Selective Rate Control for Media-Streaming Applications in Wireless Internet Environments

Media-streaming applications experience limited performance and perceptible quality degradation in the presence of random wireless errors, as the underlying congestion control typically interprets packet loss as the outcome of congestion. In this context, we propose a selective rate control, namely AIAMD, which manages to differentiate congestive and non-congestive loss by utilizing history in its control rules. AIAMD combines the most desirable features of additive increase additive decrease (AIAD) and additive increase multiplicative decrease (AIMD) controls, reacting gently to wireless loss and more aggressively to congestion. Exploring AIAMD´s potential, we identify notable gains in terms of link utilization and media delivery, without compromising intra-protocol fairness.