Speed
Speed, for the purpose of this article, is how quickly a server can deliver an article to the user. The server that the user connects to is typically part of a server farm that has many servers dedicated to multiple tasks. How fast the data can move in this farm is the first thing that affects the speed of delivery.
Once the farm is able to deliver the data to the network, then the provider has limited control over the speed to the user. Since the network path to each user is different, some users will have good routes and the data will flow quickly. Other users will have overloaded routers between them and the provider which will cause delays. About all a provider can do in that case is try moving the traffic through a different route. If the ISP has limited connectivity to the network, routing changes may have little effect.
Frequently a user can reduce the impact of network problems by using multiple connections. Some servers allow as many as 60 simultaneous connections, but this varies widely. Likewise, newsreaders are commonly limited to using as few as two or four connections.
Read more about this topic: News Server Operation
Famous quotes containing the word speed:
“Wait, Kate! You skate at such a rate
You leave behind your skating mate.
Your splendid speed won’t you abate?
He’s lagging far behind you, Kate.”
—David Daiches (b. 1912)
“It was undoubtedly the feeling of exile—that sensation of a void within which never left us, that irrational longing to hark back to the past or else to speed up the march of time, and those keen shafts of memory that stung like fire.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“The greatest felony in the news business today is to be behind, or to miss a big story. So speed and quantity substitute for thoroughness and quality, for accuracy and context. The pressure to compete, the fear somebody else will make the splash first, creates a frenzied environment in which a blizzard of information is presented and serious questions may not be raised.”
—Carl Bernstein (b. 1944)