Media Streaming Protocol: an adaptive protocol for the delivery of audio and video over the Internet

The introduction of audio and video content on the World Wide Web has greatly increased traffic on the Internet. Congestion within the network may delay the reception of frames and cause them to miss presentation deadlines. A new protocol, the Media Streaming Protocol (MSP), has been developed to stream audio and video over the Internet, which is fair in its consumption of network bandwidth. The protocol incorporates a novel technique to identify congestion within the system. The algorithm monitors the state of the system and is able to quickly adjust to the changing capacity of the network. The protocol reduces the amount of data being transmitted and minimizes the aural and visual defects during playback. Such a protocol is critical as network bandwidth is increasingly being consumed by audio and video applications.