Machine Learning Based Study of QoE Metrics in Twitch.tv Live Streaming.

Video streaming generates most network traffic in today’s Internet. For that reason, video on demand streaming is researched heavily in recent years, and many traffic monitoring mechanisms, flow and stream models, and models to predict the user perceived quality are well established. However, the quickly growing live streaming sector is not considered in these Quality of Experience models and not even the relation between network traffic and playback quality has been studied so far, forming a gap in literature. For that reason, we investigate Twitch.tv streaming as one of the largest live streaming platforms based on a large dataset and investigate the possibility to predict live streaming quality based on uplink request information. We apply approaches that are well studied for on demand streaming to predict quality changes, playback quality, and video interruption events as the most important metrics impairing user perceived quality. In this context, we answer whether these models are suitable for live streaming, if small changes are sufficient for satisfactory prediction results, or if fundamental changes and new models are required.