Patent ID: 8205003

Claim:
A method for controlling the admission of media content into a network, comprising: accessing a request for authorization to transfer media content, wherein said request for authorization comprises details of a request for media content made to a server of a plurality of servers, wherein based on said details of said request for authorization to transfer media content an admission control authority can determine which communication link corresponds to said request for media content, can determine what a current state of said communication link is, and can determine how an admission control policy of said network will affect said request for media content; determining whether said server will be authorized to accommodate said request for media content, said determining based at least in part on data accessed from said plurality of servers and on data accessed from a plurality of communications links of said network; and generating a message that is accessible by said server, said message comprising information as to whether said server is authorized to initiate a transmission of said media content, wherein an admission of media content from said server is coordinated with admissions of media content from said plurality servers and based on an aggregation of requests of said plurality of servers wherein said servers are augmented with server side extensions that are responsible for communicating with an admission control authority and for relaying decisions of said admission control authority back to said servers and wherein said admission control authority periodically tests a link's bandwidth utilization to ensure that it matches said admission control authority's internal measure of bandwidth utilization that is based on tracking plug-in messages.