P4P to Pursue Streaming Video

The P4P working group is in the middle of preparations for another round of tests for its technology, this time the main focal point being P2P video streams, Contentinople.com reports. The great benefit P4P is expected to bring through its technology is the cutting down on the pressure P2P is currently putting on ISP networks by enabling the set up of connections between users within the same subnet.

So far, the technology has confirmed its utility for BitTorrent-based file downloads. Apparently, Pando CTO Laird Popkin declared at last week's DCIA event in San Jose that a new second field test turn out even better results than a first test conducted a few months ago that revealed improvements of up to 50 percent with regard to the volume of traffic routed locally versus through interconnections to other ISPs.

This new project focused on P4P for live P2P streams may be just the thing to get the system prepared for prime time. With all that in mind, still there are some issue to be made clear by the P4P working group – like, for instance, what exactly is P4P and what will be the effects upon the end user.

This is how the DCIA defines P4P: "A set of business practices and integrated network topology awareness models designed to optimize ISP network resources and enable P2P based content payload acceleration."