Internet is strained because of the Coronavirus

We must stay home, it’s an easy law to respect in the days of internet, or maybe not? The rules to fight the advance of the Covid-19 are ever more stricter. The not indispensable companies are forced to close. The main streets all of the italian cities, and not only, but even the european and the global ones, got empty, the gates down. Everyone is closed at home, terrified by the coronavirus, everyone is connected to internet, for a reason or another.

What do we do close at home in the days of the quarantine?

These are post-apocalyptic scenarios the ones that the few authorized to go around the city face every day, in every corner of the planet, in the middle of a pandemic. The economy is slowing down however Italy and the world don’t give up, not even closed in their own homes.

Are many the ones which are still working, and we aren’t talking only about healthcare, police and supermarket cashiers. The companies didn’t stop, not all of them at least, they found out a new way to work.

Smart working is the word of the moment, it jumps from a news to another, from a job meeting (by telephone) to another. And even the ones that didn’t know it yet now they know what we are talking about.

Work from home is possible, even in the days of quarantine, but are internet and the servers of the big companies able to keep the incredible flow of datas? The smart working isn’t the only activity that overloaded the web by straining it. Next to it there are all the other activities that the world population rediscovered in the days of quarantine.

What do we do closed at home for a month, or maybe more? We finish to watch that tv serie started and never ended, we take back some online game given up for lack of time. We watch a movie in streaming, we download a new book for our e-reader.

And meanwhile we don’t know that, since the first time when the world became smaller, thanks to the internet connection, it never was so close to the crash like in this period.

The streaming video during the Coronavirus

Italy was the first one to take restrictive measures to prevent the spread of the infection of the new coronavirus, shortly after the other european countries followed it. With the incredible flow of datas that travelled on the european network we risked the collapse, so many started to take actions to prevent worse.

First of all Netflix, the first platform for the streaming of movies and tv series all over the world, which saw an incredible growth of the ratings, because of all the ones that decided to spend the time in quarantine between a tv serie and another.

In reality Netflix was already since the 2011 that used server ad hoc to better convey its own traffic and give to the users an efficient service. But with the emergency Coronavirus thses servers risked to collapse soon, so it decided to take further measures, by reducing of the 25% its european bitrate.

Besides Netflix even Youtube decided to take stricter measures, by stopping the high definition of its channels.

Finally, even the new entry Disney+ decided for the reduction of the 25% of its own bitrate.

All of it, like claimed by their CEOs, in accordance with the directives of the European Union, it won’t be useful only to protect their own tired servers, but even to prefer other kind of activites. Even though the television entertainment is essential to face the long period of quarantine, at the moment we must give priority to the smart working and guarantee to all the access to the web, for reason of entertainment, work and information.

A speedtest for the Italy in the days of the Coronavirus

All of us tried at least once to do a speedtest to verify the speed of our own internet connection. But few noticed that since December to today the connection followed a descending curve, inversely with the advance of the Coronavirus in the world and especially in Italy.

The worse situation is in Lombardia, which is closed for more time and with more stricter measure compared with the rest of Italy. For this reason a part of that famous 25 billions of euros allocated by the government to face the emrgency Covid-19, will be used to powered the network since now to the 30th of june 2020, by giving priority to the essential services and to the emergency services.

This post is also available in: Italiano