The BCDF (Broadband Content Delivery Forum) charter is
to determine the requirements needed for broadband
content delivery. Examining the issues concerning
content delivery is coming up a critical area
of interest for the Internet folks because of the
heading "merger" of network technologies: IP, Cable, Voice, etc.
The big content owners, CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC, Time-Warner, etc.
are highly concerned with this area including
- finding content - how to locate it
- delivery of content - receiving "well presented" content
- billing - assuring that the content taker is billed
(both billing and security).
The BCDF was created by Nortel but has since the start
restructured itself as an industry consortium focused
on broadband issues. The membership is strongly represented
by the Telco areas. Projects are partitioned into
three areas, called working groups:
1. Market Development - focused on BCDF (broadband) market
development issues.
2. Content and Applications - working with the Content groups
to assure requirements are met.
3. Infrastructure - defining the requirements for the
infrastructure.
There are many similarities with the Content Alliance and
Content Bridge. All groups seem to be strongly represented
by the infrastructure guys and weekly represented by the
actual content owners. The Content Alliance is creating
the CDN working group at the IETF.
My experience and BCDF was with the general forums and infrastructure
groups. Although some members were in the "lets invent it here"
mode most agreed that listing the requirements and
submitting them to the IETF would be the most productive.
They also agreed that having the BCDF spend most of its
energy working with the content providers to obtain requirements would be
the most productive (certainly more than trying to
create a different but similar set of specifications
to the IETF CNF group). We agreed to get the Content
and Applications folks focused on that and attempt to
enumerate the broadband requirements for the
concerns listed above (location, delivery, billing).
I presented the open proxy services architecture and how
it might be employed in solving some of their broadband issues.
The infrastructure folks felt that the open proxy services
model was exactly the kind of infrastructure needed for
services in a merged networked technologies environment.
They plan to support this for the upcoming IETF.
I also gave them a brief overview of the IETF and suggested
a plan for submitting requirements there (rather than
any self invention).
In my opinion they are still too technology focused
and not sufficiently strong in understanding the
operational rules of the "content "owners. This group
has the benefit of beliving that it would be better
to let the IETF sort out the technical issues.