EFFICIENT UNICAST-BASED MULTICAST TREE CONSTRUCTION AND MAINTENANCE FOR MULTIMEDIA TRANSMISSION

A multi-endpoint communication system comprising communication nodes linked in a tree structure by unicast connections includes a server to receive a request from a new communication node to join the tree structure. The system further includes a node selector to identify one of the plurality of communication nodes that is likely to be in a same local area network as the new communication node. In addition, the system includes a node linker to connect the new communication node to the identified communication node within the tree structure.