SplitStream is a high-bandwidth content streaming/distribution system that is built upon Pastry. 

In tree-based multicast systems, a relatively small number of interior nodes carry the load of forwarding multicast messages. This works well when the interior nodes are dedicated infrastructure routers. But, it poses a problem in cooperative end-system multicast, where participants expect to contribute resources proportional to the benefit they derive from using the system. Moreover, many participants may not have the network capacity and availability required of an interior node in high-bandwidth multicast applications. 

SplitStream is a high-bandwidth content distribution system based on end-system multicast. It distributes the forwarding load among all the participants, has increased robustness to node failures, and is able to accommodate participating nodes with different bandwidth capacities. The key idea is to stripe the content, and distribute the stripes using separate multicast trees with disjoint interior nodes.

[Page created 10th September 2002, last updated 14th Jan 2010- maintained by mailto:antr@microsoft.com]