# Streaming U2 live across the Internet

*2002-04-01 — note*


After the [Mars Polar Lander crashed](https://anil.recoil.org/notes/mars-polar-lander), I took a job at NetApp working as the
product architect for [NetCache](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NetCache).  Among the hundreds
of deployments that I help setup across the world, the most fun was figuring out how to scale
one of the biggest bands in the world at the time wanting to stream their concert live to a
global audience.


To pull this off, I moved to Sardinia where Tiscali was based, and worked with their team
to integrate new support we added to NetCache for the RealPlayer RTSP protocol and extensions.
The concert ended up reaching a global audience of [5 million viewers](https://www.u2songs.com/news/the_history_mix_live_streams_of_u2_concerts) (huge at the time for streaming video across the Internet!) and
eventually well over 30 million watched the archived version.

I wrote up a technical report at NetApp on setting up the CDN for the live streaming,
which was picked up by a number of other streaming companies in the next few years.
Synopsis: Technical report on setting up CDN for U2's live concert stream from Sardinia, reaching 5 million viewers globally while working as NetApp product architect.
Words: 158

## Related

- [Tiscali: How to build a Content Delivery Network](https://anil.recoil.org/papers/netapp-tr-3152) (paper, 2002-04-01)
- [Slashdot covers the Mars Polar Lander](https://anil.recoil.org/notes/mars-polar-lander) (note, 1999-12-03)

---
Canonical: https://anil.recoil.org/notes/netapp-tr-3152-1
Type: note
Tags: distributed, internet, streaming, netapp, caching, italy