Case study

The Rugby World Cup and beyond: how TF1 uses Mux Data to monitor the biggest games

As France’s biggest domestic television network and one of the largest private broadcasters in all of Europe, TF1 knows a few things about data. From sports and news to children’s shows and reality TV, the long-established company has been delivering quality programming to France and beyond for decades.

When it comes to handling their data, they trust Mux Data. TF1’s Project Manager Streaming, Simon Laroque, says that keeping track of the quality of the viewer streaming experience is important to TF1 teams. For example, during the recent Rugby World Cup — one of TF1’s biggest streaming events — Mux’s Monitoring Dashboard was crucial.

“Whenever there is a big game or when we make a major change to our infrastructure, we have the Monitoring Dashboard open on a screen somewhere so we can monitor all of it. We keep a close eye on metrics like the Exits Before Video Start and Playback Failure charts so we can catch and fix issues in real time."

Mux Data is used across a few TF1 teams. Simon is happy to report that it’s an easy and valuable tool that a wide range of TF1 employees can take advantage of because one doesn’t have to be a video expert to use it. "Mux has a user interface that even a non–video specialist can understand," he says. "This is a tool that I can give to my first-level support team and they can clear open tickets with the info from the Mux Dashboard."

More than ease of use, though, Mux Data is effective. When it comes to troubleshooting various streaming problems at TF1, Simon notes how quick and easy it is to resolve problems with Mux. “We rolled out some DRM-protected video for the Rugby World Cup this year," he explains. "Mux helped us troubleshoot which player versions were supported, identify the ones that weren’t, and ultimately provide the best experience for our viewers."

And when the biggest games end, TF1 turns to Mux again, this time to see how their video performed and how they might improve. “We use the Metrics Dashboard for analysis and deep dives into historic video views and data," Simon tells us. Whether trying to understand the overall performance score of their events or to review the experience of a specific user, the Metrics Dashboard allows Simon and his teams to look back on their events and make improvements for the future.

As for what’s next, the sky’s the limit. With more and more people opting to stream their television experiences, broadcasters need to make sure they’re covered on quality of experience.

"Until 5 or 10 years ago, media companies didn’t really care about quality of experience on the internet," Simon says. "But today, as more and more users are streaming as their primary means of watching TV, they expect that new services will be as good as cable or satellite or whatever they were using before. In order to ensure that, you need to be able to monitor the quality of experience accurately.”