Disney +, Disney’s much-anticipated streaming service, launches in Europe at a lower bandwidth consumption to help lower congestion on networks.
Millions of people across the continent have started to work from home. Therefore, European communications networks have been trying to meet increasing demand. Earlier this month, Thierry Breton, the European Union’s Internal Market and Services Commissioner has said that streaming platforms, telecom operators and users, we all had a joint responsibility to take steps to ensure the smooth functioning of the internet during the battle against the coronavirus propagation.
From HD to SD
After this call, both Netflix and YouTube decided to downgrade their video streaming quality from HD to SD for an extended period. Disney + has also agreed to reduce the streaming speed of content by 25% due to a sharp increase in internet traffic. So, it brings it in line with the pledges of Netflix, YouTube and Amazon’s Prime Video. This change covers the UK, Ireland, Germany, Italy, Spain, Austria and Switzerland.
Kevin Mayer, Chairman of Direct-to-Consumer & International, The Walt Disney Company
“In line with Disney’s longstanding commitment to act responsibly, we are responding to the request of European Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton to work together to ensure the smooth functioning of the broadband infrastructure.
In anticipation of high consumer demand for Disney+, we are proactively instituting measures to lower our overall bandwidth utilization by at least 25% in all of the markets launching Disney+ on March 24th,”
said Kevin Mayer, chairman of direct-to-consumer & international, The Walt Disney Company.
Mayer also announced the delay in the launch of its service in France in response to the request of the French government.
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