An article in the FT reports that streaming giants Netflix and YouTube have reduced picture quality in response to the growing number of people that are working and learning from home. Per the article, reducing picture quality from high definition to standard definition has the potential to reduce the data required to watch the video by half.
“Netflix has decided to begin reducing bit rates across all our streams in Europe for 30 days,” the company said. “We estimate that this will reduce Netflix traffic on European networks by around 25 per cent while also ensuring a good quality service for our members.”