Is satellite in your future?
 
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In addition to the use of wireless technology for LAN cabling flexibility, WAN user mobility and broadband last-mile access, wireless in the form of IP satellite broadcast will likely play a role in your future, directly or indirectly.
Satellite data broadcasting is quickly becoming an important complement to the wireline Internet backbone. It is one optional component of a new type of Internet overlay network called a content delivery network, or a content distribution network (CDN). The goal of a CDN is to relieve Internet congestion and improve user Web experiences now that content is becoming much richer and more bandwidth-intensive than text and e-mail.
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CDN services do this by moving content stored in servers in the Internet core out into cache servers located in ISP edge points of presence, or even at the edge of an enterprise network. The objective is to have content available just one hop away from the end user rather than, say, 17 hops across the Internet backbone. The more hops, the greater the inherent latency and the greater the possibility for Web requests to run into Internet traffic jams.
Satellite backbones are getting into the act by serving as sort of an express delivery vehicle for pushing content -including streaming media, live Webcasts and large Web files - out to these edge servers. Live or other types of content can be uploaded once to a satellite and simultaneously delivered to thousands of edge servers for direct access by local users.
If you are in the position of supporting e-commerce or otherwise building content that you want distributed to Web users, you might be able to use the services of a satellite CDN service provider for delivering Web-based content to consumers, business customers or internal users. For example, if you are in the retailing business, you might want to broadcast an Internet fashion show or other promotional event with better success than the ill-fated Victoria's Secret Webcast during the 1999 Super Bowl. Conversely, your users are likely to soon benefit, if they aren't already, by improved content delivery via other companies using satellite services.
Several IP satellite network operators include CDN/network edge delivery services either through the use of their own network architecture or in partnership with CDN service providers that own cache server infrastructures. Satellite CDN service providers include Cidera, iBeam Broadcasting, Loral Cyberstar, Orblynx and PanAmSat.
There also are internal enterprise CDN applications that can benefit from satellite delivery, which I will address next time.
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Joanie Wexler is an independent networking technology writer/editor in Campbell, Calif., who has spent most of her career analyzing trends and news in the computer networking industry. She welcomes your comments on the articles published in this newsletter, as well as your ideas for future article topics. Reach her at joanie@jwexler.com.
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