Advances in networked media - theory and practice

Summary form only given. We have witnessed the increasing convergence of digital media, wireless and networking technologies in the past decade. This has profoundly transformed the way media is being represented, processed, delivered, and presented. For over half a century, Shannon´s rate-distortion (R-D) theory has been the theoretical foundation for information representation. With the emergence of new media, devices and applications in networked environment, the conventional R-D theory needs to be extended to enable more effective representation and processing of connected media. This article summarizes our attempt to develop a ´networked R-D theory´ as well as some initial applications. In particular, it addresses the following research initiatives currently undertaken by Microsoft Research Asia: (a) new sampling and rendering structure for computer graphics and digital ink; (b) media delivery over a network with errors, congestion, retransmission, and multi-user interaction; (c) and media summarization where maximum information could be extracted for a given time boundary. Some of these technologies have already been transferred into Microsoft´s mainstream products, which will help enable a plethora of applications such as high-quality media streaming, intelligent note-taking, networked games, and home audio/photo/video editing.