Wowza Media Systems Releases Highly Anticipated Wowza Media Server 3.5

Wowza Media Systems LLC, the "Any Screen Done Right" media server software company, today announced the release of Wowza Media Server 3.5. The latest version of the company's award-winning software introduces savvy enhancements that allow content developers to have the critical flexibility and capabilities they need to stream media reliably the way they want — protected, scalable, high-quality and to any screen.
"With more than 120,000 licensees in more than 150 countries, Wowza Media Server has become one of the most trusted platforms for streaming media to users anywhere, on any type of device," said David Stubenvoll, co-founder and chief executive officer at Wowza Media Systems. "Our latest version is even more feature-rich, flexible, cost-effective and loaded with new functionality. It targets today's and tomorrow's disruptive media requirements and also gives customers more options to use the software for a number of applications in the ways they want and need. We've listened to our customers, and the result is Wowza Media Server 3.5."
Wowza Media Server 3.5 software includes several noteworthy new features:
More Options for Content Protection 

• Third-Party Digital Rights Management (DRM) provides on-the-fly encryption for live and on-demand video workflows, and now includes new options that offer Microsoft PlayReady DRM for Apple HTTP Live Streaming (HLS), as well as the newest version of Apple HLS encryption. In addition, Wowza Media Server can now decrypt PlayReady-protected assets before packaging and re-encrypting them into multiple HTTP formats.

• MediaSecurity is now incorporated directly into Wowza Media Server 3.5. Formerly a free AddOn, MediaSecurity features such as SecureToken, RTMP authentication, RTSP authentication and StreamNameAlias help ensure a more secure stream when delivering content using Apple HLS, Adobe HTTP Dynamic Streaming (HDS), Microsoft Smooth Streaming and MPEG-DASH (Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP).

• Wowza® StreamLock AddOn is a new security option for network encryption that allows users to stream using RTMPS and provides near-instant provisioning of free 256-bit Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates to verified Wowza customers using Wowza Media Server 3.5. StreamLock-provisioned SSL certificates provide the highest level of security when used with RTMP, but can also be used for secure HTTP streaming (HTTPS).
Greater Scale Distribution

• HTTP Origin fulfills requests from HTTP caching infrastructures for live and on-demand Apple HLS, Adobe HDS, and Microsoft Smooth Streaming. Downstream HTTP caches are ideal for scaling out streaming across larger regions and audiences.

• Live Stream Record, formerly a free AddOn, is now part of Wowza Media Server 3.5. The enhanced functionality allows server administrators to split in-process live stream recording archives automatically into multiple files based on video duration, clock time or file size. This feature also includes a new developer user interface, which shows all current live streams with the option to record or stop recording streams in progress.
Expanded Reach to More Users

• Closed Captioning for live and on-demand video streaming accepts caption data from a variety of in-stream and file-based sources before converting captions into the appropriate formats for live and on-demand video streaming using the Apple HLS, Adobe HDS and RTMP protocols. This feature enables U.S. broadcasters to comply with the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010 by providing captioning for television programs distributed over the Internet.

• Silverlight Multicast Player, now integrated into Wowza Media Server 3.5, allows users to stream MPEG-TS multicasts from Wowza Media Server to any Silverlight-enabled desktop. The feature also enables simultaneous live video broadcasts across the network to thousands of Silverlight-based players while only using single-stream bandwidth.
Enhanced Wowza Transcoder AddOn

• Dynamic Overlays for Wowza Transcoder AddOn enable static and dynamic images over video by using a Java-based API. The AddOn can be configured manually or pre-programmed based on external events, making it a powerful new tool for adding premium TV-like experiences. Applications for overlays include advertising, titling, watermarking, company logos and tickers used for sporting events and news updates. 

• H.263 video compression is now included in the Wowza Transcoder AddOn to support H.263 encoding for live and on-demand video streams to older mobile devices.

• Simplified pricing for both perpetual and subscription — daily and monthly — licenses now makes all AddOns the same price per instance or channel.

A complete list of Wowza Media Server 3.5 features and enhancements is available at www.wowza.com/wowza3.5.
Current Wowza Media Server version 2 and 3 customers can upgrade for free here