Net video explosion triggers traffic jam worries

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of content to get it from a local server, instead of approaching the main host all at once.

Downloadable video files are large enough that few are cached at the local level, and it's expensive for content companies to do so.

Some have looked to long-demonized peer-to-peer technologies to help lessen the load. Indeed, British ISP and cable company NTL said last week that it will test BitTorrent technology, along with CacheLogic network-speeding tools, for a new video distribution service.

Older firm Kontiki is similarly working with the British Broadcasting Corp., and rival Red Swoosh has worked with Marc Cuban's HDTV network to distribute its content online.

Peer-to-peer lessens the load on ISPs by letting customers download files from computers close to them in the network. If, for example, 100 people in a network all want the same movie, that file won't clog the mouth of the network 100 times, but can be efficiently swapped in pieces between nearby viewers.

"The whole consumer electronics world is pushing for video content," said CacheLogic Chief Technology Officer Andrew Parker. "What's being recognized by many ISPs is that P2P is a very large part of that, and that there can be a way to utilize it."

The problem with P2P is that it relies on ordinary computer users' goodwill. To work well, everyone must donate a share of his or her upstream bandwidth, sharing content with others. In the underground world of music or movie-trading, this regularly happens, but it has been less widely used for commercial applications.

Billard's Itiva is one of a newer generation of companies that say they have better ideas, midway between file-swapping and Akamai's technology, that will let even high-definition video stream quickly online.

Itiva's technology works by taking a huge movie file and breaking it up into tiny individual pieces that are formatted just like ordinary Web pages. When they're downloaded by a user, these individual pieces--Itiva calls them "quanta"--are stored in ISPs' Web caches, which are already distributed in every network.

Once stored separately like this, they can be quickly downloaded and pieced together by anyone else in that network, in a way that's much more inexpensive for the ISP than if everyone was going back to the original download site.

"It's like BitTorrent for ISPs," said one top network company executive familiar with the technology, but who asked not to be named. "It's very much of interest to telcos."

Content companies and network providers are increasingly experimenting with these technologies, and the next year will likely see commercial experiments as well. But it remains in its early days, and network experts say it's far too early to say whether they'll be more efficient than simply buying more bandwidth.

"Technologies like (these) are still developing, and will be important if we get to the point where the Internet is the only communications channel," said EarthLink Chief Architect Robert Sanders. "But I don't think that day is quite there."

[ordaj]

This sounds like oone of those bogus stories

planted by the telecos so that they get their way to charge more for content. I'm sure the data was cooked up by an astroturf organization pretending to represent a "balanced view."

The fact is we've already paid for fiber broadband, why haven't we received it?

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.newnetworks.com/broadbandscandals.htm" target="_newWindow">http://www.newnetworks.com/broadbandscandals.htm</a>

[chuchucuhi]

well

'cuz the telcos don't know where the fiber is, it got lost in the last takeover bid, hehe.

[jbelkin]

Free Lunch - Let's End it for Everyone!

Hey Verizon, about our streets you drive on with those extra heavy trucks ...

Did you used to be a regulated monopoly so we helped you build your network? We want our money back.

Or those right-of-way passage on our streets to hang your wires? I have cable &#38; cell phones - don't need your wires hanging on my street enjoying a free lunch - I know you're not a hypocrite so come and remove them ...

[203129769353146603573853850462]

P2P video not legitimate?

"more than 60 percent of Internet traffic is being taken up by peer-to-peer swaps, and about 60 percent of those swaps involve video content. Add to that the growing amount of legitimate content from companies such as Apple"

This implies none of P2P video is legitimate.

That's just not true.

A portion of video swapping is legal, even encouraged. Sources: Google, promos, amateur, etc.

[CharlesRovira]

Yeah! Sure, like they don't wanna

use all that left-over "dark" fibre from the last big telco meltdown.

This is a BS story dealing with the economics of scarcity when the cheapest thing in the ground is all that dark fibre.

They don't scare us in the least.

[nrlz]

Who's paying the bills here?

So who exactly should be paying for my 5 Mbit/s Internet connection? Do I pay for it or should Google pay for it? If Google pays, then free Internet for everyone!!!

[The user with no name]

Everyone pays

You pay for the pipe to be available to you. The web sites you visit pay for their data to be funneled down the pipe to your paid for availability. ISP's pay for their customers data to make the hop across other ISP networks as well as these same web sites needing to insure that they are paying THAT ISP so that their data stays in the 'fast lane' as it makes it hops across other ISP's lines.

And now a $55 month internet revenue turns into a couple hundred $$$ per month revenue stream. The internet gets bogged down with pipe tolls, newcomers unable to pay the fees that the big boys pay for cannot compete and pretty soon the internet world resembles the corporate real world where consumers have only a few options to choose from.

that leaves only two questions....


Exactly where did I place my (soon to be revived) library card and what will I do with the extra money I save when I cancel my net subscription?

[heystoopid]

OOPS!

And here we have the RIAA, claiming the net's major datastream, was full of the pirated music mp3's! ,so who is telling the truth!

Hmm, me thinks, the industry is full of it qite literally, given the volume of normal commercial data and the ever increasing satellite VoIP from overseas call centres(the daily terabyte unencoded stuff from banks/insurance companies/other usually travel by the standard unescorted white van around the country)

Oh well, we do live in the new age of propaganda, where all journalist's fail to ask the basic questions, and merely reprint comapany handouts verbatim, without verification like Judy M. !!!!!

[freq]

wheres the video?

at least let me watch some old 80's reruns or something... I guess tying content to hardware really does have its rewards... I dont want a pvr box and a television and a free-to-air tunner and a dish and a beta and a vhs and a laser disc and a dvd player etc etc etc... I have 7 hardware computers. that should be enough.

[sabot96]

I have paid for full access to the internet!

It does not matter what the data is! I have paid for 1.5 Meg download speeds, and my internet provider should be able to provide this or change what they say they are offering.

[The user with no name]

actually

right now we are paying for "speeds up to" X Mbps. It is an easy side step to say that while you are paying for content to be delivered UP TO THIS SPEED you will not receive ALL content at the maximum. Those providers who are paying a "premium" for their content to be delivered to you at YOUR maximum will be able to do so. If someone does not want to pay the pipe toll then it is that provider who will be responsible for you not being able to access their content at YOUR maximum bandwidth that is available to you based upon your subscription.

sidenote: I do not endorse this view but it is easy to see hwo the ISP's can justify why WE are paying for bandwidth while simultaneously being throttled back based upon the content we decide to view.

one word: b@stards!

[J.G.]

On-site viewing is one remedy

The reporter missed an aspect. Some portals, including Google
and Amazon, are offering content to be viewed only while you
are there. Downloads either aren't available or are fee based.
Personally, I've rejected Amazon shorts (digital prose and short
stories) because if I pay for something I want to own it. But, I
think this model is one of the answers to the increasing size of
files being transferred by ISPs. If the content is stationary, the
user goes to it. There is no transfer.

A market oddity I have experienced is having the paucity of
content for my iPod video encourage use of peer-to-peer
networks. That strikes me as an incentive for paid content
providers to make more content available. It is obvious that if
they offer it, an audience will come.

[booboo1243]

NOT an issue: inet is already p2p-tested

Already millions of users are using the internet to download tons of movies. Ok, it is illegal, but the point is: The net can stand the traffic.

Perhaps it will be neccessary to change the manner of distribution from centralized servers to BitTorrent or something similar, but that also has been proven to work with Linux distributions on DVD, so I don't get the point of this article...