So here’s deal, have you ever noticed the loading of fbcdn.net upon accessing Facebook? yes, no? So what does it means? Has Facebook been hacked and is it redirecting you to some phishing scam site?? Well let me give you the lowdown…

Tech minded individuals refer to it as a CDN. ie; FB CDN (Facebook CDN) - known as a “Content Delivery Network”. So what is a “Content Delivery Network” and how would it benifit South-African Facebook users?

Content Delivery Network - is a distribution system on the Internet that accelerates the delivery of Web pages, audio, video, CSS style sheets, peer-to-peer processing and may even offer server-side processing of Java and ASP scripts combined with other Internet-based content to users around the world, most often for the purpose of improving performance and scalability.

The CDN replicates the content provider’s files in servers, better known to our local tech boys as “caching servers” or “edge servers,” located in geographically dispersed datacenters. Internet Solutions (IS) to my knowledge, driven by Ronnie Apteker at the time, was the first CDN service provider in South-Africa, which remains an “ambrella word” within our local online community due to very slow internet reach and expansion of such services.

Strategically placed edge servers decrease the load on interconnects, public peers and private peers, freeing up capacity by accessing an African CDN, instead of loading all traffic on a backbone or single peer link which would drastically slow down our South-African social experience. a CDN can offload these by redirecting data (uploads and downloads) to geographically dispersed edge servers.

Because closer is better, web caches store popular content closer to the user. These shared network appliances reduce bandwidth requirements, reduce server load, and improve the client response times for content stored in the cache.

Theoretically, the closer the content to Africa, the faster the delivery to South-Africa (as apposed to accesing a Silicon Valley based core server) and the end users will likely experience less jitter, fewer network peaks and surges, and improved stream quality of HD media content - especially in remote areas throughout South-Africa, which improves the end-user performance and increases the global availability of content.

Just to update everyone - Mytrade Public Beta launch is due in a couple of weeks, so please check back soon as the date will be announced right here on my blog. For an Inside Scoop or any questions, please email me directly on beta[at]mytrade.co.za , otherwise connect with me on Facebook or Twitter

Mytrade is a young South-African Startup - a totally unique Social Marketplace where you can buy what u want, sell what you have and make New friends while you’re at it!

Tags: Content Delivery Network, facebook, facebook CDN, hosting, media, MyTrade, mytrade Beta launch, Mytrade community, servers, South-Africa