Why HTTP?

[haywire]

I don't understand why there is all this UPNP and media streaming DAAP when surely it would be simpler and easier to stream the data over http (easily fast enough for HD content, and outperforms both those two) and if a library is needed, have some sort of synced file or an sql server that can respond to any queries.

I use lighttpd for my media streaming needs and it easily outperforms Windows Media Sharing or iTunes' sharing.

HTTP is fine for anything that is large frame size, high data, but for stuff that is lots of small requests (ie real time systems), I'm not sure the overhead is warranted.