European Parliament Web TV

The European Parliament launched its EuroparlTV Web TV service on 17 September 2008. The Dublin launch took place in the European Parliament offices in Molesworth Street, Dublin 2.

You can see the service at: http://www.europarltv.europa.eu/ 

An extract from the briefing note follows:

Europarltv is not a single channel but rather is split into four channels, each directed to a different audience:

Your Parliament, aimed at those with a particular interest in politics at the EU level: informed citizens, industry groups, social partners, lobbyists, academics as well as those working in the EU institutions.

Your Voice, conceived for the general public and providing the possibility of featuring user-generated content.

Young Europe, aimed particularly at school-aged children, high users of the Internet and the European electorate of the future.

Parliament Live provides continuous coverage of live events in the Parliament, notably debates in the plenary sessions, with a link to the audiovisual archives of previous sessions, as well as in the coming months, the activities of the committees.

Oireachtas TV available on the Internet (MPEG2 IPTV)

Oireachtas TV is available on the Internet and on educational networks as MPEG2 IPTV.

The television service is available as IPTV MPEG2 at 4 MBit/sec per channel, which gives a very good quality 16:9 wide screen feed.

The SDI feed from the Broadcasting Unit is encoded as MPEG2. The following live feeds are available on the Internet (instructions for a VLC media player):

• Dáil Éireann (House) feed:
  • select “UDP/RTP Multicast”
  • enter 233.4.189.33 as the IP address
  • enter 1234 as the port number
  • Click “OK”.
• Seanad (Senate) feed:
  • select “UDP/RTP Multicast”
  • enter 233.4.189.34 as the IP address
  • enter 1234 as the port number
  • Click “OK”.

Users may receive these channels free of charge once they are connected to a network which is peered with HEAnet, and has a 10 MBit/sec or faster connection, provided by a carrier which is capable to carrying multicast traffic. In Ireland, one commercial Internet service provider, Magnet Networks, is peered with HEAnet, and access to the Oireachtas multicast IPTV service was successfully implemented in a Government Department using a connection to Magnet Networks.

Multicasting IP is used, so there is no impact on the bandwidth of users networks or Internet connections no matter how many users are watching the channels. 

The office may supply the proposed parliamentary channel, a playback channel, and a multiscreen channel showing the Dáil, Seanad and four committee rooms on one screen, as additional channels.

Users can watch the television feeds using a standard television via a set top box and a SCART cable, or on a PC.

The Oireachtas Live Webcasting service is provided in association with HEAnet, Ireland’s Educational are Research Network.

The MPEG2 Streams are provided to several networks including the following:

• Educational and Research Networks
  • HEAnet (Ireland)
  • JANET (UK) 2 * 1 GBit/sec
  • NIRAN (Northern Ireland) 1 * 1 GBit/sec
  • GÉANT (Europe) 2 * 10 GBit/sec
• Internet
  • INEX (Internet Neutral Exchange) in Ireland 2 * 10 GBit/sec
  • General Internet 2 * 10 GBit/sec

I would be interested to hear from users who are able to watch the Oireachtas TV service as a Webcasting feed or as an IPTV feed. I would also like to know the quality of the stream, e.g. bandwidth used by the stream that you are receiving.

Oireachtas TV available on the Government Networks (MPEG4 IPTV)

The Oireachtas TV Irish parliamentary digital television service is available on the Government Campus LAN in Dublin and on the Government Networks in Ireland as the Oireachtas MPEG4 IPTV service, and provided in association with the Department of Finance.

The television service is available as IPTV MPEG4 at 1.2 MBit/sec per channel, which gives a very good quality 16:9 wide screen feed.

The SDI fed from the Broadcasting Unit is encoded as MPEG4 using a Skystream encoder. The following live feeds are available:

• Dáil (House),
• Seanad (Senate)
• CR1 (committee room 1)
• CR2 (committee room 2)
• CR3 (committee room 3)
• CR4 (committee room 4)

Government department and agencies may receive these channels free of charge once they are connected to the Government Campus LAN or to the Government Networks using a 10 MBit/sec or faster connection, provided by a carrier which is capable to carrying multicast traffic (all carriers connected so far are capable of this), and your own LAN must also be able to support multicast IP.

Multicast IP is used, so there is no impact on the bandwidth of government departments’ networks or Internet connections no matter how many users are watching the channels.

The Skystream appliance encoder that we use can handle eight channels, six are in use at present. The Office plans to supply the new parliamentary channel, and a multiscreen channel showing live feeds from the Dáil, Seanad and four committee rooms on one screen.

There is also a backup encoding system in place which can use input from the RF television distribution system.

Users can watch the television feeds using a standard television via a set top box and a SCART cable, or on a PC.

Several departments and offices are already connected to this service, and discussions are ongoing with several other departments, offices and agencies.

Any government department, office or agency interested in receiving Oireachtas IPTV channels should contact:

• Leo Bollins, eDemocracy Unit, Houses of the Oireachtas
  or
• Ken Barclay, Centre for Management, Organisation and Development, Department of Finance