Smaller is Better: Generative Models Can Power Short Video Preloading

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Liu, Liming, Wu, Jiangkai, Zhang, Xinggong
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Liu, Liming
Wu, Jiangkai
Zhang, Xinggong
author_facet Liu, Liming
Wu, Jiangkai
Zhang, Xinggong
contents Preloading is widely used in short video platforms to minimize playback stalls by downloading future content in advance. However, existing strategies face a tradeoff. Aggressive preloading reduces stalls but wastes bandwidth, while conservative strategies save data but increase the risk of playback stalls. This paper presents PromptPream, a computation powered preloading paradigm that breaks this tradeoff by using local computation to reduce bandwidth demand. Instead of transmitting pixel level video chunks, PromptPream sends compact semantic prompts that are decoded into high quality frames using generative models such as Stable Diffusion. We propose three core techniques to enable this paradigm: (1) a gradient based prompt inversion method that compresses frames into small sets of compact token embeddings; (2) a computation aware scheduling strategy that jointly optimizes network and compute resource usage; and (3) a scalable searching algorithm that addresses the enlarged scheduling space introduced by scheduler. Evaluations show that PromptStream reduces both stalls and bandwidth waste by over 31%, and improves Quality of Experience (QoE) by 45%, compared to traditional strategies.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_09484
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Smaller is Better: Generative Models Can Power Short Video Preloading
Liu, Liming
Wu, Jiangkai
Zhang, Xinggong
Image and Video Processing
Multimedia
Preloading is widely used in short video platforms to minimize playback stalls by downloading future content in advance. However, existing strategies face a tradeoff. Aggressive preloading reduces stalls but wastes bandwidth, while conservative strategies save data but increase the risk of playback stalls. This paper presents PromptPream, a computation powered preloading paradigm that breaks this tradeoff by using local computation to reduce bandwidth demand. Instead of transmitting pixel level video chunks, PromptPream sends compact semantic prompts that are decoded into high quality frames using generative models such as Stable Diffusion. We propose three core techniques to enable this paradigm: (1) a gradient based prompt inversion method that compresses frames into small sets of compact token embeddings; (2) a computation aware scheduling strategy that jointly optimizes network and compute resource usage; and (3) a scalable searching algorithm that addresses the enlarged scheduling space introduced by scheduler. Evaluations show that PromptStream reduces both stalls and bandwidth waste by over 31%, and improves Quality of Experience (QoE) by 45%, compared to traditional strategies.
title Smaller is Better: Generative Models Can Power Short Video Preloading
topic Image and Video Processing
Multimedia
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.09484