http://science.slashdot.org/article..../05/21/2227240

Network coding is basically an attempt to route traffic better. It gets a bit mathy, but the basic idea is that instead of sending the traffic bit-by-bit over a single link (which may be congested), send combined data (hints) over the direct link and other hints over other links. I can't really explain this better than the article does, so if you're interested please read it ;)

My problem with this approach is that it only really seems to care about bandwidth rates, not latency. And while it would certainly be nice for bittorrent downloads, streaming video, and even web browsing, I'm not inclined to believe this would be a good thing for gaming. With network coding your latency would increase by the latency of the slowest link. This is bad enough in a typical 6-8 hop route--send data down alternate routes to recombine at the destination would cause each hop to behave as slow as its slowest link. At best such a network would have the same latency as a traditional routing network. In reality it would likely perform a good deal worse.

I think that high bandwidth networks and low latency networks, while not necessarily mutually exclusive, are at least detrimental to each other. It's the same as always: High Bandwidth; Low Latency; Cheap -- choose two.

The idea that there should be a single almighty Internet is seeming more archaic by the day. Gaming should have its own net (yes, I know some companies are already starting this). Streaming video should likewise possibly have its own net (can you imagine a fully multicast network with router caching and timing protocols? How many people try to click a youtube video at once? What if everyone was delayed by between 1-5 seconds to sync up their data, then multicast it out all at once? What if popular videos were cached at edge rouers?)

There's no reason multiple nets couldn't all share the same physical lines. That's the beauty of the network layers. You could even use the same routing equipment.