Acum mai bine de o saptamana de zile am aflat ca Apple ar putea construi un nou centru de date in Olanda, iar astazi aflam ca Apple si-ar putea construi propria retea de distributie a continutului disponibil in magazinele sale. Informatiile vin de la cei de la Wall Street Journal, ei sustinand ca Apple ar intentiona sa-si construiasca aceasta retea CDN pentru a distribui singura intregul continut disponibil in magazinele sale virtuale, dar si in iCloud, intentia celor de la Apple fiind de a isi inlocui furnizorii acestor servicii.
I’m hearing that part of Apple’s reasoning for building their own CDN is because of performance issues with iCloud, with Apple wanting to have more control over the QoS of content going to their devices. Apple already controls the hardware, the OS (iOS/OS X) as well as the iTunes/App store platforms. Right now they control the entire customer experience, except for the way content is delivered to their devices. Since Apple does not own the last mile they won’t be able to have complete control, but having their own CDN would give them more control and security than they have now.
In momentul de fata Apple utilizeaza serviciile Akamai si Level 3 pentru a isi distribui continutul, insa compania a angajat in ultimele luni diversi experti in construirea de infrastructuri CDN, asa ca intentiile sale sunt clare. Google, Microsoft si Netflix sunt doar cateva dintre companiile care si-au construit propriile retele CDN, costurile reduse si posibilitatea de a controla in totalitate modul de distributie fiind principalele motive pentru alegerea lor, Apple avand o filosofie asemanatoare in aproape orice initiativa.
The next set of questions to ask is what type of technology Apple uses? Will they go the open source route and built it in a non-proprietary way, or keep it closed? Some will also wonder if Apple might make their CDN into a commercial offering, but that wouldn’t make any sense for their business, unless they had some kind of content subscription service akin to Netflix.
Apple investigheaza de mai bine de 5 ani de zile posibilitatea de a isi construi propria retea CDN si se pare ca planurile sale ar fi intrat intr-o faza finala si incipienta inceperii procesului de constructie, insa ramane de vazut cat va dura pana cand ea va deveni functionala. In final trebuie mentionat faptul ca avand o retea de distributie proprie, Apple ar putea dezvolta servicii noi pentru utilizatori, iar aici includem un televizor sau alte metode de streaming multimedia pentru iDevice-uri.
