Granted Patent B2

US 12,603,928 · App. 18/488,876 · Granted Apr 14, 2026

Inventors: Eric W. Grab (San Diego, CA); Abhishek Shivadas (San Diego, CA)

Assignee: DIVX, LLC

H04L65/60H04L65/612H04L65/765H04L65/80H04L67/568G06Q10/10H04L67/1008

Abstract

Claims (66)

1 . A method for delivery of content, the method comprising:

receiving, at a media encoder, a fragment of a piece of media content;

encoding, at the media encoder, the received fragment to generate one or more encodings of the fragment;

receiving, at a playback server, a request to stream the piece of media content, the request being received from a user equipment device;

providing, from the media encoder, encodings of the fragment to a pool of one or more content delivery networks;

determining, using the playback server, a location of the user equipment device;

determining, using the playback server, whether a predetermined condition is satisfied;

responsive to determining that the predetermined condition is not satisfied, adding, using the playback server, an additional content delivery network to the pool of one or more content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content;

providing, using the playback server, the media encoder with an identifier of the additional content delivery network;

configure the media encoder, using the playback server and the identifier of the additional content delivery network, to provide encodings of subsequently received fragments of the piece of media content to the additional content delivery network; and

providing the encodings of the subsequently received fragments to the user equipment device from the additional content delivery network.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein:

each content delivery network in the pool of one or more content delivery networks includes a plurality of computing devices that are part of a data center;

the additional content delivery network includes a first plurality of computing devices that are part of a first data center; and

the first data center is different from the data centers of the pool of one or more content delivery networks.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein determining the location of the user equipment device includes retrieving at least a portion of a Domain Name Service (DNS) record corresponding to the user equipment device, the portion being indicative of at least one of a network or a network domain the user equipment device is part of.

4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the predetermined condition is based on a plurality of quality of service metrics associated with a content delivery network.

5 . The method of claim 4 , wherein each quality of service metric is for a different one of a plurality of communications paths.

6 . The method of claim 4 , wherein the plurality of quality of service metrics associated with a content delivery network comprises latency, bandwidth, and throughput for one or more communications paths between the content delivery network and a user equipment device.

7 . The method of claim 6 , where in the plurality of quality of service metrics associated with the content delivery network is measured at the user equipment device.

8 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising maintaining a listing of the pool of content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content, wherein the listing is updated based upon the predetermined condition being satisfied.

9 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

maintaining a listing of the pool of content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content to the user equipment device, wherein the listing is determined based upon a plurality of quality of service metrics associated with the pool of content delivery networks;

in response to the request to stream the piece of media content, determining, from the listing of the pool of content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content to the user device, a listing of a pool of content delivery networks having the best quality of service metrics; and

providing the determined listing of the pool of content delivery networks to a media encoder.

10 . A method for delivery of content, the method comprising:

receiving, at a media encoder, a fragment of a piece of media content;

encoding, at the media encoder, the received fragment to generate one or more encodings of the fragment;

maintaining, using a playback server, a listing of a pool of content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content to a user equipment device, wherein the listing is determined based upon a plurality of quality of service metrics associated with the pool of content delivery networks;

receiving, at the playback server, a request to stream the piece of media content, the request being received from the user equipment device;

in response to the request to stream the piece of media content, determining, from the listing of the pool of content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content to the user device, a listing of a pool of content delivery networks having the best quality of service metrics;

providing, using the playback server, the determined listing of the pool of content delivery networks to the media encoder;

providing, using the media encoder encodings of the fragment to the pool of one or more content delivery networks;

determining, using the playback server, a location of the user equipment device;

determining, using the playback server, whether a predetermined condition is satisfied;

responsive to determining that the predetermined condition is not satisfied, adding, using the playback server, an additional content delivery network to the pool of one or more content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content;

providing, using the playback server, the media encoder with an identifier of the additional content delivery network;

configure the media encoder, using the playback server and the identifier of the additional content delivery network, to provide encodings of subsequently received fragments of the piece of media content to the additional content delivery network; and

providing the encodings of the subsequently received fragments to the user equipment device from the additional content delivery network.

11 . A system for live streaming content, the system comprising:

a media encoder configured to:

receive a fragment of a piece of media content;

encode the received fragment to generate one or more encodings of the fragment; and

provide encodings of the fragment to a pool of one or more content delivery networks;

a playback server configured to:

receive a request to stream the piece of media content, the request being received from a user equipment device;

determine a location of the user equipment device;

determine whether a predetermined condition is satisfied;

responsive to determining that the predetermined condition is not satisfied, add an additional content delivery network to the pool of one or more content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content;

provide the media encoder with an identifier of the additional content delivery network; and

using the identifier of the additional content delivery network to configure the media encoder to provide encodings of subsequently received fragments of the piece of media content to the additional content delivery network; and

a plurality of content delivery networks comprising the additional content delivery network, and configured to provide the encodings of the subsequently received fragments to the user equipment device from the additional content delivery network.

12 . The system of claim 11 , wherein:

each content delivery network in the pool of one or more content delivery networks includes a plurality of computing devices that are part of a data center;

the additional content delivery network includes a first plurality of computing devices that are part of a first data center; and

the first data center is different from the data centers of the pool of one or more content delivery networks.

13 . The system of claim 11 , wherein determining the location of the user equipment device includes retrieving at least a portion of a Domain Name Service (DNS) record corresponding to the user equipment device, the portion being indicative of at least one of a network or a network domain the user equipment device is part of.

14 . The system of claim 11 , wherein the predetermined condition is based on a plurality of quality of service metrics associated with a content delivery network.

15 . The system of claim 14 , wherein each quality of service metric is for a different one of a plurality of communications paths.

16 . The system of claim 14 , wherein the plurality of quality of service metrics associated with a content delivery network comprises latency, bandwidth, and throughput for one or more communications paths between the content delivery network and a user equipment device.

17 . The system of claim 16 , where in the plurality of quality of service metrics associated with the content delivery network is measured at the user equipment device.

18 . The system of claim 11 , further comprising maintaining a listing of the pool of content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content, wherein the listing is updated based upon the predetermined condition being satisfied.

19 . The system of claim 11 , further comprising:

maintaining a listing of the pool of content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content to the user equipment device, wherein the listing is determined based upon a plurality of quality of service metrics associated with the pool of content delivery networks;

in response to the request to stream the piece of media content, determining, from the listing of the pool of content delivery networks that can be used to stream the piece of media content to the user device, a listing of a pool of content delivery networks having the best quality of service metrics; and

providing the determined listing of the pool of content delivery networks to a media encoder.

Assignments (3)

Continuity (4)

References Cited (400)