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What is IstoIkona?
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IstoIkona empowers customers with advanced capabilities to track, manage, and
deliver audio, video, and multimedia content via the Internet.
Privately held, IstoIkona's headquarters reside in Nicosia, Cyprus.
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What is streaming media?
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Streaming refers to media, audio and/or video, which can be experienced via the
internet without downloading/saving the files to the end users computer.
Streaming is like television and radio for the computer. This provides a higher
level of security for original content/media on the Internet.
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How does IstoIkona enable streaming
media to work with my existing Web site?
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IstoIkona specializes in tools for media management including content storage,
Player servers and customer service for the major streaming format. Anyone with
an Internet service provider and/or a Web host provider can utilize a IstoIkona
account to economically offer streaming media on their site.
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I have audio and video for my web site,
now what?
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Option 1: IstoIkona offers digitization and encoding services for a nominal fee.
Option 2: Do it yourself, however if you need help feel free to
contact technical support and they will walk
you through the process. Microsoft's Window's Media Player is a streaming format
designed to play media on the computer. An audio and/or video program needs to
be converted to a digital file. Once media is digitized the file needs to be
encoded or converted into a streaming format. Each player offers a downloadable
version of encoding software that converts digital media into a streaming
format.
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I only want to stream audio or flash
animation not video, is IstoIkona still for me?
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Whether you're streaming stock quotes, original music or corporate meetings,
IstoIkona offers competitive packages in all sizes and price ranges, designed to
accommodate everyone from individual consumers to large corporations.
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Does IstoIkona charge a setup fee?
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No. IstoIkona strives to provide the best hassle-free streaming service
available.
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Can I just send you my material and let you take care of the
rest?
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Yes, IstoIkona can capture and convert your media for you for a nominal fee.
Click here for price quote. If you prefer to
do this yourself, but think you'll need help, you can contact our tech support
team and they will walk you through the process of uploading your media, if
necessary. Our goal is to empower you to manage your own content so you can
upload, delete and modify your account as often as you need. If you have any
questions, feel free to contact us .
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What formats can I use with my IstoIkona Account?
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IstoIkona enables you to use the major
streaming formats
(Windows media) from a single account.
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How do I stream across a firewall?
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Media Players generally fail-over to HTTP Port 80 to bypass firewalls. If the
player doesn't fail-over you have to manually configure it. For help
contact IstoIkona Support .
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What is the difference between downloading and Streaming
Downloading?
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Downloading: Your computer saves the entire file to you hard drive. Often files
will begin playback before it is finished saving, but you cannot fast forward
beyond what is on your hard drive.
Streaming: The file is not saved to your hard drive and plays back in 'real
time' as it is received. Some streaming formats support multiple bit rates
allowing the server to adjust the stream for the viewers connection speed.
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What is a streaming servers and a web server?
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Streaming: Streaming servers send on-demand and live content to a media client
for immediate play back. The servers generally use the RTSP protocol, which can
use both UDP and TCP packets.
Features include: multiple bit rate files for sending to the client/player for
the best connection speed.
If a packet is lost the server will continue to send the stream and play.
With on-demand, users can fast forward to anywhere in the file at any time.
Web Server: A web server can only send on-demand content for the client/player
to download and save to their hard drive. The servers use HTTP protocol, which
only uses TCP packets.
Features include: When downloading if a packet is lost, play back will be
stalled until the download is complete.
Entire files will be downloaded without being able to take advantage of multiple
bit rates.
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How much storage space will I need for my media ?
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Streaming media is measured in kilobits per second (Kbps). You may be accustomed
to seeing the amount of storage space used on your computer in kilobytes (KB).
To estimate how much storage space your streaming media will take up at
different rates, you can simply use our handy streaming calculator. If you would
like to know the math behind it, here's what you need to know:
- There are 8 bits in a byte.
- Take the kilobits per second and divide by 8. (This will give the kilobytes per
second.)
- Multiply this number by 60 so that you will have the kilobytes per minute.
- Multiply the kilobytes per minute by the length of your media in minutes. This
number will probably be at least four digits.
- To translate into megabytes (MB), divide by 1024.
- Did you know that QuickTime displays data transfer in KiloBytes per second, not
kilobits per second? Thus a QuickTime clip stream at 3 KBps is going at the same
rate as a Real or Windows Media clip at 24 kbps. (3KB x 8 bits per byte = 24
kbps)
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What payment options do I have?
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All IstoIkona accounts have the option to receive invoices by email and/or
postal mail. IstoIkona provides for several payment options:
. Credit Card
. Check
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What credit cards do you accept?
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. Visa
. MasterCard
. American Express
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