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The Smart Techie was renamed Siliconindia India Edition starting Feb 2012 to continue the nearly two decade track record of excellence of our US edition.

Internet Video is Coming; Is Your Wireless Network Ready?

Sujit Dey and Craig Lee
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Sujit Dey and Craig Lee
Broadband Internet access is growing fast, bringing the benefits of high-speed connectivity to millions of users around the world. Carriers are driving this growth by offering DSL and cable modem service packages to subscribers that make Internet access a part of everyday life.

As the user base continues to grow, the behavior of the users continues to change. Many people look for the ‘killer apps’, the applications that are ‘killers’ from an essential need perspective. But perhaps the ‘killer app’ isn’t about the essential need, but about the application that will ‘kill’ the Internet. Clearly, the number of users is growing fast. But in the past two years, there has been a dramatic increase in the bandwidth consumed by Internet Video. The major content providers are establishing websites to allow their subscribers to access content via the ‘free’ medium of the Internet.

In the U.K., the iPlayer from the BBC was introduced in July 2007. The iPlayer allows the U.K. based Internet users to access up to one week’s content from across the BBC radio and TV lineup. During 2008, iPlayer accounted for five percent of all content on the Internet in the U.K. As of December 2008, more than 180 million programs had been viewed on iPlayer.

In the U.S., numerous sites allow Internet users to access popular video content. Hulu, a company jointly owned by NBC, Fox, and ABC, publishes movies, TV shows, and other content. In February 2009, comScore VideoMetrix reported that Hulu had an audience of 34.7 million people who watched 332.5 million video streams. That was a 42 percent increase in visitors since January 2009. This growth is particularly impressive considering Hulu is available only in the U.S.

As Internet video affects the usage of wired broadband, it is logical to expect the same usage on wireless broadband.


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