Patent ID: 8260877

Claim:
A machine implemented method comprising: requesting data, with a client device, over a network using a transfer protocol; receiving, in response to the requesting, a playlist comprising a plurality of tags and a plurality of Uniform Resource Identifiers (URIs) indicating a first playlist file and a second playlist file, wherein one or more of the plurality of tags indicates a first URI associated with the first playlist file and specifying a first location for a stream of content and a second URI associated with the second playlist file and specifying a second location for the stream of content, wherein the second location is different from, but at least partially redundant of, the first location; selecting, with the client device, the first playlist file or the second playlist file; using the transfer protocol, requesting the selected first or second playlist file with the client device, wherein the requesting uses a URI from the playlist corresponding to the selected playlist file; receiving, with the client device, the requested playlist file, the requested playlist file having URIs indicating a plurality of media files and a plurality of tags having parameters related to playback of the plurality of media files, wherein the plurality of media files are segments of the stream of content; using the transfer protocol, requesting one or more of the media files in an order indicated by the requested playlist file; receiving the one or more requested media files over the network using the transfer protocol.