they run their own cdn.

it's arguable cheaper than buying but then again it's also the core business and outsourcing put's the whole operation in danger

What exactly do you think a CDN is?

Okay I'll answer your low-effort question in case a lot of people, like you, think they know what a CDN is but don't.

A CDN is when you set up servers in datacenters around the country and distribute content to them so that your content is closer to your users.

What Netflix did is create guidelines for ISPs that want to cache Netflix content at the edge. So Netflix isn't running a CDN themselves, the ISP acts as a CDN.

Seems like you're talking about OpenConnect. In that, Netflix ships an OpenConnect Appliance (a server for sending out Netflix video) to an ISP that meets the minimum requirements and agrees to set up networking to the OCA in a certain way.

> A CDN is when you set up servers in datacenters around the country and distribute content to them so that your content is closer to your users.

Yes, exacly - the server in the Netflix case is called an OCA, and is set up in datacenters all around the country - in this case they are owned by the ISP rather than being a 3rd party data center where the ISP has a fiber and the CDN rents space. Here's the thing though.... Akamai, Cloudflare, and Fastly all do the same as Netflix too. The ISP wins because it saves transit, the CDN wins because it doesn't need to rent dc space, and customers of both win because the content is delivered faster to the people using that ISP.

Or maybe you're talking about the peering guidelines? Hate to break it to you, every CDN is happy to peer with just about anyone with a mutual POP - keeping the transit bill lower is always a win.

Yes, that's what I was talking about. As a small competitor of Netflix, ISPs will laugh me out of the room if I suggest they install one (let alone many) servers in their buildings.

What? Netflix has their own cdn, they talk about it often.

My car runs on gas. I don't own my own network of gas stations, but I still have a gas tank that keeps me going.

>What is Netflix Open Connect? Open Connect is the name of the global network that is responsible for delivering Netflix TV shows and movies to our members world-wide. This type of network is typically referred to as a “Content Delivery Network” or “CDN” because its job is to deliver internet-based content (via HTTP/HTTPS) efficiently by bringing the content that people watch close to where they’re watching it. The Open Connect network shares some characteristics with other CDNs, but also has some important differences.