MP4 or MPEG 4 is a collection of functions and methods that defines a specific compression of audio and/or video data. The name comes from the joint collaborating authority – Moving Picture Experts Group, who defined and agreed upon this format of coding and decoding audio visual data. This data format is under the ISO/IEC group, and thus is an international standard of audio video collaboration.
This container format, since its inception in 1998, has been widely used in TV broadcasting, streaming audio and video, Compact Discs and Digital Versatile Discs. New and more versatile parts of the MP4 standard is being used by High Definition Digital Video Discs (HD DVD) and also the Blu-Ray Disc format.
This file format is still under development, and therefore is highly benefited by the tonne of outside development on it, apart from the MPEG and other officiating bodies. Thus, it exists in different parts, each individually containing several functions, methods and objects that work with various consumer media players and devices. The built in methods themselves are all not used, since they only add to the complexity of the music or video file, and thus each player is distinct in the usage of its features. Some forms of digital copyright protection, such as Digital Rights Management (DRM) is also included in the profiles or levels of the MP4 standard – thus publishing houses use this method very often.
MPEG-4 was originally intended to be used as a low bit-rate data communication implementation, as a seed of the video streaming boom. Thus it was supposed to be, and is, a fast coding and low error format which could be easily ported from one system to another, via the World Wide Web. It provided for an interaction never before seen in an audio and video container format, providing vigorous transmission with low latency layers, and the ability to interact with user generated video and audio. The ability to transform into a television signal via some procedures helped the MPEG-4 container format into becoming the primary mode of inter operator signal communication, allowing for clearer signals on TV, and a transparency that was not seen before.
Lastly, the MPEG-4 format extended itself by the Intellectual Property Management and Protection, that put a copyright and a robust security system on a single file so that it could not be illegally ported to another device, otherwise known as Digital Rights Management.
