Bunch of takeaways from this deal: the content distribution network space is consolidation quite rapidly, and all comers are going after Akamai, which continues to stay on top. How long it can stay there? I am not even going to try and guess. Another thing which I must say is that Internap is trying to be network and CDN, a combo with mixed results in the past. Will it work this time?
So network provider Internap bought smallish content distribution network (CDN) Vitalstream, probably on the theory that all the YouTubing the kids are doing is going to mean Fat City for people who can push pixels through the pipes.
Let me add a question to Om's: if all Akamai's competition does is throw incremental improvements at the traditional CDN architecture, is there any reason to believe they'll manage to take a serious chunk out of Akamai's business? I'm much more interested in seeing if/how content distribution around the peer-to-peer edge, fuelled by social networking connections (high-concept pitch: it's BitTorrent meets MySpace and YouTube) changes the way large content gets moved from machine to machine.
Tags: Akami, Internap, Vitalstream, CDN, p2p, BitTorrent