AUDIO/VIDEO CODING AND TRANSMISSION METHOD AND SYSTEM

摘要

The invention is the method and system of delivering a television-like viewing experience with the ability of start and switching programs in a near-instantaneous fashion using any non-acknowledged and unreliable packet based transmission mechanism such as the Internet. The embodiment of this invention is a new data transmission protocol based on minimal acknowledgement, in a method that requires unique multimedia data coding methods. The user experiences near instantaneous multimedia playback upon requesting a viewing channel without the typical pre-buffering step, without any subsequent re-buffering step. Any change in the selected viewing channel can be done with sub-second response time, and at no time during the user experience, barring catastrophic extended breakdown of the Internet fabric, is the viewing experience stopped for re-buffering of information. Program channel changing, multiple camera angle programs, multiple audio track programs, pan and scan programs, and pointer device feedback are a few of the advanced delivery possibilities that can be achieved with this transmission protocol and data coding method with a minimal cost in transmission overhead that adapts continuously to the bandwidth available between client and server.