Resource allocation in underprovisioned multioverlay live video sharing services

In a multioverlay live video sharing service consisting of multiple independent peer-to-peer live video streaming systems, a user can simultaneously watch multiple live video streams. A major challenge for such services is the interoverlay bandwidth competition problem, which is to find an upload bandwidth allocation between the overlays each peer has subscribed to. So far, no solution has been proposed in the literature for the important case where the overall system is underprovisioned, that is, when peers do not have enough upload bandwidth to ensure a distribution of videos at full quality. We show that an allocation of upload resources that minimizes the wastage of resources (i.e., minimizes the upload bandwidth allocated to overprovisioned overlays) can be computed in polynomial time. Then we present a generic model that allows the design of different strategies for the management of the resource deficit in underprovisioned systems. Finally, we provide relevant simulation results to demonstrate the gains in video quality resulting from the implementation of our solutions.