User control over content delivery

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9736230-B2
Application number	US-201614996904-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 15, 2016
Priority date	Nov 23, 2010
Publication date	Aug 15, 2017
Grant date	Aug 15, 2017

Abstract

Novel tools and techniques for Internet service providers to enable enhanced user control over content delivery. In an aspect of certain embodiments, these tools can allow the customer to select, on a variety of different bases, whether content should be obtained from the Internet or from a lower-cost source, such as a metropolitan content delivery network (“CDN”) operated by the ISP or a private peering connection with a content source. Both of these options can, for example, avoid accessing content over the Internet and thus can reduce ISP delivery costs. In some embodiments, these cost reductions can be passed to the consumer in the way the ISP accounts for the content delivery.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. In a relationship between an Internet service provider (“ISP”) and a subscriber, a system for delivering content, the system comprising:
a computer system in a customer service point computer in a residential gateway that provides connectivity between the subscriber and a network of the ISP, the computer system comprising:
one or more processors; and
a computer readable medium in communication with the one or more processors, the computer readable medium having encoded thereon a set of instructions executable by the computer system to:
provide an application programming interface (“API”) for a video streaming system at a customer premise to select whether a set of Internet content should be obtained through an Internet drain of the ISP or from a content delivery network (“CDN”) associated with the ISP; and
update one or more routing records within an ISP network to correspond with a subscriber's selection, so that requests from the subscriber are routed in accordance with the updated one or more routing records.

2. In a relationship between an Internet service provider (“ISP”) and a subscriber, a method of delivering content, the method comprising:
providing, by a computer system in a customer service point computer in a residential gateway that provides connectivity between the subscriber and the ISP, a user interface for the subscriber to select whether a set of Internet content should be obtained through an Internet drain of the ISP or from a content delivery network (“CDN”) associated with the ISP; and
updating one or more routing records within an ISP network to correspond with a subscriber's selection, so that requests from the subscriber are routed in accordance with the updated one or more routing records.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the one or more routing records comprise one or more domain name system (“DNS”) records on a DNS server.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein each of the one or more DNS records comprises a plurality of fields, the plurality of fields including at least one IP address associated with an Internet source of the set of Internet content, and at least one IP address associated with a CDN source of the set of Internet content.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the plurality of fields further comprises a subscriber list field that identifies one or more subscribers that have selected to obtain the set of Internet content from the CDN.

6. The method of claim 2 , wherein the one or more routing records comprise dynamic host configuration protocol (“DHCP”) records on a DHCP server.

7. The method of claim 2 , wherein the CDN is operated by the ISP.

8. The method of claim 2 , wherein the CDN is operated by a third party and co-located within the ISP network.

9. The method of claim 2 , wherein the CDN is outside the ISP network and operated by a third party having a peering arrangement with the ISP.

10. The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
subjecting the set of Internet content to a first bandwidth restriction if the subscriber selects to obtain the set of Internet content through the Internet drain; and
exempting the set of Internet content to a second bandwidth restriction, or no bandwidth restriction, if the subscriber selects to obtain the set of Internet content from the CDN associated with the ISP.

11. The method of claim 2 , wherein the user interface comprises a web portal.

12. The method of claim 2 , wherein the user interface allows the subscriber to specify that some content should be obtained through the Internet drain of the ISP and that other content should be obtained from the CDN.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the user interface provides the subscriber with an option to select, for each of a plurality of types of content, whether content of that type should be obtained through the Internet drain of the ISP or from the CDN associated with the ISP.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein the plurality of types of content comprises data files, streaming video, video game data, video chat, and instant messaging.

15. The method of claim 12 , wherein the user interface provides the subscriber with an option to select, for each of a plurality of sources of content, whether Internet content from that source should be obtained through the Internet drain of the ISP or from the CDN associated with the ISP.

16. The method of claim 2 , further comprising providing a content provider portal for a content provider to specify whether redirection is allowed for content from that content provider, wherein the content provider portal allows content providers to manage Internet content stored in the CDN.

17. The method of claim 16 , wherein the content provider portal provides an interface for a content provider to upload content to the CDN and assign an IP address and URL to the content uploaded to the CDN.

18. The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
receiving, from a customer device, customer-owned content; and
storing the customer-owned content at the CDN.

19. The method of claim 2 , wherein the routing records are updated by the computer system in the customer service point in the residential gateway.

Assignees

• Centurylink Ip Llc

Inventors

• Bugenhagen Michael K

Classifications

• H04L41/0896

  Bandwidth or capacity management, i.e. automatically increasing or decreasing capacities (flow or congestion control using dynamic resource allocation, e.g. in-call renegotiation, H04L47/76) · CPC title

• H04L67/10 Primary

  in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network (software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46) · CPC title

• G08B25/08

  using communication transmission lines {(G08B13/19658, G08B21/0286, G08B25/016 take precedence)} · CPC title

• G08B25/14 Primary

  Central alarm receiver or annunciator arrangements · CPC title

• H04L67/02

  based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP] · CPC title