UK Guardian: Rise of video downloads threatens gridlock on net

[DeepModem Mom]

Rise of video downloads threatens gridlock on net
· Online jams loom as filesharing services grow
· Internet providers urged to increase investment
Bobbie Johnson, technology correspondent
Saturday February 10, 2007

The growth in video downloads could create an internet traffic jam that threatens the net's development, according to Google. Services such as YouTube, which is owned by the Californian giant, are proving tricky for internet providers to deal with and new developments could create even more problems, senior internet executives were told yesterday.

"The web infrastructure - and even Google's - doesn't scale," said Vincent Dureau, Google's head of TV technology. "It's not going to offer the quality of service that consumers expect."

Surfers around the world already use sites such as YouTube to watch videos online, but video filesharing services are increasing pressure on the internet's capacity. One of the unwitting culprits is BitTorrent, a technology already used by millions of people to obtain high-quality video over the net. Many people use it to download episodes of US TV series such as Lost, which have yet to be shown in the UK, or to see concert footage....

***

Despite the relatively small number of users, research indicates that systems such as BitTorrent are responsible for more than 50% of all internet traffic. Some executives fear that without proper investment, video download services could clog up the internet and cause online gridlock.

"Most of the internet traffic is peer-to-peer, and most of that is video. Every year we have to invest substantially just to maintain the user experience. In fact it has actually decreased," Richard Alden, chief executive of Spanish cable company ONO, told the Cable Europe Congress in Amsterdam. "People don't like to talk about (the fact) that just to stand still, they have to invest."...

http://technology.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2010131,00.html

[nebenaube]

1. I still have problems buying into this..

After all, before there was anybody online showing video, the cable companies were telling us how they were going to replace TV with the internet.