Inauguration Strains the Internet

The inauguration of President Barak Obama on January 20 put a significant strain on the Internet. There were reports of difficulties connecting to the broadcast.

Arbor Networks published and article that shows the traffic peak that occurred. Backbone traffic jumped by as much as 40 percent over a normal Tuesday.

This peak occurred with most people using lower speed streams intended for PCs. Think of what would have happened if this content were be delivered to HDTVs at 1080p resolution!

Beefing up the Internet to handle this kind of demand but of HD streams is the challenge that the major ISPs have to face to make Internet TV more than a side show. This experience showed that the Content Delivery Networks were effective in managing backbone traffic, where they were used. This leaves the metro networks. My report Telecom 2020: Transformation Strategies suggests that video needs to be kept at the optical layer in the metro networks to handle this kind of onslaught. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.