An overview of IP multicast as deployed in the Internet today,
from the perspective of the MBONED working group. Existing
infrastructure is examined critically. Suggestions for possible
improvement of the overall architecture are presented for the IESG.
IPv6 multicast is included in this analysis.
One of the concepts presented is that IGMP and MLD snooping might be
discouraged, due to the complexity it requires on the part of the Ethernet
switches. (Namely, interpretation of IPv4 and IPv6 datagrama.)
Another concept presented is to change the many-to-one static mapping
between IPv[46] multicast group addresses and IEEE MAC addresses, in favor
of a dynamic mapping much like IPv4 ARP or IPv6 Neighbor Discovery.