[opendtv] Aereo issues
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 16 Sep 2013 22:54:33 +0000
It looks to me like too many IP devices were trying to initiate unicast
sessions with the Aereo servers in each market. For live programming, of
course, it would be best for the ISPs to distribute the Aereo programming as IP
multicasts. This would reduce the load on the Aereo servers and also on the ISP
network. Instead, my take is that the ISPs don't like to do this, because
multicasting would make the ISPs lose track of who's watching what, and
therefore the Aereo servers have to create oodles of unicast sessions.
And this has been discussed in the IETF multicast working group. Converting a
unicast to a multicast, for just this sort of scenario (ISP gets programming as
unicast, then distributes it as multicast).
But what's interesting to me is that Aereo took the blame for the problems.
This implies that Aereo determined ISP capacity was not the issue, rather it
was the capacity of their servers.
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
> Two lessons here:
>
> 1. The technology is still fragile and will need to scale massively to
> allow for a shift from the MVPDs to wired and wireless broadband.
The fact that ISP capacity may not have been a problem is actually huge, Craig.
Installing servers that can support more unicast sessions, or more mirrored
servers, is a technique that's well understood. Reminds me that it was also
hard it was to get Microsoft updates, back in the early Windows days. Although
of course ultimately, if everyone starts watching sports as IP streams, the ISP
nets could also saturate.
> 2. Broadcasters have a viable option for survival - Focus on the mobile
> devices that need an affordable wireless option to fill their screens.
You mean, "beat Aereo at its own game," by deploying their own IP servers in
each market? Or do you mean, bypass the ISP networks and broadcast the content
direct to the mobile devices?
I've already agreed to the former, assuming broadcasters can get the rights to
do so. Of course, this wouldn't solve the technical issue. The broadcasters'
servers would also have to be up to the task.
The latter, I have no idea why the cellcos would suddenly change their tune.
Bypassing their networks means the cellco isn't getting paid for carrying those
bits.
> I wonder how many people tried to watch an NFL game on an ATSC mobile
> (M/H) receiver?
Whatever the answer, that sure would have taken the load off the Aereo servers,
eh? That or IP multicast.
Bert
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