Location aware advertisement insertion for mobile network video streams

Mobile phone networks are on the verge of a major breakthrough in terms of the services they offer. At the same time, active networks are being presented as the next step in the evolution of network architecture, with the aim of providing greater functionality within the network but retaining flexibility. At the same time, the 3G revolution seems to be floundering, due to the need to make a financial return on the huge investment tied up in the licences. This thesis seeks to provide a way forward, by investigating the implementation of a novel service that is the provision of video streaming across the mobile network with location dependent advertisement insertion. The work retains flexibility within the network architecture to enable additional services to be evolved and implemented with minimal modification to the nodes. The approach taken is to combine the traditional architecture with active functionality. As a result this thesis describes a novel service, the implementation of a short video service with location dependent advertisement insertion. This enables the provider to generate an income by transporting the service (it is possible for a third party to generate the content instead of the network provider) and by selling the advertisement space. This thesis investigates the implementation issues involved in providing the service and presents a protocol for the operation of it. The impact of this service on other users is also studied with the conclusion being that it does not adversely effect the quality of service of the voice traff ic within the network. In order to investigate the implementation of the protocol, a simulation model was constructed in OPNET [42]. This enabled the operation of the protocol to be tested under artificial conditions using fixed movements, to verify that it operated as specified. Then under more realistic conditions, so as to predict its effect on the other traffic in the network.