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P2P Not Dead, Just Hiding
Posted by
michael
on Fri Oct 29, 2004 06:59 PM
from the hunting-wabbits dept.
from the hunting-wabbits dept.
adavies42 writes "Contrary to media reports, P2P is not dying (PDF); it's just becoming harder to detect. In a paper for CAIDA, the Cooperative Association for Internet Data Analysis, researchers present evidence that the supposed decline in P2P traffic is actually due to a decline in easy-to-track protocols as those that change port numbers on a regular basis become more popular."
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Geez (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Geez (Score:5, Insightful)
i) It would mean less people would join the P2P community, which means less sources and less content for sharing.
ii) RIAA et co. may just think that their heavy-handed tactics are working and step-up their efforts.
If anything, we WANT everyone to know that P2P is alive and kicking and there's no way of stopping the revolution.
Parent
First.. (Score:3, Interesting)
second, they fight it
Third, they accept it as truth.
The journey that is p2p is just starting.
It WILL gain proper mainstream recognition, someday.
Re:First.. (Score:5, Insightful)
To compare the struggle that gandhi went through, to P2P apps. Okay, I do see the freedom of speech angle, but really, this gandhi quote turns up about every third article. It only cheapens it. Much the same as the martin niemoller quote "first they came for the communists..." and so on.
And parent didnt even get the quote right!
"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."
Throw a "then profit" step in there, i dont care, at least get it right!
And again, if you use it for each and every topic, it loses meaning. Please reserve such things for _important_ things. Maybe you consider this topic to be that important, okay, in that case I don't fault you directly. Im just sick of seeing important quotes from important people used on non-important topics.
no offense.
Parent
Re:First.. (Score:4, Interesting)
- Arthur Schopenhauer
And it even is older than the Gandhi quote. So while his quote was correct it still doesn't make sense. I can't remember the RIAA ever ridiculing p2p instead they opposed it violently in the beginning they violently oppose it today and they'll oppose it with violence the day they file for chapter 11
Parent
Re:yes, i know i didn't get the quote right. (Score:4, Informative)
Napster was the first real standalone p2p app, but the precursor to that was IRC channels dedicated to sharing. Much of the jargon that's used in modern p2p comes from that, for example, and the choice of encoding formats, e.g. mp3. Its almost certain that anyone who is at all serious about open source, hacking, gaming and any of a multitude of underground internet scenes has spent a good deal of time on an IRC channel at one time or another, and the scene is as much a social medium as it is a file trading medium.
Hell, if you want to go back even further, you could credit Doom and John Carmack with p2p. I haven't thought a whole lot about this, but it could be argued that the relatively open nature of Doom gave rise to networked group of file traders who would swap Doom mods and addons on BBS's, which were essentially prototypical networked IM and P2P applications (and occasional gaming platforms). The key to BBS's were that they were largely owner-operated -- you could chat with the owners, you knew them, they were part of the community. The notable thing about Doom filesharing was that creating Doom mods was a creative endeavor that benefitted from the free exchange of ideas. The runaway success of the scene spawned the idea that free and open trading of intellectural property was a moral good. Open source may have developed concurrently along the same lines, but I'm not sure there was very much cross-over. OS people were real coders and focused on that, and warez and mp3 people were more social and into gaming and things like that, almost like a collectors club. The intersection of these two groups in recent times greatly expanded on the ideas of the past, and with the addition of real coding ability came modern p2p, where coders no long limited themselves to the simple scripting environment of IRC clients, and went so far as to invent their own protocols and fully-fledged GUI environments designed to address the needs of specific internet sub-cultures. The user-friendly interfaces propelled them into the mainstream, e.g. Napster.
P2P enthusiasts are dead-serious about the importance of open intellectual property, and if its not seen as fundamental as Ghandi's struggle, it is seen as an important rights issue, which is what the parent was probably getting at more than suggesting that the P2P movement exactly follows the Ignore-Laugh-Fight-Accept model. Microsoft, RIAA, MPAA and the DMCA stifle human expression and creativity for profit and this causes immeasurable harm to society. The exact details of this harm are probably best left to another post, I may write a blog entry about it in the near future, but suffice it to say the lack of creativity and contribution in a person's life has a profoundly negative effect.
Ok, I should really go to bed...
Parent
Re:First.. (Score:3, Funny)
> second, they fight it
> Third, they accept it as truth.
Fourth, they stop being able to track it by port number, ...
Fifth, they say it's dying.
Sixth, Netcraft confirms it! They have NO... sixth!
In Soviet Russia, someone makes a joke about Seventh,
Eighth, there is nothing for you to see here.
Ninth,
Tenth, Gandhi wins the (+5, Funny)?
This just in! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:This just in! (Score:3, Insightful)
Second rule of suprnova.org is you do not talk about suprnova.org!
In other news (Score:5, Funny)
I have to agree (Score:5, Insightful)
Sharing 1,360,174,152 files (38,675,976 GB)
Re:38 what-a-bytes? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:38 what-a-bytes? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:38 what-a-bytes? (Score:3, Interesting)
I use Gnutella for this, and what I find amazing is the amount of genuinely useful information you can download IF you know how to look for it.
I'm still shocked no one has build a decent Gnutella search engine.
Re:38 what-a-bytes? (Score:5, Funny)
You can take away my porn when you pry it from my cold dead fingers.
Parent
Re:38 what-a-bytes? (Score:5, Funny)
--Pat / zippy@cs.brandeis.edu
Parent
No news here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Decentralized? (Score:5, Informative)
As much as bittorrent is the greatest thing since sliced bread, it is not decentralized. It is 1st gen P2P with a centralized tracker, despite actually being better than 2nd gen networks like KaZaA. And I certainly wouldn't want to compare it with 3rd gen networks like Freenet, MULE etc. which are at present even worse. So there's no shame in calling it 1st gen, far from it.
Of course, bittorrent more or less emulates a decentralized structure as each torrent operates independently of each other, but bittorrent itself is not. That does make it considerably harder to take down torrents than e.g. Napster, though.
Kjella
Parent
Freenet (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Freenet (Score:5, Interesting)
I agree that the concept is probably the way that p2p will travel in the future.
Are there links to files/sites available on Freenet which don't have to be found by searching through Freenet? While I realize an unencrypted list of files might defeat the purpose of the network, it was hard to find content when I used it.
I genuinely like the model for p2p that Freenet represents, but definitely would need a concrete reson to switch over from BT.
Parent
Re:Freenet (Score:5, Insightful)
Freenet is still fairly slow, but that doesn't really matter. The goal of Freenet is that you can post and download stuff, completely anonymously. No one really cares if you download the latest movies from BT, but you'd get tracked down and in major trouble if you posted classified documents or other such material. On Freenet, you can do whatever you want, and no one can find you or stop you. That's the purpose of the network, not petty copyright infringement.
Parent
Re:Freenet (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Freenet (Score:4, Insightful)
Let me guess. It is getting better because it is working better on the developer/unstable network than the stable network? Well, here's a secret. It always did. Smaller network, easier to route, better. Doesn't mean Freenet is getting better.
Kjella
Parent
Also I2P (Score:5, Informative)
A good, and working, anonymous P2P alternative to Freent is I2P [wikipedia.org]. The creator of I2P has been around for a while and cross talks with Freenet developers on occasion as both the Freenet and I2P community channels are on the anonymous irc network IIP, and irc.freenode.net.
A lot of I2P is put into the public domain, with parts of it being GPL. Try www.i2p.net [i2p.net] for more information.
Parent
"private networks" (Score:5, Informative)
Tools such as Waste [sourceforge.net] make this very easy to set up.
Re:"private networks" (Score:5, Insightful)
And Waste is impossible to detect because each person running Waste can set their own port number (from the default 1337), and even set it to run on port 80 if they wanted.
Anonymous P2P like Mute [sourceforge.net] is calling itself the next generation in P2P, and sacrifices performance for privacy - i.e. you don't know who's requesting a file, you only know who you're connected to, so you could actually be a conduit for dozens of people sharing files.
Anonymity (Mute) vs. Privacy (Waste) are mutually exclusive. You either know who you're talking to reliably, or you don't. You can't both know who you're talking to AND be anonymous.
Private networks suffer from the same problems as ShadowCrew - if you let too many people in, one person could comprimise the entire network and learn the identities of everyone. There are websites out there that share waste networks. That just seems silly to me. Waste is about *privacy* so publicizing your existance is just stupid. The problem then becomes finding a group of people you trust who have different content from you.
I read somewhere a while back about a Japanese DVD trading ring - they actually mailed DVD's back and forth, perhaps pirating them once they had them. When you joined you had the name of the person who invited you in attached to your name until you built up a reputation. People looking to go underground would be wise to adopt such a policy. Invitation only, stay small, and develop a reputation system. Don't these people watch undercover movies like Wu jain dao [imdb.com] (Infernal Affairs here in America)?
Parent
Re:"private networks" (Score:3, Interesting)
Empornium.us for example.
I wouldnt mind (Score:5, Interesting)
Breaking the asymmetrical bandwidth assumption. If P2P
traffic continues to increase and legal complications are overridden,
the P2P paradigm will bring dramatic changes in supply and
demand in edge and access networks. Bit rates of many access
links, in particular for DSL and cable modems, are currently provisioned
asymmetrically with significantly lower upstream bandwidth.
This provisioning was based on the expectation of users
downloading much more data than they send upstream. The relevance
of such technologies will be challenged and their market
share will dwindle if alternative broadband technologies can offer
comparable upstream and downstream performance.
The effect of P2P could propagate from the access points upward
the network hierarchy to Tier 2 and even Tier 1 ISPs creating
the need for more peering among ISPs. Current practices
require balanced bidirectional load among peers10, a stipulation
easier to achieve with symmetric link utilizations as the
norm. There is no doubt that the P2P paradigm will change Internet
engineering as we know it today. Given the observed trends,
the only remaining question is when, not if.
as I can not find anyone whod be willing to give me a symetrical here in worlds end; maybe thatll finally change.
Asymmetric bandwidth wrong in the first place (Score:5, Informative)
TCP was designed with the assumption of a symmetric bandwidth path between the involved end points.
To try to put a figure on it, for around 80% to 90% of the Internet's history, the Internet has been run over symmetrical bandwidth links eg. 56Kbps full duplex point to point links, T1/E1s, T3/E3, Frame Relay, ATM, Token ring, the Ethernet variants etc. Asymmetric links such as DSL and cable are the exception.
TCP has performance issues when run over paths which involve asymmetric bandwidth links. They are described in RFC 3449 - TCP Performance Implications of Network Path Asymmetry [faqs.org].
Parent
PF can help (Score:3, Informative)
prioritizing ACK packets with PF on OpenBSD [benzedrine.cx]
This was posted on Slashdot a while back. I personally use this for my home network with pretty much the same results posted there (as far as I can tell without doing formal testing). It's pretty much the only way I can keep my connection usable when my web server or torrents are having a good day.
PF is now avail
Re:Asymmetric bandwidth wrong in the first place (Score:3, Informative)
Well,that's what I call good news (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Well,that's what I call good news (Score:3, Informative)
The former seem to desire preserving the layer 3 protocols, meaning that they are (nearly) true networks that we are used to. However, even they have drawbacks... hidden services aren't currently able to have anything similar to dom
It's not dead ... (Score:5, Funny)
More expensive? (Score:3, Interesting)
How could you accurately (and more importantly quickly) determine whether some traffic is some P2P program as the article suggests when you have a really BIG haystack and a tiny needle?
Wasn't this the prediction anyway? (Score:3, Insightful)
(y'know we only have rotate the port frequencies... or was it port harmonics... to keep them from getting a bead on us...)
The RIAA are truly stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
I remember going to DCC warez channels a few years back on IRC, and seeing constant ads/notifies there about bedroom FTPs set up via dyndns and so on...not to mention the "leet" (private) IRC servers you'd hear about. (although I heard about those a lot less often)
If the RIAA had been realists, they would have realised a couple of important things straight off the bat:-
1) The Internet was designed to be able to withstand a nuclear exchange, and P2P in particular probably operates more purely via decentralised mesh topology principles than just about any other net application in existence. (As opposed to say IRC, which typically uses branch topology...which is why a single netsplit on the wrong server can lobotomise the entire network) In other words, they have less than no chance of EVER being able to stop it, or even tracing the origin node of a given file in most cases.
2) Given the fact as stated above that they'd have more chance of moving the rock of Gibraltar than shutting down P2P, the truly clueful thing for them to do would have been to try and figure out a way to use it as a source of revenue for themselves. On a network where anything is available, the neatest trick is isolating/finding what you want...so they could have had "featured" lists stacked with their own artists and used a subscription model for their search service, OR run their own private show AKA Kazaa and again used the subscription model for that. For another thing...in an environment of files, just about everything is a generic copy of a copy of a copy. With the "mashy" thing a bit back, David Bowie's fans demonstrated that what they really wanted was personalisation...something that an individual could feel was uniquely theirs, and not just an identical copy of what everyone else had. This would be more difficult to make money from, to be sure, but in different ways I'm betting it could be done.
Yet *another* way they could have made major cash for themselves would be by mining the online indy scene. They encourage the proverbial bedroom DJs, who then not only produce more fodder for the subscription model, but could even in some ways go towards satisfying the "individual" demand mentioned above via exclusive/semi-exclusive concert type recordings, individualised remixes, etc. The possibilities are endless.
3) The very LAST thing they should have wanted to do was push this underground, because once they've do that, they lose the ability to a) monitor/police it AT ALL, and b) profit from it because they either don't know where it is, or because they've already destroyed user goodwill by previously attempting to destroy it.
The problem with too many corporate bodies these days is the desire to make money via scorched earth techniques...but what they never think of is that by destroying the host environment today, (whether online or off) they lose the ability to make money from it tomorrow...whereas if they were smart, they could capitalise on these things indefinitely.
Parent
Not dying at all (Score:3, Informative)
Don't forget (Score:4, Informative)
A huge amount of p2p clients (most kazaa lite buids, azureus, one of the most popular bit torrent clients) have methods built in to support these block lists, and are turned on by default.
How to infringe & NOT get caught. An 'experime (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyway, here is the proces:
1) Take copyrighted-song.mp3 and XOR it with copyrighted-song.mp3-prndbits.bin of the same size to get prndbits.bin-copyrighted-song.mp3
2) Share both files BUT NOT AT THE SAME TIME ON THE SAME MACHINE! In fact, with this approach, the files could be posted on the World Wide Web in an analagous fashion.
3) After time, both files are on the P2P network of your choice. You need both to get copyrighted-song.mp3 back and yet mere non simultaneous possession of either of the two files on a machine that 'form' the song is not (seemingly) illegal. If the labels come after you for sharing such a file, tell them to sod off as the file in question is worthless without the other file which you did not share at the same time, did you?
The only way the content cartel can get the last word in is to simply make encryption illegal worldwide except for authorized parties.
That means no more legal use of such encryption software like PGP, GPG, CipherSaber, PCP, and the like by the average Internet user.
Just envison the backlash such a move would cause....
Re:How to infringe & NOT get caught. An 'exper (Score:4, Funny)
We're working on it.
-- Your friends at the RIAA
Parent
Re:How to infringe & NOT get caught. An 'exper (Score:3, Informative)
The copyright merely has to "subsist in" the data, not be the recording itself. Even though worthless in isolation, I'm sure this would not hold water in court; it'd be an absurd interpretation of the purpose of the act if the only reason this file existed was to infringe copyright.
Incidentally, the careful choice of the w
Re:How to infringe & NOT get caught. An 'exper (Score:4, Insightful)
- Since the only purpose for distributing the files is to distribute the copyrighted material, it is likely to be legally the same.
- Needing to download two files of the same length as the file you want from different servers is really annoying.
One solution is a large repository of seemingly random data with separately distributed "recipe files" that describe how to rebuild the files you want. If you make the random files sufficently interconnected, you can make it so that any order to stop distributing a specific random looking block of data will prevent numerous legal files from being built in addition to the copywrited data that is targeted.
There are still some problems with that system, mostly in lack of ease of use.
As long as eMule still works, it's unlikely that anyone will actually adopt any system so complex.
Parent
Torrents? (Score:4, Informative)
BitComet's default setting is to use a randomly generated port, and you can switch from port to port with the click of the "Random Port" button as often as you'd like.
Or you can choose to not listen on any ports, if you're like that, but you'll take a hit to the download speed.
MySpleen is one of the greatest torrent communities I've found, and if you're interested in MST3k, ATHF, Venture Bros, or the other Adult Swim 'toons, check us out!
Someone (Score:4, Funny)
stealthier (Score:5, Interesting)
Lately, I've gotten more reports indicating that these ISPs that have been blocking BitTorrent have been using more sophisticated methods of detecting the protocol, by apparently sniffing the initial protocol handshake.
My response was this letter [degreez.net]. The next iteration of the BitTorrent protocol is already being planned, and if this sort of behavior spreads, the new protocol's handshake will be made nearly impossible to sniff out. Yes, it's true BitTorrent is being misused for trading pirated content, but it's also being used for good purposes, such as publishing Linux distros, and in some cases it is practically impossible to obtain content without doing so via BitTorrent.
This will of course make it difficult to meter how much network traffic is being used by BitTorrent, or to throttle it moderately, but the purpose of BitTorrent is to distribute content, and all other concerns come second.
Tips for running a successful Freenet node (Score:5, Informative)
3 Most important ingredients:
Permanent connection
Bandwidth
Disk space
Without these you'll be complaining like the rest. Go ahead and set up a node, but optimum performance is a dream without all 3 above elements. Also, count on 2 days of letting it just run before you'll be able to get much done. After you're integrated things run much more smoothly!
If you're behind a firewall you'll need to know how to setup port forwarding. Windows install is the easiest, GNU systems should be trivial and there's a port for FreeBSD. I believe MacOSX can run it as well. If you can run a modern JavaVM, Freenet should be no trouble for you.
(About firewalls - if your $50 router/NAT/switch thingy cannot handle the hundreds of TCP connections Freenet can generate, you might want to either invest in a dedicated box (OpenBSD works well for me and allows me to prioritize traffic behind my interactive_ssh and vonage queues - Linux floppy distros should be fine too) or specify in freenet.conf to limit the number of open connections. Just be aware as connection tables can overload and distrupt the connection for all behind the NAT. Then again your $50 box may have no trouble at all. Port numbers are all random high port numbers making Freenet difficult to detect and firewall. Connections out will be made but the portforward is necessary for other nodes to connect to you. If nodes can't connect to you, performance will most likely be horrendous.)
If you just install Freenet and immediately try and download large files, you will be frusturated and give up. DON'T! Many freesites will not appear at all. NEVER FEAR! Let your node run in the background for a few days and get itself integrated into the mesh. Nodes that are more useful to the network (fast connection, large data store) will end up the most successful when downloading or uploading content. If you can't leave your machine running all the time or want to use freenet over dialup, fine, but your performance will not match those of others that can provide more to the network. Leeching is fine, it allows others to leech off of you - but leave your machine connected and Freenet's performance may end up suprising you.
Towards the beginning you may just want to start a number of downloads and count on many of them not completing - JUST WALK AWAY or do something else. Don't waste your time. By grabbing whatever bits you can, you'll increase the data in your own datastore and your connections within the network. If others find those bits from your node, your status will increase, more will connect to you and they will then be potential sources for more desired bits of your own. The better connectivity you've got, the more you will find. Leaving your node up at all times and keeping your datastore intact are the best ways to increase Freenet's performance (not just for you but for all).
THOSE PARANOID: I've been running my Freenet node wide open (no throttle) on my Earthlink cable connection in the heart of Raleigh, NC for some time. No threatening letters or trouble, my Vonage works fine (I do use pf's ALTQ) and those in my house have no trouble with connections, download or upload speeds)
For those that are already on Freenet and trying to download large files, one tool is critical. FUQUD [localhost] (Freenet Utility for Queued Uploads and Downloads). Find it. Use it. Fred (the built in web interface) isn't going to cut it.
Regarding disk space. Unless you've got around say 2Gigs to dedicate to a node, your node may not perform as well as it could (200M is practical minimum). Consider the value you choose to be relatively permanant. You can't trade it with other uses - you build a datastore and that's the size, unusable for your MP3's or ogg's for example. They don't grow or shrink. You s
Re:Not unlike (Score:5, Funny)
>Bin Laden
That's no moon... that's a .torrent of Star Wars being hosted on Al-Jazeera.com!
(Allah Ackbar, IT'S A TRAP!)
Parent
Re:I guess (Score:3, Funny)
Well we know what you're downloading now don't we...
Re:What are these clients? (Score:4, Funny)
Parent