On the eve of this year’s MIPTV, Russia Today (RT) is launching Ruptly, a Berlin-based agency that provides real-time and archived visual news materials from all the global hotspots via state-of-the-art delivery platform.
Ruptly aims “to become the go-to alternative resource in a highly concentrated market of professional news video footage, and to deliver coverage of stories that other agencies miss.”
The new agency will work with the international stringer network and leverages RT’s extensive global presence that counts outposts in Washington DC, London, Madrid, Damascus, Cairo, Gaza and Baghdad among its 22 bureaus.
“Right now there are basically a handful of agencies that provide majority of news footage to international outlets, and particularly to TV channels and online platforms that cannot afford to have bureaus or send correspondents to every hotspot. As a result, viewers often see events around the globe through the eyes of these providers. In such a market there are inevitable gaps in coverage, plus the risk of bias in the eventual reportage,” says Margarita Simonyan, RT’s editor-in-chief.
“RT has already established itself as the alternative voice on the international news landscape and now, with Ruptly, we can bring our vision and expertise to a whole new market.”
One of Ruptly’s features is its delivery mechanism, which allows TV stations, online media outlets and mobile multimedia platforms to receive and broadcast Ruptly video feeds of live events in real time, as the events are happening. The platform enables simultaneous streaming of five live video feeds, of the highest quality, including HD, and built-in redundancy ensures continuity of streaming even if one of the servers goes out.
Ruptly builds on success of FreeVideo, RT’s unique project for media professionals, launched in 2009. FreeVideo became Russia’s first English-language video agency, and over 16 000 TV channels and agencies from 185 countries avail of the service.
