Shuttle Launch Sets Streaming Record
Nearly 433,000 people tuned in to watch the Space Shuttle Discovery roar into space Tuesday morning, in an event that smashed a streaming video record set by AOL earlier this month. 335,000 people simultaneously watched via Yahoo in Windows Media, while Akamai served up the other streams in Real Video format.
AOL jumped into the record books on July 2 when Live 8 concerts were streamed to over 175,000 people simultaneously. The shuttle launch more than doubled those numbers, and quadrupled NASA's prior record of 118,000 streams for the Deep Impact mission.
One key factor in the number of video streams was the timing of Discovery's launch: 10:38am ET on Tuesday. Many Americans were at work and the Web was their only outlet to catch the historical moment. The U.S. Space Shuttle had been grounded for over two years following the Columbia disaster.
The launch of Discovery was also a much shorter event than Live 8, which lasted for almost 11 hours in London. Nonetheless, Yahoo is pleased with the turn out.
"This makes the launch one the largest simultaneous video streams in Internet history (possibly the largest)," a Yahoo spokesperson told BetaNews. "By offering the live stream via Yahoo!, NASA tripled the online audience it has garnered for past events."
Yahoo will also be offering live video feed of the entire 12-day Discovery mission through a partnership with NASA TV.