Patent ID: 8589583

Claim:
A method of configuring a media player to adaptively select from a first bitstream having a first version of a media program and a second bitstream having a second version of the media program wherein the first bitstream has a different bit rate than the second bitstream, comprising: receiving data describing a temporal variability of the bit rate of the first bitstream; receiving the first bitstream on a communication channel; determining a throughput of the communication channel; determining an amount of data currently buffered in a buffer for the media program; generating a comparison of the throughput of the communication channel with the received data describing the temporal variability of the bit rate of the first bitstream and the amount of data currently buffered to determine if the amount of data currently buffered exceeds a shortfall of an amount of data expected to be received for a portion of the media program based on the temporal variability of the portion due to the bit rate of the temporal variability for the portion being above the throughput; and when the amount of data currently buffered does not exceed the shortfall of the amount of data expected to be received for the portion of the media program based on the temporal variability of the portion, selecting the second bitstream for further reception at least in part according to the generated comparison.