ISPs Struggle to Deliver Video Traffic While Imposing Bandwidth Caps

Many Internet service providers are struggling to cope with the rapid growth of video traffic while trying to put a reasonable limit on the amount of bandwidth consumers can use.

Bandwidth capping is seen as a way to help pay for new infrastructure by constraining demand on the network while extracting revenue from higher net worth customers who download the most data. However, online applications tend to evolve to fill up the capacity available, creating a situation where there likely never will be a point when pressure on bandwidth within the network ceases. But bandwidth capping also has a quality of service function, to ensure there is enough capacity for critical applications that generate less data streaming than video, such as e-mail.

"This phenomenon of fast increasing amounts of video over broadband is going to cause some very significant problems in terms of cost and also user expectations over the next few years," said Simon Orme, director of content services at British Telecom's wholesale division. "We see these huge hockey sticks from the analysts projecting explosive growth, which get worse every time I look at them."