Ask HN: How will Comcast provide better service for Netflix content? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How will Comcast provide better service for Netflix content?

3 pointsthrush4 comments

Comcast and Netflix recently struct a deal last week that will improve the quality of Netflix video streaming [1]. What I would like to know is how exactly will this work? I envision two scenarios, which I will explain in a very general sense.

1. Comcast detects Netflix network data and somehow gives it preferential treatment.

2. Comcast uses algorithms to predict which videos are most likely to be watched in specific regions, and store the relevant video data locally so that network calls are more efficient (aka caching). I think this would be similar to the service that InstartLogic provides.

Which (if any) of these scenarios are happening? If it is the second, it seems like a really exciting innovation, and the story should receive much more positive reception in the media that it currently has.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/24/business/media/comcast-and-netflix-reach-a-streaming-agreement.html?_r=0 http://instartlogic.com/

I think your metaphor is kinda off.

Don't think of it like a stream, where some of the water can be separated off and filtered.

Think of it like a road system. All the roads between Netflix Town and Comcast City have to go through Cogentville, and the roads are PACKED. Traffic is crawling, really slow.

This deal is like opening a new six-Lane highway, direct from Netflix to Comcast, that allows everyone to travel really fast and avoids all the gridlock.

I don't think there was filtering before. I think Comcast just let the traffic get really bad, and was stalling issuing permits for the new bypass.

How about 3, Comcast turns off whatever network throttling they have been employing against Netflix identified content streams. Which would be the inverse of 1. Comcast detects Netflix network data and does not give it detrimental treatment.

There have been a few articles claiming Comcast is throttling the connection when it knows it is coming from Netflix.

Previously, Netflix was sending traffic to Comcast through Cogent. This traffic had problems because the link between Comcast and Cogent was saturated to such a degree that packets were dropping.

Today, Netflix now has their own connection to the Comcast network that is not shared with Cogent.

Netflix has paid to have Comcast connect to their CDN, open connect. The way it works is you either host their hardware or you peer with them and they host it themselves. It is probably the second option, direct connections to netflix's network.

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