accurate colors and a decent contrast ratio. It improves upon just about everything we liked with last year’s Home Cinema 2150, though not in any way that’s significant enough to justify upgrading if you’ve already got one of those. If you’re in the market for a new projector, though, the 2250 should be on your short list.

Like

Incredibly bright

Accurate colors

Built-in streaming

Don’t Like

Somewhat expensive

Not as sharp as some competitors

Loud at full brightness

The standout aspect of the 2250 is its extreme light output. I’m pretty sure it the brightest projector I’ve measured, like, ever. High brightness allows a projector to look better at bigger sizes and when there’s some ambient light. Unlike most other ultra-bright projectors this one also has a pretty decent contrast ratio. It’s not as punchy or sharp as our Editors’ Choice BenQ HT2050, which I still like better overall, but the Epson does have some significant advantages over the BenQ, with better placement options, immunity to DLP rainbows and built-in Android TV streaming.

My biggest complaint about the Epson is that it’s probably $150-$200 too expensive. It’s a great projector, but would be even more competitive if Epson chopped the price a bit.

1080p in all sizes

Native resolution: 1,920×1,080 pixels

HDR-compatible: No

4K-compatible: Yes

3D-compatible: Yes

Lumens spec: 2,700

Zoom: Manual (1.6x)

Lens shift: Manual

Lamp life (Normal mode): 4,500 hours

The 2250 is a 1080p resolution projector, but like many can accept (and downconvert) a 4K resolution signal. There’s no real benefit in doing this, but it doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t accept HDR, which is fine because projectors in general don’t do a great job with HDR.

One of the best aspects of the 2250, like its predecessor, is how easy it is to place in a room. With ample zoom range, it can sit well behind your seating area. Even better, there’s lens shift, which is rare in sub-$1,000 projectors and quite welcome. The combination allows for significantly more placement options, like on a shelf behind your sofa. 

Most DLP-based projectors — which is nearly the entire projector market in this price range other than those from Epson — lack any sort of lens shift. Many also have a very limited zoom range. You need to make your room work around them, while the 2250 works with your room. It’s much more user friendly.

I measured approximately 1729 lumens of light output, or 192 nits. This just edges out the previous brightest projector I’ve measured, the BenQ TH685, by 10 nits/88 lumens. 1729 is a lot of light. So much so that in an otherwise dark room, on a 102-inch 1.0-gain screen, it was almost too bright. That’s actually good for two reasons. One, you’ll want to keep it in ECO mode most of the time anyway, since it’s significantly quieter. In ECO mode it puts out a still-brighter-than-many-projectors 126 nits. Two, projectors get dimmer over time, so starting with “too much” means it will be far better looking for longer.

One mild surprise is the lamp life. In Normal mode, which is the brightest, is 4,500 hours. This is fairly typical, but in ECO it’s only 7,500, about half what many other projectors can do. I don’t think this is that big a deal since Epson lamp replacements aren’t that expensive, and 7,500 is still over 5 years at 4 hours a night.

Geoffrey Morrison/CNET

Who needs connections?

HDMI inputs: 1

PC input: No

USB port: No

Audio input and output: 3.5mm stereo

Digital audio output: No

Internet: Wi-Fi

12v trigger: No

RS-232 remote port: No

MHL: No

Remote: Not backlit (x2)

It might seem surprising that the 2250 actually loses an HDMI input from its predecessor. However, I can’t imagine many people use the second HDMI input on any projector. Who runs multiple long HDMI cables when it’s way easier to switch at the source using an HDMI switcher, soundbar, or receiver? 

The lone HDMI also relates to why there’s no USB connection, which for many years has been there to power a streaming stick. The 2250 has Android TV built-in. So if you don’t want to run HDMI, or just want to use this for occasional movie nights, all you need is a power cable, flat surface, and Wi-Fi. It has all the usual suspects: Netflix, Vudu, HBO Max, Amazon Prime, etc., and you can cast from your phone right to the projector.

The 10-watt mono speaker isn’t going to offer sound worthy of the image the 2250 can create, but thankfully there’s a 3.5mm audio output, so you can easily connect the projector to any powered speaker with an analog input.

Two small remotes come with the 2250; neither is backlit. One is only for controlling the built-in Android TV. The other can control the Android TV, but also controls the projector. This seems needlessly confusing to me. 

Geoffrey Morrison/CNET

Picture quality comparisons

I connected all three projectors via a Monoprice 1×4 distribution amplifier, and viewed all on a 102-inch 1.0-gain screen. The 2150 is last year’s model, while the HT2050A is still our pick for best projector in this price range.

These are some of the best projectors around $1,000 and it shows. All three projectors look good on any content you want to send them. The images are colorful, natural, and punchy, at least relative to other projectors within a few hundred dollars. 

Side by side, I could clearly tell the 2150 and 2250 are made by the same company. The images look far more similar than different. The extra brightness, about 7%, isn’t that noticeable. The 2150 was the third brightest projector I’ve measured. Which is to say, they’re all very bright. 

The biggest difference is in the contrast. Technically, the 2150 has a higher contrast ratio, about 1,220:1, which is the second highest for projectors in this price range after the BenQ HT2050A. The 2250’s 1,026:1 is lower, but when it comes to contrast ratio a difference of 20% is hard to notice at best (and fairly close to what could be considered inherent measurement error). However, they look different. This is largely because there seems to be less of a color tint in the 2250’s darkest images. So it looks less artificial and, subjectively, better than the 2150 overall. 

Neither projector comes close to the BenQ in this regard, however, which is still our champion in contrast ratio at 2,094:1. Its image has more depth and punchiness, though the difference is less pronounced between these rarefied contenders than with some I’ve reviewed in the last year. 

Geoffrey Morrison/CNET

The other edge the BenQ has is in detail. Both Epsons are LCD, and in my experience LCD just doesn’t look quite as sharp as DLP. So even at the same resolution, the BenQ just looks higher resolution. Edges and fine details are just more noticeable. The Epsons certainly don’t look soft, but side-by-side with the BenQ they’re definitely softer.

Comparing the BenQ HT2050A and the Epson 2250, it’s not an easy choice. On a strictly image quality basis, I’ll give the nod to the BenQ. That contrast ratio is fantastic. Both projectors have great color accuracy, but the the BenQ looks sharper. The Epson is brighter, but the BenQ is still quite bright. 

This isn’t quite the whole story, however. 

Beyond the specs

Like all single-chip DLP projectors, the HT2050A is subject to rainbows. Personally, I’m not bothered by them. Some people are, however, and if that’s you, it doesn’t matter how good a DLP projector could look, it’s unwatchable. So point to the Epson, since it uses three LCDs, which can’t exhibit rainbows.

The HT2050A is also harder to fit in a room. The zoom range is a lot less, the maximum throw distance is less, and while it has lens shift, it’s not as much as the Epson. I don’t think built-in streaming is a big benefit in this kind of projector, but the 2250 has that too and it works well. So that’s another point.

Geoffrey Morrison/CNET

The Epson’s biggest liability, however, is its price. The BenQ is 25% cheaper, and there are other projectors that can get the job done for even less. For the same money as the 2250 you could get the 4K Optoma UHD30. That projector has some issues, but looks great and is incredibly detailed. 

So the bottom line is this: The Epson 2250 is an excellent projector. If you’re not interested in the BenQ HT2050A, or want to sacrifice some overall picture quality at the altar of pixels for the UHD30, the 2250 is the one to get.

Geek Box

Test Result Score Black luminance (0%) 0.189 Poor Peak white luminance (100%) 192 Good Derived lumens 1729 Good Avg. grayscale error (10-100%) 2.485 Good Dark gray error (20%) 3.524 Average Bright gray error (70%) 2.605 Good Avg. color error 5.564 Average Red error 7.171 Poor Green error 8.1 Poor Blue error 4.771 Average Cyan error 7.352 Poor Magenta error 3.192 Average Yellow error 2.797 Good Avg. saturations error 3.12 Average Avg. color checker error 2.6 Good Input lag (Game mode) 28 Good

Measurement notes

Out of the box, in the Cinema picture mode and the seven-color temperature mode, the 2250 was very close to accurate in just about every measurement. It lacks green throughout the grayscale range, except for the brightest of images, but not enough to look that way to the naked eye.

Color primaries and secondaries were all very close to their targets. Green is very slightly yellow, as is red. Cyan is slightly blue. 

There are two different lamp modes and two iris speeds. You can hear the iris working if you’re close to the projector. In Normal lamp mode, labeled Power Consumption in the menu, the 2250 is quite loud, but is able to produce 192 nits, which works out to roughly 1,729 lumens. Drop to ECO mode and the fan noise drops to a more acceptable level, while still producing 126 nits. If you want to go all out, and sacrifice overall image quality and accuracy, the Dynamic mode can produce a whopping 289 nits, or roughly 2,602 lumens. I wouldn’t recommend that setting for normal viewing.

The contrast ratio average, not including the iris, was 1,026:1, which is quite good for a projector in this price range. The iris, which tracks the video signal to make darker scenes darker, gives the 2250 a dynamic contrast ratio average of 5,730:1. I didn’t find that it added much and disabled it in the menu.