Media Experiences 2 Go

The Wall Street Journal had a Valentine’s Day article last week on the latest boom in network spending. A little “We Heart You” to the network equipment providers of the world. What was interesting was the distinction the reporter made between what networking gear is selling today versus what brought in the moola in the 1990s. The last decade was all about building out infrastructure for broad, unspecified capacity. Today, successful profit seekers are focusing on specialized equipment designed to prioritize traffic for the best use of bandwidth.

I’ve talked about bandwidth management several times before, but one of the things I haven’t mentioned is the dynamic nature of traffic prioritization. As the WSJ article points out, many existing networks aren’t very efficient at handling new interactive, bandwidth-intensive services like gaming and online video. Luckily, new technology is starting to correct that. Take for instance the PacketCable Multimedia spec. It’s set up to define an architecture where application managers request Quality-of-Service (QoS) for a specific device (the best current example is a voice modem) and policy servers can then authorize (or not) the required flow of traffic. PacketCable Multimedia provides a standard for traffic prioritization.

Like in a highway system, tools for authorizing and directing traffic are critical to getting things where they’re supposed to go. Not only do these tools deliver a more satisfactory experience for end-users, they also allow network operators to expand their service offerings. Hence the reason they’re so popular and integral to the success of today’s network equipment manufacturers.

You don’t always need a new highway, just someone to build a few more EZPass lanes.