{"id":1547,"date":"2020-03-20T05:30:43","date_gmt":"2020-03-20T05:30:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.qwilt.com\/the-capacity-gap-is-here\/"},"modified":"2022-11-06T23:59:55","modified_gmt":"2022-11-06T23:59:55","slug":"the-capacity-gap-is-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.qwilt.com\/the-capacity-gap-is-here\/","title":{"rendered":"The Capacity Gap is Here"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday brought an extraordinary confirmation that the biggest challenge facing OTT content delivery is not speed, as is commonly thought, but rather capacity. As you have probably heard by now, EU Commissioner Thierry Breton directly asked Netflix CEO Reed Hastings to stop streaming video in HD in order to \u2018<a href=\"https:\/\/www.fiercevideo.com\/video\/netflix-asked-to-curb-hd-video-to-ease-pressure-networks-europe\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">secure internet access for all<\/a>.\u2019 As a direct result of the pandemic, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2020-03-18\/netflix-twitch-traffic-booms-because-everyone-needs-an-escape\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">many more people than usual are at home watching Netflix and other streaming services<\/a> and, in Thierry\u2019s view, are effectively clogging the Internet. In response, <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2020\/digital\/global\/netflix-cuts-streaming-video-bit-rates-europe-1203539294\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Netflix agreed to lower their streaming bandwidth<\/a> in the EU for 30 days, even though they believe their Open Connect service is already helping service providers, and that their streams already adapt based on available bandwidth.<\/p>\n<p>What is important to note is that the whole conversation reflects an imperfect understanding of how video is delivered over the Internet. Not to make light of a serious situation, but it reminds me of an old joke where a guy walks into a doctor\u2019s office and says, \u201cHey doctor. My arm hurts when I move it like this.\u201d The doctor responds, \u201cwell don\u2019t move it like that.\u201d It solves the immediate problem, but kind of misses the point. Similarly, having Netflix lower their bandwidth solves the immediate problem, but kind of misses the point. The reason there are bottlenecks is not that Netflix is streaming at too high a bandwidth, although that certainly exacerbates the problem, it is that most of the content from all kinds of content publishers is being cached on the wrong side of the ISPs\u2019 core networks. CDNs typically cache OTT publishers\u2019 content at data centers or just inside an ISP\u2019s front door. Netflix content is not much different, even though they use Open Connect. Every single viewer of Netflix content, or anyone\u2019s OTT content for that matter, is getting their own stream which must traverse the entire ISP network to get to the user. Even if these streams are identical, each one has to make the full trip from Netflix\u2019 server or a CDN\u2019s server all the way through the ISP to the end user.<\/p>\n<p>ISPs, in general, have plenty of network capacity to each customer\u2019s home. But there are two choke points that are now becoming more obvious. The first is the peering or interconnection links between the CDNs and the ISPs. While Commissioner Breton may not have been aware of it, these links are filling up. If your Disney stream isn\u2019t looking as nice as usual, it may be because those peering links are being clogged by all the video conferencing going on. The second choke point is the ISPs\u2019 core networks, which were never built to support such massive simultaneous streaming. Core networks are tremendously expensive to grow and maintain, so ISPs only build what is necessary. Core network capacity expansion projects also take a great deal of time, planning and execution to complete. They can\u2019t just grow by an order of magnitude because everyone is suddenly staying at home.<\/p>\n<p>The solution is to allow the ISPs to cache the video themselves. This is a decision ultimately made by the individual content publishers. Currently, either Netflix\u2019 servers or a CDN\u2019s servers are caching the content and often dumping millions of identical streams (one for each viewer) on the ISPs and essentially telling them, \u201c<em>Now it\u2019s your problem. You deliver it.<\/em>\u201d No wonder things are getting clogged. If the ISPs are able to cache the content on their own caches, placed deep in their networks on the end users\u2019 side of their core (also known as the access network), their core will remain open for unique traffic, like individual video conferences. The ISPs don\u2019t need to massively grow their core networks. They just have to store the video in a better place.<\/p>\n<p>The technology to solve this problem was created as an open specification by the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.streamingvideoalliance.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Streaming Video Alliance<\/a>, an industry organization whose members include Disney, Warner Media, Verizon and many other streaming experts. Called <a href=\"https:\/\/www.streamingvideoalliance.org\/technical-groups\/open-caching\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Open Caching<\/a>, Qwilt has built a commercially available service based upon this specification. We named our service <a href=\"https:\/\/www.qwilt.com\/qwilt-media-delivery-for-content-publishers\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Content Delivery Sharing<\/a> because it takes a page out of the sharing economy. It is sometimes referred to as \u201cthe Uber of content delivery.\u201d Just like Uber doesn\u2019t own the cars \u2013 the drivers do \u2013 Qwilt doesn\u2019t own the caches \u2013 the ISPs do. \u00a0In the analogy, the ISPs are the drivers and the content publishers are the riders. Many Tier 1 content publishers and ISPs have seen this problem coming and are already using Qwilt\u2019s service to help alleviate the very bottlenecks described above.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps this crisis will hasten that adoption. We now live in a world in which the deluge of streaming media has exposed a capacity gap for all to see. This gap may be obvious now but, in our view, has been brewing for quite some time. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.qwilt.com\/contact\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Reach out<\/a> if you are interested in learning more.<\/p>\n<p>On a more sobering note: the pandemic we face is dire and, unfortunately, the pain and suffering that is already here for some and is yet to come for others is incredibly difficult. We wish everyone good health and safety during this time.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday brought an extraordinary confirmation that the biggest challenge facing OTT content delivery is not speed, as is commonly thought, but rather capacity. As you have probably heard&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":1358,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[38,11,25,12,36],"acf":{"thumbnail_image":3428},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Capacity Gap is Here - Qwilt<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Yesterday brought an extraordinary confirmation that the biggest challenge facing OTT content delivery is not speed, but rather capacity\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.qwilt.com\/the-capacity-gap-is-here\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Capacity Gap is Here - 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