P2P File-Sharing Addresses Internet Video Concerns

May 16, 2006

Earlier this week, Peter Svensson, technology writer for the Associated Press, voiced a concern that is leading the country toward a multi-tiered Internet scenario, under which ISPs would be able to charge more for users or for content providers who take up more bandwidth.

In his article "High-Def Could Choke Internet, ISPs Fear," Svensson says ISPs and cable and phone companies claim that the Internet isn't built for transfers of video at rates anything like the volumes common among U.S. TV-watchers. As things stand now, the Internet has no problem accommodating normal web browsing, emails and the occasional file download. "Small clips are fine," Svensson writes, "but TV-quality and especially high-definition programming could make the Internet choke." Not all experts agree that usage is likely to overtake capacity any time soon, but the possibility has providers worried -- and lobbying heavily for a non-neutral Internet.

Recently some commentators have suggested that peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing could offer a solution to the problem, since it decentralizes file transfers, instead of requiring them to travel through networks in large concentrated streams. I first ran into this idea in Robert X. Cringely's essay, "Why P2P Is the Future of Media Distribution Even If ISPs Have Yet to Figure It Out." (See my March 16, 2006, entry, "P2P Enables Large-File Media Distribution.")

In fact, this appears to be the thinking behind the announcement from last week that the Warner Brothers movie studio is contracting with file-sharing company BitTorrent to distribute movies and TV programs using its P2P software -- see BusinessWeek's article "BitTorrent Goes Hollywood." Here's how the article describes the delivery strategy:

"Distributed delivery is attractive because the technology downloads files by collecting bits and pieces of it from many sources, rather than putting the burden on just one source. That means it costs next to nothing for content owners to distribute movies or music -- a huge advantage over the current approach, in which files are streamed over individual servers and the massive amount of bandwidth required for video can run up huge bills."

P2P software is a fitting and natural application strategy for the decentralized Internet that works best when the intelligence is placed at the edges. And In spite of its widespread use for illegal music downloads, I've always felt that P2P file-sharing was an intriguing technology that would eventually lend itself to legal business models.

AB -- 5/16/06