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Ask HN: Why is there no P2P streaming protocol like BitTorrent?

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Ask HN: Why is there no P2P streaming protocol like BitTorrent?

#1

Post by memet_rush »

I've been wondering if anyone knows why there is no P2P protocol for mass live stream content in decent quality? specifically what are the technical limitations or is it mostly that people don't want to get destroyed by media company lawyers? I've searched around for a while and i cant find anything like that that can handle thousands of people streaming. The closest is probably Webrtc and that looks like it can only handle 500~ peers.

I was thinking most people nowaday have at least 30mbps upload and a 1080p stream only needs ~10mbps and 720p needs ~5ish. Also i think it wouldnt have to be live, people would definitely not mind some amount of lag. I was thinking the big O for packets propagating out in the network should be Log(N) since if a master is sharing the content then is connected to 10 slaves, then those connected to 10 other slaves and so on.

The other limitation I could think of is prioritizing who gets the packets first since there's a lot of people with 1gbs connections or >10mbps connections. Also deprioritizing leechers to keep it from degrading the stream.

Does anyone have knowledge on why it isn't a thing still though? it's super easy to find streams on websites but they're all 360p or barely load. I saw the original creator of bittorrent was creating something like this over 10 years ago and seems to be a dead project. Also this is ignoring the huge time commitment it would take to program something like this. I want to know if this is technically possible to have streams of lets say 100,000 people and why or why not.

Just some thoughts, thanks in advance!

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no P2P streaming protocol like BitTorrent?

#2

Post by elmerfud »

People have tried to build BitTorrent clients to do this. As far as I know they never took off. The primary problem is you oftentimes don't get people who want to share back or who have firewalls or other connections that don't allow them to share back. So you end up with a few people who end up seeding everything out. The second problem is in order to watch a streaming protocol things need to arrive in order. It is totally possible to do with BitTorrent and request the blocks in the order that you want but you may not always be able to get them in the order you want.

In general people aren't tolerant of lag and spinning circles and other such things when they're trying to watch streaming content. If you're fine with just watching it a little bit later might as well queue it up and left the whole thing down load so it's ready when you're ready.

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no P2P streaming protocol like BitTorrent?

#4

Post by memet_rush »

elmerfud wrote: post #2

People have tried to build BitTorrent clients to do this. As far as I know they never took off. The primary problem is you oftentimes don't get people who want to share back or who have firewalls or other connections that don't allow them to share back. So you end up with a few people who end up seeding everything out. The second problem is in order to watch a streaming protocol things need to arrive in order. It is…

what about having something reasonable for lag, like 30-60 seconds would that make a big difference or you think it would just eventually degrade too? Also do you think there's any way you can prioritize seeders in such a protocol? like some kind of algorithm that the more you share the more you're prioritized in getting the most up to date packets.

The main reason I would think it would be useful is 1. since streaming sites seem to lose a lot of money and 2. sports streams are really bad, even paid ones. I have dazn and two other sports streaming services and they still lag and are only 720p

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no P2P streaming protocol like BitTorrent?

#6

Post by memet_rush »

LargoLasskhyfv wrote: post #5

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PeerTube ?

looks interesting! surprised something like that never caught on. I looking for something like Twitch basically. It has really good quality and is live. But obviously Twitch is just losing money and using all Amazons resources so I wanted to see if there's a more sustainable p2p approach

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no P2P streaming protocol like BitTorrent?

#8

Post by dave4420 »

memet_rush wrote: post #4
elmerfud wrote: post #2

People have tried to build BitTorrent clients to do this. As far as I know they never took off. The primary problem is you oftentimes don't get people who want to share back or who have firewalls or other connections that don't allow them to share back. So you end up with a few people who end up seeding everything out. The second problem is in order to watch a streaming protocol things need to arrive in order. It is…

what about having something reasonable for lag, like 30-60 seconds would that make a big difference or you think it would just eventually degrade too? Also do you think there's any way you can prioritize seeders in such a protocol? like some kind of algorithm that the more you share the more you're prioritized in getting the most up to date packets. The main reason I would think it would be useful is 1. since streami…

With sports streams you specifically want low lag, don’t you? It’s no fun being spoilered by people cheering (or not) next door.

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no P2P streaming protocol like BitTorrent?

#9

Post by memet_rush »

dave4420 wrote: post #8
memet_rush wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what about having something reasonable for lag, like 30-60 seconds would that make a big difference or you think it would just eventually degrade too? Also do you think there's any way you can prioritize seeders in such a protocol? like some kind of algorithm that the more you share the more you're prioritized in getting the most up to date packets. The main reason I would think it would be useful is 1. since streami…

With sports streams you specifically want low lag, don’t you? It’s no fun being spoilered by people cheering (or not) next door.

i wouldn't mind a minute of lag tbh if the quality and reliability was better. I'm pay $20 a month for dazn and it still lags and buffers lol

Re: Ask HN: Why is there no P2P streaming protocol like BitTorrent?

#10

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

memet_rush wrote: post #6
LargoLasskhyfv wrote: post #5

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PeerTube ?

looks interesting! surprised something like that never caught on. I looking for something like Twitch basically. It has really good quality and is live. But obviously Twitch is just losing money and using all Amazons resources so I wanted to see if there's a more sustainable p2p approach

What do you mean by never caught on? It's 'live' at https://joinpeertube.org/ where you can either go to https://joinpeertube.org/browse-content and put something into that search form, or limit that search to specific 'instances' under https://joinpeertube.org/instances

Or to get back to your original question: https://docs.joinpeertube.org/use/create-upload-video

edit: Your'e not limited to these addresses, for one there are other instances, for another you can selfhost your own, if your'e into that.

Technically that is one of many possible solutions, 'ready to roll' right now.

addit: Regarding sustainability, and who is behind it, maybe https://framasoft.org/en/ would be of interest?

Linked from there https://framablog.org/2024/12/17/peertube-v7-offer-a-complet...

and

https://framablog.org/2025/04/10/2025-peertube-roadmap/

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