Internet video buffs are buzzing about today's announcement that P2P-based IP television start-up Joost will receive another $45 million in funding, and has cut a deal to deliver video content for Viacom/CBS. We've previously noted the potential disruptive impact on network traffic from Joost (previously known as the Venice Project), with early tests showing some P2P clients devouring 2 gigs of bandwidth per day.
Om Malik at GigaOm reports that Joost has had some problems in recent weeks, and says he's not alone in questioning whether its infrastructure can deliver the goods.
Joost is using a peer-to-peer version of streaming video, which means that it will have to deal with quality of service issues that come along with both P2P and streaming. Those in the technical community believe it would be difficult for the company to guarantee the quality of service of the video streams. ... Joost, apparently is going to use some sort of a content distribution network to make up for it all, but that also means the P2P economics that worked so well in the case of Skype may not be an advantage for them at all.
See Anil Gupte's Video Blog and Mike Wolf's blog at ABI Media and Wired Epicenter for additional discussion and analysis.
