In today's streaming landscape, bursts have become an all-too-familiar phenomenon. These sudden spikes in traffic can be triggered by events like popular sports games or major conferences. While your infrastructure may be able to handle normal day-to-day requests, it's often woefully unprepared for the massive influx of users that comes with a burst.
As Andrew Casale noted at ATS London, bursts can be just as devastating as a DDoS attack on your system. Imagine millions of viewers trying to access your stream simultaneously, causing an overwhelming number of requests that can bring your ad servers to their knees. The consequences? A crashed stream or ads not loading - neither is ideal.
So how do you prepare for these unpredictable spikes in traffic? Building an infrastructure capable of handling bursts is a significant undertaking. Running servers and services 24/7 just to be ready for the occasional big event can be costly, especially considering the variable nature of such events.
Fast scaling might seem like a viable solution. However, this approach requires a system that can quickly scale up to handle increased traffic and then scale back down once the burst has passed. When using third-party services, you must also rely on their ability to handle these load spikes - not always a guarantee.
The Solution: RapidStreams’ Pre-fetch Feature
That’s where RapidStreams’ pre-fetch feature comes in - designed specifically to mitigate bursts by proactively fetching ads ahead of time and spreading the request load. By anticipating when ads will be requested, we can cache them in advance, ensuring they’re ready for access as soon as users need them.
To learn more about this innovative solution, check out our recent blog post on pre-fetching: https://rapidstream.video/blog/2024/prefetch.
Don’t Let Bursts Catch You Off Guard
While bursts will undoubtedly remain a significant challenge to manage in streaming infrastructure, there are strategies like RapidStreams’ pre-fetch feature that can help mitigate the risk. If you’d like to learn more about how we can support your streaming needs, please get in touch - we’re here to help!