Distributed rate and power allocation for wireless video chats via pricing schemes

Video chat is a power and rate-intensive application which requires efficient resource utilization. Unlike video streaming which is generally one way, video chats characterize distributed two way traffics relayed via base stations. In this paper, we propose a distributed rate and power allocation framework for joint coding and transmission in wireless video chats. The base station imposes a service charge, which considers relay transmission power as a cost, for relaying video bitstreams. For clients, we derive the optimal rate and power allocation for video coding and transmission such that the network service charge and video distortion are minimized under a power constraint. For the base station, existing pricing schemes could not ensure fairness and efficiency simultaneously. We propose an optimal hybrid pricing scheme which allows balanced tradeoff between fairness and efficiency in network service. Network dynamics of video chats can be analyzed in the Stackelberg game framework, and shown to converge to the Stackelberg equilibrium. Extensive simulations confirm the performance analysis of the proposed solutions and the network dynamics.