Multicast WWW (mcwww) --------------------- Charter Last Modified: 06/05/2000 Current Status: Concluded Working Group Chair(s): Bernard Aboba Ross Finlayson Applications Area Director(s): Ned Freed Patrik Faltstrom Applications Area Advisor: Ned Freed Mailing Lists: General Discussion: To Subscribe: Archive: Description of Working Group: Many Web sites that distribute popular, frequently updated content experience problems with "flash crowds": thousands of access per minute to the same Web page overload the Web server or the network link leading to the server. Moreover, with the increasing growth of "push" technology, it is likely that these problems will get worse, not better. It is possible that integrating IP multicast with the transport protocol used by the Web (HTTP) may be used both to solve serious existing operational problems like "flash crowds", and to avoid creating new problems due to "server push" applications. Several applications (i.e. cache stuffing) appear to be naturally amenable to use of unreliable multicast. Thus, moving ahead on unreliable webcasting will serve to advance these applications as well as to potentially provide short-term solutions for other applications. The primary goal of this BOF will be to see if there is enough agreement on the problems to be solved, and enough interest in moving forward to form a working group on the subject of unreliable multicasting of Web content. Goals and Milestones: Internet-Drafts: No Current Internet-Drafts. Request For Comments: None to date.