Here are two graphs showing inbound HTTP from a link off a small service providers network.  The first graph is Jan 19th, 2009 day prior to Obama’s inauguration.  The second graph is Jan 20th, 2009 the day of the inauguration.  If you look at 11:00 – 12:30 you can clearly see the abnormal bandwidth increase due to this being broadcast live over the internet and this is just HTTP, not other streaming protocols that might have been used.

You can clearly see the increase in bandwidth on this one link during the Inauguration.  This has happened before. Twitter has inauguration data that shows the same trend for their micro blog service.

As the Internet becomes more and more the media for information, bandwidth is going to constantly increase and spike when these type of events occur. Service providers need to effectively manage the bandwidth, ensuring fairness, privacy, and deploying appropriate infrastructure to support the trending increase in bandwidth over the next 5-10 years.

I look at my family over the last 3 years. We hardly watch television and any shows we do watch, we watch via the Internet. We listen to the radio via the internet. We get all information and news via the Internet. We communicate almost exclusively via the internet.