The 'Tiger Effect' Slows Some Networks

The volume of Flash media traffic on major networks spiked sharply on Monday afternoon, according to Arbor Networks, prompting some ISPs to wonder whether they were under some new type of DDoS attack. "For several ISPs, traffic into their network grew by 15-25%," noted Craig Labovitz of Arbor, which aggregates traffic data from 70 ISPs around the world through its Internet Traffic Observatory. "In one provider, inbound traffic nearly doubled."

It turns out that Tiger Woods is to blame. Both NBC and ESPN provided live Internet video of the U.S. Open playoff between Tiger Woods and Rocco Mediate at Torrey Pines. Arbor's analysis found that the spikes in Flash traffic correlated closely with key moments in the Tiger-Rocco duel, peaking when Woods prevailed on the 19th playoff hole. Not surprisingly, the largest increases in traffic were seen out of Akamai and Limelight content delivery networks and their upstream providers.

As most golf fans know by now, Woods said Wednesday that he will need surgery to repair the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in his left knee, along with the fact that he played the Open with two stress fractures of his left tibia.