The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers® (SMPTE®), a leader in
motion-imaging standards and education for the communications, media,
entertainment, and technology industries, today announced that Dr. Neil Hunt, chief
product officer at Netflix, will present the keynote address at the Entertainment
Technology in the Internet Age (ETIA) conference, this year scheduled for June 16-17
at Stanford University near Palo Alto, California.

Titled “The Race Is On!”, the conference will explore past, current, and future
technology requirements for delivering a compelling entertainment experience on the
Internet. 

“Though Neil Hunt once was called ‘the most important Netflix executive that nobody’s
ever heard of,’ other leaders across the media and entertainment industry are well
aware of his tremendous engagement and influence in the world of Internet-delivered
entertainment content,” said Pat Griffis, education vice president at SMPTE and ETIA
2015 conference program chair.

“Intimately involved in every aspect of the Netflix pipeline, Neil is positioned to offer
unique insight into the strategy and success of the world’s leading Internet television
service. His keynote address and his participation on a session panel will enrich an
already-exciting ETIA conference program.”

During the ETIA 2015 conference, more than a dozen sessions will bring technical,
creative, and ecosystem experts together to explore how the Internet is changing
entertainment and to provide context that will aid attendees — engineers, creatives,
and researchers focused on the future of entertainment over the Internet — in
understanding both technology and application trends. Kicking off the afternoon of the
first day, Hunt’s keynote address will look at how the content creation community and
the titans of the Internet can better collaborate in providing compelling content to
consumers.

Hunt will discuss the challenges of this proposition, as well as the benefits it could
bring to all parties, particularly the consumer.

“Not So Safe: Entertainment on the Web” is a special evening session scheduled for
June 16. A panel of industry leaders and security experts will explore the latest
technical options and how content providers and cloud-solution providers are dealing
with the challenges of securing content in the new age of Internet-based content
distribution.

Additional ETIA 2015 sessions also will focus on Internet image quality and the impact
of higher spatial temporal resolution, along with higher dynamic range and color
gamut; compression efficiency versus image quality and pixel mix; and the use of a
new electro-optical transfer function — perceptual quantizer — based on human
perception.

A session dedicated to net neutrality will review developments over the past year, as
well as the impact of U.S. decisions on the rest of the world. 

Further information and online registration for the ETIA 2015 conference are available
at www.etia2015.org. More information about SMPTE is available at www.smpte.org.