A geographic analysis of P2P-TV viewership

Abstract

A promising P2P application, P2P-TV, has attracted hundreds of thousands of Chinese viewers. These viewers who are located in different regions represent groups with distinct cultures. However, little existing research has provided sufficient insights into the societal impact of P2P-TV systems, from the viewpoint of geographic distribution of viewers. In this paper, we analyze geographic distribution of viewers of three most popular P2P-TV systems simultaneously, PPLive, PPStream and UUSee. With more than 20 GB worth of log data from three different P2P-TV systems, we have completed a thorough investigation of geographic distribution of viewers. We also seek to explore the potential correlation between viewer population density and economic development level and find that there is indeed a highly negative correlation between them.