Date: Thu, 4 Mar 1993 00:26:59 EST
From: mkovacs%
[email protected]
Subject: File 3--Internet Talk Radio (fwd)
Originally from
[email protected] via
[email protected]
Reprinted with permission from ConneXions,
ConneXions--The Interoperability Report is published monthly by:
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USA
Phone: (415) 941-3399 FAX: (415) 949-1779
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Free sample issue and list of back issues available upon request."
Internet Talk Radio
Carl Malamud (
[email protected])
Over the past few years, two trends have come together to
present an opportunity for a new type of journalism. On the one
hand,
the trade press has focused on marketing and product reviews,
leaving
an ever-larger gap for a general-interest, technically-oriented
publication focused on the Internet. At the same time, the
Internet
has made great progress in supporting multimedia communication,
through standards such as IP multicasting and MIME messaging.
Internet Talk Radio attempts to fuse these two trends and
form
a new type of publication: a news and information service about the
Internet, distributed on the Internet. Internet Talk Radio is
modeled
on National Public Radio and has a goal of providing in-depth
technical information to the Internet community. The service is
made
initially possible with support from Sun Microsystems and O'Reilly
&
Associates. Our goal is to provide a self-sufficient, financially
viable public news service for the Internet community.
Head: Flame of the Internet
The product of Internet Talk Radio is an audio file,
professionally produced and freely available on computer networks.
To
produce these files, we start with the raw data of any journalistic
endeavor: speeches, conference presentations, interviews, and
essays.
This raw information is taped using professional-quality
microphones, mixers, and DAT recorders. The information is then
brought back to our studios, and edited and mixed with music, voice
overs, and the other elements of a radio program. The "look and
feel"
we strive for is akin to "All Things Considered" or other programs
that appeal to the general interest of the intelligent listener.
Our goal is hit the topics that don't make it into the
trade
press. Instead of SNMP-compliant product announcements, we want to
present descriptions of SNMP. Instead of articles on GOSSIP, we
want
to describe the latest Internet Drafts and place them in
perspective.
Instead of executive promotions, we want to give summaries of
mailing
list activity and network stability. Instead of COMDEX, we want to
cover the IETF.
Head: Town Crier to the Global Village
The result of Internet Talk Radio's journalistic activities
is
a series of audio files. The native format we start with is the
Sun
Microsystems .au format, closely related to the NeXT .snd format.
This format consists of the CCITT Pulse Code Modulation (PCM)
standard
of 8 bits per sample and a sampling rate of 8000 samples per
second,
using the u-law [ed. use greek letter mu] encoding (a logarithmic
encoding of 8 bit data equivalent to a 14 bit linear encoding). A
half-hour program would thus consist of 64,000 bits per second or
15
Mbytes total.
Programs are initially spool on UUNET, the central machines
of
the Alternet network. Files are then moved over to various
regional
networks for further distribution. For example, EUnet, a
commercial
network provider for Europe with service in 24 countries, will act
as
the central spooling area for the European region. The Internet
Initiative Japan (IIJ) company will provide the same service for
Japanese networks.
The goal of coordinated distribution is to reduce the load
on
key links of the network. Transferring a 15 Mbyte file over a 64
kbps
link does not make sense during peak times. On the other hand, a
leased line has the attribute that a bit unused is a bit forever
gone.
Transferring large files at low priority in non-peak times has
little
or no incremental cost.
Files thus move from the UUNET central spool area, to
regional
spools, to national and local networks. We anticipate most of this
transfer to be done using the FTP protocols, but some networks are
discussing the use of NNTP news groups and MIME-based distribution
lists.
It is important to note that Internet Talk Radio is the
source
of programming and does not control the distribution. These files
are
publicly available, subject only to the simple license restrictions
of
no derivative work and no commercial resale.
Distribution is controlled, as with all other data, by the
individual networks that make up the Internet. We intend to work
closely with networks all over the world to ensure that there is
some
coordination of distribution activity, but ultimate control over
this
data is in the hands of those people who finance, manage, and use
networks.
We don't believe indiscriminate use of anonymous FTP is the
proper method for distributing large archives. Previous experience
with ITU standards, with RFC repositories, and with large software
archives such as the X Windows System indicates that setting up a
top-level distribution hierarchy goes a long way towards
alleviating
network load.
Even with a top-level hierarchy, however, there will always
be
anonymous FTP sites and there will always be people that go to the
wrong FTP server. This behavior is largely mitigated by setting up
enough "local" servers and publicizing their existence. Like any
large distributor of data, we are mindful of the load on the
transcontinental and regional infrastructures and will take
aggressive
steps to help minimize that load.
Head: Asynchronous Times, Asynchronous Radio
Once files have made their way to a local or regional
network,
they are moved to the desktop and played. Once again the
individual
users of the network decide how to present data. We hope to see a
wide variety of different ways of having our files played and only
list a few of the more obvious methods.
The simplest method to play a .au file on a Sparcstation is
to
type "play filename." If the file is placed on a Network File
System
(NFS) file system on a central server, the user simply mounts the
file
system and plays the file. Alternatively, the user copies the file
to
a local disk and plays it.
More adventuresome playing of files uses multicasting. A
simple multicast program called "radio" for a local Ethernet is
available from CWI, the mathematics institute of the Netherlands.
A
more sophisticated approach, IP multicasting, allows a program to
reach far beyond the confines of the Ethernet.
IP multicasting might be used on a local basis, or can have
a
global reach. There is a consortium of regional networks that have
formed the Multicast Backbone (MBONE), used for audio and video
programming of key conferences such as the Internet Engineering
Task
Force.
Internet Talk Radio does not assume use of the MBONE for
playing files. Needless to say, the operators of the MBONE are
free
to play Internet Talk Radio files (and we would be delighted if
this
happens), but it is up to the local network affiliates to determine
how and when they distribute this audio data.
In many cases, people will want to play files on a wide
variety of different platforms. The Sound Exchange (SOX) program
is a
publicly-available utility that easily transforms a file from one
format to another. Using this utility, the Macintosh, Silicon
Graphics, DECstation, PC, and many other platforms can play
Internet
Talk Radio files.
Head: Geek of the Week
In the spirit of dignified, conservative programming, the
first production from Internet Talk Radio is dubbed Geek of the
Week.
Geek of the Week features technical interviews with key
personalities
on the Internet. Some of the people who have agreed to appear on
Geek
of the Week include Daniel Karrenberg of the RIPE NCC, Dr. Marshall
T.
Rose of Dover Beach Consulting, Milo Medin of the NASA Science
Internet, and Daniel Lynch of Interop Company.
Geek of the Week focuses on technical issues facing the
Internet. This initial program is sponsored by Sun Microsystems
and
O'Reilly & Associates. Their support makes it possible for Geek of
the Week to be produced professionally and then to be distributed
at
no charge.
One of the issues that Internet Talk Radio faces are the
vestiges of Appropriate Use Policies (AUPs) that linger from the
original ARPANET days. While Sun Microsystems and O'Reilly &
Associates view Internet Talk Radio in terms of an investigation of
on-line publishing, of multicasting, and other engineering issues,
we
feel it important that our sponsors are given due credit in the
programs.
At first glance, this smacks of the crass and commercial.
Indeed, it smacks of advertising. Jumping to that conclusion,
however
would be a simplistic mistake. The Appropriate Use Policies were
formulated to guarantee that networks are used for the purposes
envisioned by the funding agents. In the case of an
AUP-constrained
networks such as the NSFNET, this means that use of the network
must
benefit U.S. science and engineering.
We feel that an in-depth interview with Internet architects
clearly falls within the purview of all AUP policies. However, we
understand that certain networks may not accept certain types of
programming. For this reason, our central spool areas are
carefully
picked so they are AUP-free. This way, if a network feels the
programming is inappropriate, they can simply inform their users
not
to obtain or play the files.
It should be noted that one advantage of supporting the
professional dissemination of news and information up-front is that
the user is not directly charged. Somebody has to pay for
information
to be produced, and the sponsorship model means that copy
protection,
accounting, security, and all the other complications of a charging
model are avoided and that high-quality news and information
becomes
increasingly available on the Internet.
Head: The Medium is the Message
While Geek of the Week is our flagship program, we intend
to
intersperse mini-features throughout. The Incidental Tourist, for
example, will feature restaurant reviews and other travel
information
for sites throughout the world. The Internet Hall of Flame will
highlight non-linear behavior on mailing lists, and we will have
periodic book reviews by Dan Dorenberg, one of the founders of
Computer Literacy Books.
The logical extension to Geek of the Week is to begin
coverage
of industry functions. To date, we have received permission to
tape
for later rebroadcast sessions and presentations at the European
RIPE
meetings, the IETF, and at the INTEROP Conferences. We are
negotiating with other industry forums to try and establish
permission
to cover additional conferences.
Our hope is to begin providing news summaries of these key
conferences. If you can't make it to the IETF, for example,
Internet
Talk Radio would like to provide a half-hour news summary
describing
what happened on each day.
The next logical step is to begin producing analysis of key
technical topics. Here, we look at in-depth (e.g., 15 minute)
summaries of technical topics such as MIME, proposals for the next
IP,
SNMP v. 2, or the architecture of the Global Internet Exchange
(GIX).
We would also furnish analysis of political topics, such as the
POISED
effort to reorganize the Internet standards process, or the
background
of the IPv7 debate.
Eventually, our hope is to combine all these reports
together
and form a daily news broadcast to the Internet. When you walk in
and
start reading your mail, you simply click on the "radio" icon and
listen to Geek of the Week while deleting messages from the more
hyperactive mailing lists.
Head: Tomorrow is the Future
The "radio" metaphor was carefully chosen. We wanted an
alternative to plain ASCII files, yet did not feel that the
Internet
infrastructure was ready for regular video feeds. Production of
video
or true multimedia required an order-of-magnitude higher investment
in
production facilities. After all, we know bad TV since we see so
much
of it.
Eventually, Internet Talk Radio wants to go beyond the
confines of the simple radio metaphor. Already, we describe the
service as asynchronous radio, recognizing that our listeners can
start, stop, rewind, or otherwise control the operation of the
radio
station.
As a multicasting infrastructure gets deployed throughout
the
Internet, we see the opportunity to expand the radio metaphor and
begin the creation of a truly new news medium. Multicast groups
and
videoconferencing tools allow the creation of an Internet Town
Hall, a
moderated forum with a very wide reach or games shows like Name
That
Acronym where everybody gets to play.
Because we are on the Internet, we can add a wide variety
of
different programming techniques. While listening to a series of
interviews about MIME messaging, for example, you might also scroll
through a series of Gopher menus that hold more information about
the
MIME standards, or search a WAIS database for a biography of the
speakers.
We hope that Internet Talk Radio will be the first of many
such information services on the Internet, supplementing the random
anarchy of news and mailing lists with professionally produced news
and information. Indeed, we hope that Internet Talk Radio forms
the
first of many "desktop broadcasting" efforts.
Internet Talk Radio debuts at the Columbus IETF at the end
of
March. Stay tuned for more information.
Head: For More Information
Guido van Rossum, FAQ: Audio File Formats,
ftp.cwi.nl:/pub/AudioFormats2.10. An excellent introduction to
audio formats, encoding, and other information about sound files
on different platforms. This same site also has copies of the
SoundExchange (SOX) program for translating files into different
audio formats, and the Radio program for playing a sound file on
an Ethernet.
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