How difficult is it to setup a streaming website?

[starfish]

I have a couple of questions about this.

 

1. Websites like twitch.tv all had to start somewhere, so I was wondering how something like this would be done by today's standards. I currently have a webhost godaddy.com, but I'm still learning. My account is shared webhosting, so I would assume I would need a dedicated server? I'm also assuming that the bandwidth cost would be catastrophically high. Can someone explain how a smaller site like that could be setup in a sensible way. I don't mean web development information, but what components I would need and if these things are available as open source.

 

2. For personal streaming. If I have a shared webhost. Is it possible to setup my own stream to my own website? Would I still need a dedicated server?

 

My extent of knowledge is a little web programming, but I have never seriously adiminstered a website, so I have not done anything remotely similar.

 

3. Where can I find further info on this. What should my google search look like?

[justsomeguy]

I think that Adobe Media Server is still fairly popular, but there are other streaming servers out there. Wowza is one example of a service that you could use.