Verizon is locked in a head-butting battle with Cogent Communications, a large bandwidth provider. The cause for these issues: Netflix, one of Internet’s killer applications that has been growing its share of the network. Bad news for Verizon customers: Netflix may not work as well. Read more »
Video has long been the driving force behind our growth in broadband traffic. The latest Sandvine report shows us that’s still the case and offers clues on how ISPs may cope. Read more »
Netflix accounts for 33 percent of all of North America’s peak residential downstream traffic, which makes it much bigger than any of its direct competitors: Based on those traffic numbers alone, Netflix sees more than 60 times as much usage as HBO Go. Read more »
The Internet can handle several million people staying home to watch Netflix and telecommuting, according to Sandvine. The deep packet inspection company noted that traffic was up 114 percent on Monday as people stayed home to await Hurricane Sandy. Read more »
The growing number of handsets that have front-facing cameras may mean that another common device becomes less necessary — the mirror that many women carry around in their purses. After all, why pull out a compact when your smartphone can show you exactly what you look like. Read more »
Apple fans seem to love Mountain Lion OS X which launched earlier today. And evidence of that love is found in the sharp spike in download traffic from iTunes and Mac App Store. Here is a snapshot of what the downloads look like on a network. Read more »
Facebook went down for a few hours last night, causing people to turn to Twitter to complain, quip and mourn. But despite the outsized reactions from the site’s users the web itself barely felt the shock of losing the largest social network on the planet. Read more »
Congress, along with many in the content industry, are wondering about the fate of television in an Internet Age. I think the future is broadband, and I’d like to offer this chart from Sandvine, showing that the future is already here. Read more »
Netflix can now be watched on more than 800 devices, and some of them are starting to gain more traction than others. Apple TV, for instance, has been really successful for the company — and tablets are starting to attract more usage than PCs. Read more »
Sandvine has some interesting New Year’s predictions about how tablets will intersect with the wacky world of mobile broadband. While new family data plans will encourage more consumers to connect their tablets to 3G and 4G networks, they will be awfully careful with their usage. Read more »
Gone are the days in which traditional cable TV had a larger audience than online video makers: YouTube’s top five channels rival the daily viewership of their cable counterparts. That may explain why YouTube now causes 20 percent of all peak mobile downstream traffic. Read more »
AT&T is arguing that most of its DSL customers won’t even get close to its new 125 GB bandwidth caps. However, new data from Sandvine suggests that one in three Xbox 360 owners is already consuming 80 GB per month, thanks to a Netflix subscription. Read more »
Netflix continues to grow, with its streaming service now making up more Internet traffic than BitTorrent file sharing in North America. That might seem like a big win for Hollywood, but the traffic growth also comes at a time when ISPs are introducing bandwidth caps. Read more »
The royal wedding between Prince William and Kate Middleton was a very gallant affair, and one that amassed huge global audiences online. Due to a large number of live streams available, viewers from all over were able to tune in live from wherever they were. Read more »
People treat their mobile broadband connections like they treat their wireline connections — downloading as much data and expecting the same performance. Sandvine today released data showing exactly how much people use mobile broadband, and concluded that such use isn’t sustainable or profitable for carriers. Read more »
