multicast (was Re: Readiness for IPV6)

Tue Jul 9 17:36:48 UTC 2002

>
> There is also a "cart and horse" issue here:  Where is the pervasive
> content?
>
> Most content providers don't want multicast because it breaks their
> billing model.  They can't tell how many viewers they have at a given
> moment, what the average viewing time is, or any of the other things
> that unicast allows them to determine and more importantly bill their
> advertisers for.  There is no Nielsen's Ratings for multicast so that
> advertisers could get a feel for how many eyeballs they are going to
> hit.
>

I worked for a startup in 1999 that was doing just that.  Neilsen's for
multicast.  It was cool while I was there, but it quickly became clear
that the product was ahead of it's time.  They now do event streaming and
I think they support unicast and multicast.  Without a network that
supports it, multicast apps are useless.

jas