Sandvine Releases Compelling Figures Regarding Network Traffic

  • A new report from Sandvine found that real-time entertainment (primarily video) has risen to 64.5 percent of total U.S. network traffic in March from 53.6 percent last September.
  • YouTube accounted for 13.8 percent of total traffic in March.
  • Sandvine also reported last fall that half of North America’s Internet use was related to video; Netflix accounted for 27.6 percent of daily downstream volume with HTTP following at 17.8 percent, YouTube at 10.0 percent and BitTorrent coming in at 9.0 percent.
  • With this transition to broadband for video content, usage can become an issue for both video quality and the network. “Technical solutions such as adaptive bit-rate streaming or buffering content to a hard drive help,” GigaOM reports. “But Sandvine concludes that basic monthly usage caps, such as the ones ISPs are implementing, don’t.”
  • “Are caps a worrisome protectionist tool to keep subscribers locked to both broadband and pay TV subscriptions?” GigaOM asks. “And if that’s a yes, then what should the FCC, Department of Justice or Congress do about it?”

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