Streaming video across the world...

[Donny5150]

Hi there,

We have an online video service which has around 100 videos which we stream to people in the UK. We are trying to stream the same video content to people in Dubai, but they are having trouble viewing them.
the symptoms seem to point to bitrates being to high, or their connection being too slow.
Does anyone know of any technical issues that would halter people in Dubai streaming these videos?

Stuff:
Flash videos embedded in a simple html page.
average duration of video: 5min.
flash videos are using progressive download technology from servers in London.
I have encoded the videos at bitrates between 100 & 800 Kbps.

the main question i have really, is that do sites like youtube have mirrored servers across the world which aid people in places like dubai to watch video content, or should people be able to view view from London the same as we do here in the UK?

Thanks for your help...

[Eye for Video]

The quick and simple answer is that you already seemed to have pinpointed the problem, too high a bitrate for their connection speed. And, as you know that connection speed varies from place to place.
By the time you get up to 500kbps, you are excluding a lot of viewers with higher speeds. Probably the lowest bitrate with any hope of “fair” quality is about 200kbps. Remember, the quality per bitrate formula is also tied to the dimensions of the video “screen”. A 160 X 120 video may have very good quality at 200kbps, yet that exact same video file, spreading those same bits of information out over 320 X 240 (which contains 3.5 times the number of pixels) will suffer greatly in quality. It’s like trying to paint a 320 foot X 240 foot area with the same amount of paint you used on a 160 X 120 area.
If you have a large enough audience to make it worth while, render two versions, one at 4-500kbps for hi-speed (3MB and up) and another (150-200kbps) for low speed, with a smaller video screen, 160 X 120.
Use only one video format, so if you are already using Flash, fine…look for a .swf which is a video player with a playlist drawing from an .xml file. This .swf is what is embedded into the html page, not the videos. Lots of code in the Forum for that, but you’ll need to get hold of a Flash player.
Since the videos will be progressively downloaded, you’re really not “streaming”. Using that terminology can confuse people about what you are doing.
Best wishes,
Eye for Video
www.cidigitalmedia.com

[Donny5150]

Hi there,

Thanks for your reply.
I have tried lowering the bitrate to 100kbps, with a frame size of 320*240, and the videos still need to buffer every few seconds.
The contact in dubai I have has an 8Mbps connection (okay, it won't be anywhere near that, but it should stream -or prog download- a 100kbps video).

I have already rendered many files at 600Kbps which play perfectly here in the UK.
We use a video hosting company who stores the Flv in a swf container page, which we embed in our html page. this works fine europe wide.

Surely the bit rate of 100kbps can't be too high, considering here in the UK I can watch videos at 800kbps on a 2Mb connection. Does geography has anything to do with this?

Thanks again for your help.

[Eye for Video]

The reason for the buffering is that the video is playing faster than the bitstream of information is being downloaded. Normally the main cause of this is a slow Internet connection, but there can be other problems.
Just to varify the connection speed, have your contact run a couple of connection speed tests like:
http://www.speakeasy.net/speedtest/
or Google connection speed tests for others.
Is the connection being shared with other machines? For example, if 4 machines share a 8MB connection, they would only receive part of the signal if there was conncurrent use.
Perhaps there's an issue with a firewall or security software which does not allow a straight connection but have to sift through all incoming signals (common in large corporations, schools, and some businesses).
Is the individual machine the problem? Is it just your videos that are slow to download or does that also happen with YouTube etc.?
I just don't know the specifics related to Dubai, but testing a few of these ideas may help.
EfV