Ian McDonough Blackbird CEO
When did you first realise the severity of the environmental crisis? I’ve always been interested in the environment and nature. I’m a big fan of Sir David Attenborough shows, which have made me very aware of the severity of the crisis. We weren’t aware of how much impact we had as an industry until we started doing more research. We released our findings in the report, Video Shouldn’t Cost the Earth (blackbird.video/ carbonefficient). We realised that the carbon emissions going into the atmosphere are actually huge, and there’s a very fine balance before the amount entering the atmosphere has a significant impact. There doesn’t actually need to be much temperature change How will the climate crisis affect your business and the industry? I think of it more the other way around – about how we can affect the environmental situation. We don’t do enough as an industry, because many people aren’t aware of our impact. It’s a story that’s not really out there. This is the most important thing facing the planet today. We are the media industry, and we are the ones that need to tell people how to change. If we can’t get our own house in order, we can’t be a role model for those companies and people. I want to flip that one on the head. We should be employing technologies that have an immediate impact on climate change. We also need to use the talent that we have in the industry to innovate technologies. We celebrate special effects and storytelling, but don’t celebrate innovation around carbon efficiency – and we should. for things to have a huge impact on how we live. What changes have you made to reach zero carbon? What changes do you plan to make? We get to zero carbon by reducing emissions, while offsets are also important. We’re a technology that can help other companies reduce carbon emissions quite significantly, so
we are not aiming for carbon neutrality ourselves, because we don’t think that’s going to have much of an impact. Instead, we help larger organisations significantly reduce their carbon footprints by employing technologies that have a far lower carbon footprint. For example, we’re a company that works on Wimbeldon. Throughout the two-week tennis event, the carbon emissions generated from an on-premise system – just on the video editing side – reach about 175 tonnes. Blackbird is 91% more carbon efficient. We haven’t yet reached
zero, but we are far more carbon efficient than they are – and even 80% more than a standard cloud- based system. We are also constantly innovating our own technology to become even more carbon efficient. The
WE DON’T CELEBRATE INNOVATION – AND WE SHOULD
figure behind being 91% more efficient stems from a codec we call Blackbird 9. We are currently working on Blackbird 10, set to be twice as efficient. If you had the power to universally mandate one behavioural change, what would it be? Within our industry, it would be to stop moving as much content with high bit rates. In terms of transferring data, powering centres and the necessary bandwidth has a huge impact. It’s not just the streaming; it’s also video production. If there should be one behavioural change within our industry, it’s that. As an engineer, I’ve got to say Elon Musk. He is by far the most flamboyant and impactful industry leader at the moment, and he’s mostly on the side of the good in regards to this story. Admittedly, he is quite polarised and may not be a saint, but he’s very influential and a genius. He’s probably inspiring a whole generation of engineers and entrepreneurs to follow in his footsteps. I hope he continues to be a force for good! Who is your favourite scientist (past or present)?
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