Google is taking a page out of Netflix playbook by signaling out the Internet Service Providers that are not up to the task of giving their customers the ability to stream YouTube in HD at a decent enough speed.
The pressure Google is placing on ISPs came from a tool called Video Quality Report, which is designed to measure speed quality of various ISPs in the United States. In addition to measuring stream quality, the tool also measures buffering frequency, an issue that usually happens with slow connections.
"Nothing ruins the experience of watching a YouTube video like Magic of Rahat more than seeing the dreaded buffering wheel, which is why we're always working to make videos play smoothly in the best quality possible," YouTube product manager Jay Akkad said in a post on Google's blog. "And when you can't see what you want, when you want, it's important you know why."
According to Google, the search company's aim is to rate ISPs as HD verified if their network connection is capable of streaming a 720p and higher video with issues. ISPs that can only stream videos at 360p at least, will be recognized as SD verified. Now, any ISP network connection that can only stream at resolutions below 360p will have a quality rating of lower definition.
Google based its Video Quality Report at the minimum speed available 90 percent of the last 30 day period. As stated before, Google only provides ratings for ISPs in the United States, as opposed to Netflix, which provides data for ISPs in several countries.
We expect as time goes by, Google will increase the amount of countries it supports with its Video Quality Report and, hopefully, it will be enough to force ISPs everywhere to improve their speeds being delivered to consumers.
Google and Netflix have become good friends ever since the latter was forced to pay Comcast to travel on the Internet fast-lane. Netflix won't have to pay Google a dime for faster connection through the company's new Fiber network, but it won't be a huge benefit to just yet since Google Fiber is only available in a handful of states in the U.S.
