Video Out: The Low-down on Download-and-play

Streaming media may seem like the end-all be-all of Internet media since it catches so much press coverage, but the "old way" of distributing media on the Net, downloading files and then playing them, is still alive and kicking. While it may not be the fastest option, download-and-play still has many features that make it entirely suitable for many purposes, and in some cases, a better solution that streaming.

What's the Difference?

Before streaming media, all media on the Web was distributed as download-and-play media files. With this system, you would create media files and then post them on a server (a host computer connected to the Internet). Viewers then downloaded them from that server onto their own hard drives. Once downloading was complete, users could play the files, from their local drives.
In subsequent years, streaming media has become increasingly popular, often supplanting the download-and-play type of media distribution. It's called streaming because the end-user can watch the "stream" of video as it plays from the server. Streaming media has the advantage of beginning playback quickly, making it popular in our "I want it now" world. The tradeoff for quick delivery is quality. Image quality can suffer depending on connection speed or the number of users currently accessing the server.
For a time, after streaming media arrived on the scene, many people generally avoided download-and-play media in favor of sites that boasted streaming media. A general perception that download-and-play media was out-of-date turned people prematurely away from this remarkably viable means of Internet video distribution.<…