MPEG-A促进了基于标准的创新多媒体应用和服务的快速发展。为此，MPEG-A引入了一组标准化的多媒体应用格式（MAF）及其相关的软件实现。该标准软件演示了MAFs的使用方法，并为供应商开发基于MAFs的多媒体产品提供了一个良好的开端。MPEG对MAFs的最终目标是通过在应用程序级别增加不同媒体类型的互操作性来刺激MPEG技术的使用。虽然在过去，MPEG已经指定了配置文件，但在标准的特定部分内的技术子集，例如MPEG- 2视频，它从未建议跨标准的不同部分（如MPEG-2音频和MPEG-2视频）或跨不同标准（如MPEG-4和MPEG-7）使用特定的配置文件组合。正是这种跨MPEG标准的技术组合，才是MPEG-A的主题。 ISO/IEC TR 23000-1:2007描述了这一新标准系列的最初动机，以及ISO/IEC 23000所有其他部分（MAF）构建的基本概念。此外，它还简要概述了迄今为止已标准化的所有MAF。

MPEG-A facilitates the swift development of innovative, standards-based multimedia applications and services. To this end, the MPEG-A introduces a set of standardized Multimedia Application Formats (MAFs), together with their related software implementation. The normative software demonstrates how MAFs are used and offers vendors a head start for developing multimedia products based on MAFs. MPEG's ultimate objective for MAFs is to stimulate the increased use of MPEG technology through additional interoperability of different media types at the application level. Although in the past MPEG has specified profiles, subsets of technologies within specific parts of the standards, such as MPEG-2 Video, it has never recommended the use of specific combinations of profiles across different parts of a standard, such as MPEG-2 Audio and MPEG-2 Video, or across different standards, such as MPEG-4 and MPEG-7. It is this combination of technologies across MPEG standards which is the topic of MPEG-A. ISO/IEC TR 23000-1:2007 contains a description of the original motivation for this new family of standards and the concept underlying the construction of all other parts (MAFs) of ISO/IEC 23000. Furthermore, it provides a short overview of all MAFs that have been standardized to date.