Exploiting Heterogeneity in P2P Video Streaming

In this paper, we investigate the impact of peer bandwidth heterogeneity on the performance of a mesh-based P2P system for live streaming. We show that bandwidth heterogeneity constitutes an important resource for P2P live streaming systems. Indeed, by effectively exploiting it, the overall performance of the system is significantly improved. This requires the adoption of smart schemes for both the overlay topology construction and chunk scheduling mechanisms that discriminate among peers based on their bandwidth.