VoIP and Audio Transport -- Minimising Perceived Latency in Audio-Conferencing Systems over Application-Level Multicast -- Background Noise Influence on VoIP Traffic Profile -- Adaptive VoIP Transmission over Heterogeneous Wired/Wireless Networks -- Video Encoding I -- On Modeling MPEG Video at the Frame Level Using Self-Similar Processes -- Dynamic Bit-Rate Allocation with Fuzzy Measures for MPEG Transcoding -- A Modified Gaussian Model-Based Low Complexity Pre-processing Algorithm for H.264 Video Coding Standard -- Scalable Stereo Video Coding for Heterogeneous Environments -- Multi-source Multimedia -- Multi-source Multimedia Conferencing over Single Source Multicast: An Application-Aware Approach -- Distributed Multi-source Video Composition on High Capacity Networks -- Multicasting and Broadcasting -- Analysis of FEC Codes for Partially Reliable Media Broadcasting Schemes -- Supporting Mobility in Multicast: A Compromise Between Large and Small Group Multicast -- Scheduling Schemes -- A Comparison of Opportunistic Scheduling Algorithms for Streaming Media in High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) -- Adaptive Scheduling for Improved Quality Differentiation -- Video Encoding II -- Experimental Feasibility Evaluations of Heuristic Multi-Layering Schemes for QoS Adaptive MPEG-4 Video Streaming -- Residual Motion Coding Method for Error Resilient Transcoding System -- A Fast Motion Estimation Algorithm Based on Context-Adaptive Parallelogram Search Pattern -- A Fast Successive Elimination Algorithm for Multiple Reference Images -- Content Management -- Using Dynamic Replication to Manage Service Availability in a Multimedia Server Cluster -- Design of a Hybrid CDN -- Multimedia Services -- Using the Session Initiation Protocol for Connected Multimedia Services in a Ubiquitous Home Network Environment -- The Digital Call Assistant: Determine Optimal Time Slots for Calls -- Augmented E-commerce: Making Augmented Reality Usable in Everyday E-commerce with Laser Projection Tracking -- Security -- Architecture and Protocols for the Protection and Management of Multimedia Information -- Application of ‘Attack Trees’ Technique to Copyright Protection Protocols Using Watermarking and Definition of a New Transactions Protocol SecDP (Secure Distribution Protocol) -- Digital Image Authentication Based on Turbo Codes.

Interactive Distributed Multimedia Systems (IDMS) and Protocols for Mul- media Systems (PROMS) have been two successful series of international events bringing together researchers, developers and practitioners from academia and industry in all areas of multimedia systems. These two workshops successfully merged in 2003 and now constitute the MIPS workshop. After the outstanding MIPS 2003 workshop, organized in Naples, Italy, by GiorgioVentreandRobertoCanonico,fromtheUniversityofNaplesFedericoII, MIPS2004movedtoGrenoble,France. Followingthegreattradition,MIPS2004 was intended to contribute to scienti?c, strategic and practical advances in the area of distributed multimedia applications, protocols and intelligent mana- ment tools, with emphasis on their provision over novel network architectures. This is undoubtedly a rather broad area, which is con?rmed by the large range of topics that were addressed in the submitted (and accepted) papers. This year the Call for Papers attracted 74 submissions, essentially from - rope and Asia, plus a few contributions from North America, the Middle East, and Africa, for a total of 20 countries. We would like to express our warmest gratitude to all the authors, without whom organizing this event would have been impossible! Thanks to the outstanding work of the Program Committee and the ad- tional reviewers, 20 full-sized papers and 5 additional short papers were ?nally accepted, which was not an easy task. Like MIPS 2003, MIPS 2004 remained a highly selective event (33% acceptance ratio, including the short papers) which is the best warrant of a good program quality.