Real World Serverless with theburningmonk

#98: How DAZN streams live sports to millions of concurrent viewers

Mar 13, 2024

Learn about the challenges of streaming live sports to millions of concurrent viewers, including ensuring uptime during CDN outages and delivering a seamless playback experience. Dive into the complexities of optimizing serverless architectures and the transition from Lambda to containerized solutions for enhanced performance. Explore how DAZN integrates global commentary into live sports streams and the importance of localized viewing experiences for maintaining high uptime.

53:06

Episode guests

Bob Hannent

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Episode notes

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

Ensuring uptime during CDN outages is crucial for live sports streaming at scale.

Optimizing delivery across multiple platforms enhances the viewer's playback experience.

Careful engineering decisions are essential when pushing AWS and CDN providers to their limits.

Deep dives

Bob Hennant's Role at the Zone

Bob Hennant, a principal architect at the Zone, discusses his role at the company, highlighting his transition from a video architect to a wider focus on infrastructure technologies. He delves into areas like cloud compute, physical infrastructure, content security including DRM and anti-piracy measures, legal patent work, and regulatory oversight. Bob shares his extensive 20-year experience in the media tech industry working with major brands like the BBC, Norwegian Telecom, and TalkTalkTV.

Introduction

3min

Challenges and Operations of Streaming Live Sports

30min

Managing Live Video Streams for High-End Matches

2min

Global Commentary Integration and Localized Viewing Experiences

7min

Optimizing Serverless Architecture Challenges

7min

Challenges of Front-End Teams and Scalability in Streaming Services

4min

In this episode, I spoke with Bob Hannent, the principal architect of DAZN's video playback and delivery system. This system is responsible for streaming live sporting events to millions of concurrent viewers.

We discussed the many challenges that come with streaming live videos at scale. How to ensure uptime even when your CDN partners suffer an outage. And how best to ensure the best playback experience for your customers across dozens of different platforms.

There's a lot to learn from this conversation. Honestly, I'm amazed by how much thought and engineering have gone into delivering those bytes from the stadiums to the customers.

And when you can push both AWS and CDN providers to their limits, every engineering decision has to be thought through carefully.

Opening theme song:
Cheery Monday by Kevin MacLeod
Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/3495-cheery-monday
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0

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