|
There's little doubt that creating video content storehouses at the Internet fringes is the darling of delivery strategies these days. But carving out a place for these servers is no easy task.
Although many content providers may want it, they won't likely find server space in cable headends, even if the MSOs offer broadband Internet service. While some have speculated the MSOs don't want to encourage Internet video because it will compete with their core broadcast video service, at least one operator is arguing it is more a matter of bandwidth management.
For Cox Communications Inc.'s John Hildebrand, limiting the flow of Internet video on cable's broadband pipe is as much a matter of getting the most bang for the bandwidth as it is competitive business practice. The MSO's vice president of multimedia technology points out that bandwidth is a finite commodity, so devoting more channels for high-speed Internet services gorging on streaming video may not be as profitable as adding new cable network programming or video on demand. "Like most people I'm looking at new services and saying 'What's in it for us?' " Hildebrand says.
Right now, it is simply easier for an MSO to provide video via standard MPEG-2 transmission as opposed to heavy Internet Protocol-based footage streamed to users. Key to this is the philosophy that video will continue to be seen primarily on a television, Hildebrand says.
"At this point we really don't care how video gets down to the set-top box," he says. "It's just more efficient to do it with MPEG. It's not like they (streaming video players) are the bad guys."
In fact, Cox has just begun testing Intertainer's IP video system in the lab, but it still doesn't offer the same video quality as standard transmission methods, Hildebrand says.
"If we wanted to do IP we would probably want to do it to the television, and there's not a good technical solution right now," Hildebrand says. "That's a problem."
"We don't have that problem on the MPEG side," he adds. "Everything is a question of bandwidth. To me it is picking the right technology with the right business model."
Hildebrand also is in the camp of those who don't see the allure of streaming full-length movies to a 17-inch PC screen. "We are really not convinced people want to watch streaming video on a PC," he says. While some segment of the population might want to do that, "I don't think that is something we want to encourage on the PC."
Meanwhile, digital subscriber line competitor SBC Communications Inc. is also keeping streaming servers out of its outlying central offices for network management reasons. SBC's strategy is to place the servers in its Internet Data Centers, the first of which was opened in July in Dallas, according to spokeswoman Lisa Ward. "We see the Internet Data Centers being the central offices of the future-the central offices of the Internet," she says.
Placing the streaming servers there not only allows content to flow through SBC's own private network and avoid the public Internet, it also allows for greater capacity and security, Ward says.
While that may not sound much like an edge-network distribution favored by streaming media, SBC is working on opening three other data centers in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Chicago. "We definitely have three others we are moving forward on and we will add others as we see the demand," she says. "The plan is regional, but as the demand warrants we will open up other centers-particularly if we migrate to IP."
|
