Microsoft Ignite Virtual 2020: Microsoft Stream

At the Microsoft Ignite Virtual 2020, there were so many exciting announcements, and one of the exciting ones was regarding Microsoft Stream. With the surge in remote work due to the pandemic, the demand for online video has exponentially skyrocketed. Video is becoming an important aspect of communicating within an organization and to those who are its external target audience. With the pandemic and restrictions on social distancing and numbers of people in one place, video has become the choice of communication to meet whether for business or pleasure.

A video platform is a powerful tool as it connects people visually, provides the ability to authenticate the people present, and allows viewers to cue in on non-verbal communication such as body language. Additionally, video plays an important role in communication, especially for training, team engagement, and recordings which allow playback to revisit what had taken place.

Microsoft Stream is receiving new features and enhancements as part of Microsoft 365, bringing with it the ability to intelligently create a video, share and view throughout all the Microsoft 365 apps while users and administrators manage video content as they would for any other file type. The new vision for Microsoft Stream is more than that of a video app by leveraging the rich content management features of SharePoint and the intelligence of Microsoft Graph. By leveraging these powerful engines, Microsoft Stream can deliver external and anonymous sharing, integrate Microsoft Search, add new controls for security and compliance, and enhance analytics.

User Experience

Stream: the web app, as a part of Office.com, users will share, discover, and manage videos like any Office document in Word, Excel, or PowerPoint. Stream will be a one-stop-shop for users to seamlessly create, edit, manage, playback, and discover videos. The Stream app will also provide a consolidated recommended video list to the user, a video list that is curated from videos shared by other users across the organization.

Improved Playback for Video in Microsoft 365: building upon the classic Stream playback page, the new Stream app will be adding and improving features, including noise suppression, chaptering, meeting recordings with accurate speaker attributions, and analytics. It will retain the high quality and scalable playback quality that is currently in classic Stream.

Portals: out-of-the-box templates will provide users the ability to be creative and to produce videos by combining messaging and other media to tell their story on any news post or page for video-rich sites and portals. SharePoint ensures responsive and accessible content across browsers and devices.

Mobile: improved video capabilities including creating and uploading from a mobile device with security and without having to save to the camera roll plus one can watch videos inline in chats, notification feeds, and more across Microsoft 365 and with the Stream app for iOS and Android.

Productivity

Microsoft Teams Meeting Recordings: Microsoft Teams meetings are recorded and stored in Microsoft 365. As with all Office files, they can be shared with OneDrive and SharePoint with people inside and outside of the organization. Customer requests for analytics and API-level access to meeting recordings are affected by this change.

Video Search: videos are found by using the video’s metadata and name in Microsoft 365 by utilizing Microsoft Search. Once classic Stream is transitioned to the new Stream, specific video searches can be conducted including transcript search and recommended video search.

Video Analytics: currently file analytics in SharePoint and OneDrive support view trends over a period of time and audience and usage insights. Future additions will include video-specific analytics including device, user, and content interaction.

Video Management

Sharing and Permissions: Video sharing and permissions will be like that of any Microsoft 365 file – users can share with anyone inside their organization, outside of it, or with specific people based on sharing policies of the organization.

Admin Capabilities: SharePoint Admins will be able to act on content in any SharePoint site or any user’s OneDrive for Business. Additionally, end-user sharing and permissions, controls, report administrative settings, and other actions that apply to files will also apply to videos.

Governance: video files will inherit governance features, like all Office documents, from Microsoft 365. Retention labeling will be automatic for Teams meeting recordings that are saved on the SharePoint files platform and with appropriate licensing. Microsoft intends to invest heavily in governance, so monitor upcoming additions.

Storage Management: the bulk of videos being stored in Stream are Microsoft Teams meetings. To aid in managing the storage of Teams meeting recordings, the new Stream will apply automatic retention policies and other features.

Video Extensibility

APIs for Video: by integrating Stream with Microsoft 365, developers can leverage existing APIs in SharePoint and Microsoft Graph to create custom video-centric experiences and applications. More APIs will be created for video in the future.

The new Stream web app makes working with video a lot easier, including screen recordings, webcam recordings, podcast recording, and building playlists which all be done on the home page. Microsoft is emphasizing and changing how we look, think, and feel about videos by treating them, and showing us they can be, treated like any other document in the Microsoft Office Suite. Video recording, sharing, editing, streaming, and organizing has jumped up a whole level with Microsoft Stream.