An architecture for delivering broadband video over the Internet

Abstract

The emergence of content delivery networks (CDNs) has helped to improve the efficiency of delivering streaming media. In this paper, we argue with evidence that the edge delivery paradigm behind current CDNs cannot scale up to delivering high-quality broadband video content, such as DVD movies. This is because there is no sufficient and affordable bandwidth or quality of service (QoS) in the subscriber loop. Additionally, it is difficult to scale up edge delivery with increasing numbers of users and to aggregate bandwidth demand in services such as video on demand. We describe a new architecture that extends the current CDN design with a second tier of surrogate servers. These second-tier servers, called leaf servers, are placed inside local area networks and networked homes with broadband Internet connections. High scalability and QoS can be achieved because media content is served to clients by massively distributed leaf servers within the subscriber loop.