Patent ID: 8918644

Claim:
A method comprising: at a server system, establishing, based at least in part on cryptographic information placed in a predefined portion of a handshake network communication, a communication session with a client system to stream one or more streams from the server system to the client system, the predefined portion being reserved for random data; processing the one or more streams, wherein the processing comprises: dividing each of the one or more streams into a plurality of network communications, wherein each network communication of the plurality of network communications has an associated data payload and an associated header, and writing to a header of a network communication from the plurality of network communications rendering information relating to a media rendering state associated with the network communication and one or more subsequent network communications of the plurality of network communications, wherein a portion of the rendering information that remains unchanged from the network communication to the one or more subsequent network communications is written to the header of the network communication but omitted from a header of the one or more subsequent network communications, such that the headers have variable lengths; and streaming the processed one or more streams to the client system via the established communication session.