Archive for the ‘ ISP’s ’ Category

Soccer dip

An interesting traffic pattern on the Amsterdam Internet Exchange during the live webcast of the year: the World Soccer game between NL and DK. Instead of a traffic spike, overall traffic was lower. A dip! (updated chart)

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2010
06/14
POSTED BY
admin
CATEGORY
Distribution
ISP's
The Last Mile
Video Working Group
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Logistics!

Many companies are investing in online content services. YouTube, Hulu, broadcasters, publishers. These companies build business cases on the boom of online video: advertisement models, subscription models and pay-per-view models. Their business cases depend on scalability and performance of the internet, both broadband and mobile.

Internet vs cable
Cable operators offer good quality and quality of service, but their limited number of channels and titles can never compete with the vast number of internet channels and billions of online videos. Consumers don’t want to be locked into a package anymore. They want to pull content. Subscribers want to be in control. The internet is open and therefore the distribution infrastructure of today and the future. Digital television operators who ignore this fact will face a very difficult future.

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2010
06/04
POSTED BY
admin
CATEGORY
Business
Density
Distribution
History
ISP's
Logistics
Set Top Box
The Last Mile
Value chain
Video Working Group
cooperation
mobile
trends
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CDN interoperability

I have been advocating cooperation between CDNs, telcos and content owners for many years.

CDN interoperability pilot

I am pleased to announce that we are formally starting a project in the Netherlands with the NPO (Dutch Public Broadcaster, best compared to the BBC), KPN (tier-1 Telco) and SURFnet (academic ISP). Read more

2009
10/29
POSTED BY
Stef
CATEGORY
Business
ISP's
Video Working Group
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CDNs and Net Neutrality

By patching their networks together, many small and large network operators around the world have built a global virtual network: the Internet. It offers open and global access to any server and service in any connected network. The open and neutral character is what made the Internet the next big thing in humanity. So it is important to keep it open and neutral. And it is important to keep it running.

Iin the past few years, there has been discussion about Net Neutrality. Are ISPs allowed to block services? No? What about spam? Are ISPs allowed to shape traffic? No? Not even if a small number of subscribers can take their entire network down? Are ISP’s allowed to rent network resources to service providers so they can accelerate specific services?

In the USA, the Net Neutrality discussion is very polarized: either you are ‘freedom fighter’ who want laws to make sure that no single bit is discriminated or accelerated, or you are against government involvement and want the TelCos to be able to tune their network.

In Europe, we have a different view… Read more

2009
09/21
POSTED BY
Stef
CATEGORY
Business
Distribution
ISP's
Marketing
The Last Mile
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The KPN CDN

This summer we helped KPN to deploy their CDN. KPN has licensed our VideoExchange CDN software suite.

Like all telecom operators KPN has multiple strategical, technical and commercial reasons to deploy an on-net CDN.

Let’s start with some details about KPN for those who only know the US market players: Read more

2009
08/12
POSTED BY
Stef
CATEGORY
Business
Distribution
ISP's
Uncategorized
Video Working Group
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Horizontal or vertical

I get many questions whether CDN’s should be a horizontal or a vertical service.

I say horizontal. For a number or reasons:

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2009
08/06
POSTED BY
Stef
CATEGORY
Business
ISP's
Value chain
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There is no European market

U.S. based CDNs often ten to think that they can enter the European market by having an office in London, Paris or Amsterdam.
Although there is a European Union, without borders, with free economics and a single currency, there is no single market like there is in the U.S.A.
There are over 25 countries and languages in Europe. You will encounter cultural and language barriers. Opening an office in London also means a geographical barrier.
In southern countries, business is done mostly via personal relations. You need to personally meet, drink, eat and laugh. And again and again. And then they may want to deal with you. Business in Eastern Europe is hard. They don’t trust you. And you should not trust them. Let them pay in advance. In other countries, business is very strict. Polish your shoes if you want to do business in Germany. Don’t small-talk too long.
English people can be very rude. They don’t say their name when they call you. “I need a quote, now!”. The French, oh the French are so chauvinistic. They even have their own words for internet protocols. They don’t do business outside France. They still think that France is the center of the world. Like many people from the U.S.A. still think they are the center of the world.
It is changing though. A younger generation grows up with the Internet. And English is the Internet language. It surprises me how well many international customers speak English, especially Italians and Spanish customers.
We have the luck of being in the Netherlands. Dutch people speak two, three, sometimes four or even five languages. We are a very open society and we have always been internationally oriented, both culturally and trade-wise. We are not that chauvinistic and are open to do business with anyone. As long as you pay.
The European market is also dividid for content, both culturally and by language. Shows who are extremely popular in Germany will never work in the UK, even if they were produced locally with local stars in their native language. The Germans don’t get English jokes and the English don’t get German jokes. Really.
Even if you find a content format that works in multiple countries, you have the language barrier. You have to produce content in multiple languages. Some countries require native spoken content. Other countries want dubbed content. And other countries prefer subtitled content. If you do this wrong, no one will watch your content.
Even pan-European broadcasters like MTV and Discovery have custom channels per country or per language region. 95% of all broadcasters are focussed on just one country or one language region.
There is no pan-European advertisement industry. Take the product overview of giants such as Unilever or Proctor & Gamble, and you wil see that the very same toothpaste product has many different names throughout Europe. Heck, we had Dove soap and Dove chocolat.
So there is no European market. If traffic stays for 90% within your own country, why sign up with a global CDN? Why not work together with a regional player?
In Europe there are a lot of regional streaming providers who do local business only. Over 90% of their business is in their own country. Over 90% of their traffic stays within their own country, even though they claim to be a significant European player.
The problem is that these small players can’t innovate fast enough. They can’t compete on support, technology, infrastructure or price.
As far as I know, our own StreamZilla service is the only CDN that has managed to capture a true European market. Over two thirds of our customers (and our traffic) comes from EU countries. We even managed to become dominant in some markets. Only twenty per cent comes from our home country the Netherlands. And about ten percent is delivered to the U.S.A, South America and the rest of the world. Where we have excellent performance too, by the way: A+ status for each streaming protocol.
StreamZilla has grown large enough to compete with larger, USA based CDN’s. We do offer better customer support. Our performance in Europe is better than most global CDN’s can offer. We have been able to invest in technology. And our rates are competitive.
This is also an opportunity for ISP’s. There is no EU market. Imagine you are a content owner. Why sign up with a global CDN if you can do direct business with an operator who controls both access and distribution in the target market?
Build a CDN and do business in your own country, in your own language, in your own cultural way.
So is this a threat to StreamZilla? Yes and no. We may lose some content owners when they can do direct business with ISP’s. But the content owners still need someone to tie the CDN’s together: to act as an overflow platform, to act as an overlay platform.
So is this a threat to local streaming operators? Yes and no. They will lose the innovation race. StreamZilla already proposed some that they stop doing their CDN part and focus instead on value added services: encoding, asset management, translation services, portal services, custom video players. In some markets this turned into a very successful partnership.
So is this a threat to the global CDN’s? Yes. Sorry!

U.S. based CDN’s often tend to think that they can enter the European market by having an office in London, Paris or Amsterdam.

Although there is a European Union, without borders, with free economics and a single currency, there is no single market like there is in the U.S.A.

There are over 25 countries and even more languages in Europe. You will encounter cultural and language barriers. Opening an office in London also means a geographical barrier.

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2009
08/04
POSTED BY
Stef
CATEGORY
Business
Distribution
ISP's
The Last Mile
Value chain
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Why are telecom operators deploying CDNs?

Telecom operators have a four-way strategy to own an on-net CDN. On-net CDNs offer deeper network penetration with better QoS and larger capacity. The CDNs that we deploy support all popular delivery technologies for the web, mobile and IPTV. This means that the telecom operators can:

  1. optimize on-net traffic flow, reduce backbone and peering load
  2. host and deliver on-net web, mobile and IPTV services
  3. sell CDN resources to content owners
  4. Take back the distribution role in the value chain

External CDNs could only have addressed number 3 in this list. Read more

2009
08/04
POSTED BY
Stef
CATEGORY
Business
Distribution
ISP's
Logistics
Technology
The Last Mile
Value chain
Video Working Group
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