[SBE] SBE Digest, Vol 264, Issue 7

[Dan Rapak]

"What would you like the Society to do on your behalf?  Is there a 
compelling member interest that the Society should take an aggressive 
position on decidedly "industry" issue?

Barry,

I have a suggestion. How about a seminar, webinar or if necessary an Ennis 
course on how video is mass-distributed via server? How many of us know how 
this all actually works? You don't just stick a server or two in a closet 
and have millions of people log in.

For example, take a company like Akamai Technologies. If memory serves, this 
is one of the companies (or they purchased one of the companies) that 
handled the web distribution of the "March Madness" basketball games for 
CBS. For those who aren't familiar, CBS made all of the games - including 
out of market games - available on streaming video. Initially it was pay per 
view, but beginning in 2006 the feeds were advertiser supported and free to 
the viewer. So many people watched that year that one of our Congressman 
actually decried CBS on the floor of Congress for lowering the nation's 
productivity because so many people were watching basketball on their 
computers at work! I heard someone from CBS speak about this at NAB the 
first year they did it. The gentleman (forgive me, but I can't recall his 
name) bemoaned the fact that had they known it would be so successful, they 
could have charged MUCH higher rates for their commercials. 
http://www.newsweek.com/id/124404

Here are some things that many SBE members may not be aware of. As this was 
several years ago, I may not have this 100% correct and would welcome anyone 
who was actually involved in the process to chime in and set me straight.

- Someone wishing to log in to watch the game was initially entered into a 
queue and NOT connected to a server. The purpose of this was to prevent the 
servers from being swamped. When it was certain that server access was 
available, viewers were taken from the queue and connected to a server. The 
wait time was minimal.

- More servers were brought into the mix as the queue grew.

- The servers were spread out geographically around the world to "spread the 
load." The idea was not only to avoid overloading one particular server, but 
also to avoid overloading any one section of the Internet.

There is no doubt much more interesting stuff about this process. Assume 
more and more TV sets with Internet connectivity. Assume people realize that 
even Cable TV is becoming superfluous. Sooner or later our stations are 
going to want to stream programming live via the web and in full broadcast 
HD quality. It might behoove us all to learn more about the process.

Food for thought.

Regards,
Dan Rapak - CPBE, CBNT, 8VSB