

Next-gen Copyright-aware P2P System Whitepaper 280
meier73 writes "A whitepaper has just been released detailing a secure (OpenSSL/digital signatures), copyright-aware P2P network. The paper claims that this system enables legal file trades, something that isn't guaranteed by Kazaa, Morpheus or eDonkey. The whitepaper goes on to state that the long-term goal of this system is to catalog
every human creation in existence that can be expressed by a digital medium. Project stats: a super-computing cluster that will scale to more than 900TB of storage, 300M transactions per day and trade music, television, movies and books.
Doesn't this constitute a responsible and legitimate use of P2P?"
Wonder how long that will last. (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, it's server-based and not 'true' P2P...my mistake.
No one will use it
Kinda sad... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2)
At least change your sig in 'id Software lost $2.75 million to record-breaking piracy on the weekend before Doom 3's release ; And hauled in a few multi million licensing contracts of that same engine ; Thanks Guys !'
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless they can come up with a better selling point than "with added restrictions" then of course nobody will use it.
People who don't want to infringe copyrights are entirely capable of not infringing copyrights. They don't need a system that prevents them doing it.
People who do want to infringe copyrights also obviously don't want a system that prevents them doing it.
Unless there's actually something they do BETTER than the competition then they aren't going to appeal to anyone.
Less noise (Score:2)
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2)
iTunes.
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2, Insightful)
You can take it however you want to, but if you look at the growth of networks that don't care for copyrights (note I said "care", not "honor", since it's ultimately up to the person on the other end, not the means of obtaining it) compared to say, napster (really? does anyone you know use napster?)...what I said is more or less an educated guess on the future of it.
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:5, Insightful)
The dollar figure is just a made up number to throw around to make it sound like ID lost a bunch, there really is no way to know.
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:5, Interesting)
It's just a big number they invented for some pr.
but it is true, if I was _paying_ I wouldn't want to bother with p2p since I'm already _paying_ for it I could easily pay the cent or two that would go into the necessary bandwith to get it from the centralised server and certainly wouldn't bother with donating bandwith to their business volunteraly.
if the material were legal(licensed with $$) and there were a working micropayment(hell, it's not going to be micro when the mpaa/riaa gets around) there wouldn't be need for p2p since you could finance the fat pipes and buying the bandwith from akamai with the money.
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2)
It's more than "a cent or two". Server bandwidth runs around $1/GB, so Doom3 would probably cost $1.50 to download.
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:5, Interesting)
Thus the only version of the game I can run on my system is a pirate version.
Thanks, guys!
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:5, Informative)
In many cases, copy protection like this is forced on developers by the publishers. The devs usually have absolutely nothing to do with it, never even touching (or knowing) the copy protection software used. For all of us, it's very frustrating because we try to provide users with as bug-free an experience as we can get, and then publishers slap a buggy-as-hell copy protection system on and we take the flak. They're the ones who are all paranoid about pirates, while we mostly just want people to have fun playing our game.
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2)
why don't you.... (Score:3, Insightful)
To me, and I'm not a downloader of anything that is gray market, music movies or games,so I got no dog in this fight, I just wonder why they charge those ridiculous prices, when they could severely drop the prices to very cheap and make it on volume sales. Like today, there's no reason music cds couldn't be 3 buck
Re:why don't you.... (Score:2)
Unfortunately, very few developer groups out there have the a good enough financial position to do something like this. Paradox Entertainment [paradoxplaza.com] and a few others that hava a loyal fan base are starting to do this kind of thing, but most other studios are either owned by a big media conglomerate [www.blizzardcom] or just sold out to a big publisher [poptop.com]. id is one of the few developers that has the power to do something like this and is not even trying.
I don't plan to buy the game until id releases the obligatory official patch th
Re:why don't you.... (Score:2)
Recently my bank upgraded their software and was no longer Quicken 2002 compatible. Now, I personally hate the way that Intuit doesn't provide an ability to manually update tax tables on their software, therefore forcing you to buy upgrades year after year. However, I could see how a bank adding features to their service would be a legitimate reason for breaking some compatibility.
I've also been checking out gnucash/kmymoney.
Id's Doom3 (Score:3, Informative)
So I found a tutorial on the internet on how to effectively use a HEX editor on doom3.exe to essentially remove the software protection, or copyright (whate
Re:Id's Doom3 (Score:5, Insightful)
there have been other games (e.g. Painkiller) where you cannot run the game if you have CD writer software installed on your computer.
I'm not talking about actually using the emulation
This is like not being able to play DVDs if you have video codecs installed, just because some dumbfuck company thinks having codecs installed mean you will rip, encode and pirate.
P.S. I don't have to justify anything - since I cannot run the software I don't. I have not pirated the game, or any other game. I have no problem paying for software, but if the software will mess me about and try to say what I can and cannot have installed on my own computer, then I simply take my business elsewhere.
Re:Id's Doom3 [not true[ (Score:2)
I'm not seeing where others have had the problem, and I did a normal install.
Re:Id's Doom3 [not true[ (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Id's Doom3 [not true[ (Score:2)
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:5, Insightful)
The number you show in you sig was never claimed by id software, it was done by some BBC journalist. The id officials never used it - because it is nonsense. The news about "losses by piracy" alone probably were PR (concidering ids cool statements in the same article) worth 2.7 million in sales. And thats not just multipling supanova-downloads (before release) with the game prize. Without a estimate on how many users would buy the game when it hits the stores this number is utterly worthless.
Link to the BBC article about "lost sales" [bbc.co.uk] for reference.
I actually got accused of trolling the other day because of my sig.
well, you are.
You basically admitted that nobody will use it because copyrights are enforced.
No. He says that nobody will use a network which relies on central servers and a registration. Maybe because of:
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2)
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2)
Re:Kinda sad... (Score:2)
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:3, Insightful)
Now here's the hitch, once you download a show, you should be able to burn it to a DVD and keep it. Ideally, the quality should be high enough that you can burn several episodes to a DVD and watch them on your TV, and not notice that t
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:2)
Yeah, they're available for purchase, but they were broadcast for free previously. This is simply time-shifting.
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:2)
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:2)
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:2, Interesting)
Also, clients must be registered with us to be used on the network. We give each piece of software a private key to sign with -- and we won't be giving any keys out to software that violates copyright :).
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:5, Insightful)
make the protocol open, and people will re-write it to exclude the copyrights.
And well they should. I'm not saying that copyright should go away, or anything quite so dramatic, but as soon as you have a system whereby it's possible to physically limit free speech, you no longer have free speach. (Yay free speech zones!). Let the judicial system do what it's supposed to do, prosecute those who deserve to be prosecuted, and stay away from any new forms of enslavement like this...
OT: free speech zones (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:OT: free speech zones (Score:2)
I thought this whole country was a free speech zone. Didn't you?
It's been obvious for some time now that this is no longer the case. I've moved out of the country because of this. I still keep up on politics, and vote to try and make a difference, but, at this time, I have no desire to live in the country I grew up so proud of.
Re:OT: free speech (Very OT, mods please ignore) (Score:2)
France, though it's not so easy to come here. (I was lucky enough to get a temporary contract, so I worked my ass off and they were so happy with my work that they brought me over. At this point, I have an unrestricted work permit, and even if I were to lose my job, I could still find another, or go on unemployment if necessary.)
If you want to try a European country, Ireland is one of the easiest at this point, though if you have any ancestry to call upon, that country usually becomes easier.
I've heard t
Re:OT: free speech zones (Score:2, Troll)
2) Say anything you want and noone will give a shit
3) Perfect democracy!
France? There not only stealing digital content (P2P) is illegal, the government acts against import of foreign content (movies). Some democracy!
What free speech? They yet need to get the right to free watching and listening!
Seriously, get real.
He's moved out of country because it didn't work out for him - it's easier to get by that way than to stay on and fight for your rights.
Any for
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:2)
Well, true P2P or not, it was my impression that networks that can have a few central users on very fast connections (e.g. the original Napster) can perform much better with many people using them, for one thing because each search only has to go to the servers and not through every node. Which is probably (at least one reason) why the old Napster used to work so much better than Gnutella did not long after. With the introduction of supernodes in most P2P schemes, this is probably mitigated somewhat, but
Re:Wonder how long that will last. (Score:2)
Seems like a p2p network that would have lots of clients (pretty much everybody) but few trades because, after all, you can only download what you already have on your PC o
Answer: Wonder how long that will last (mod up) (Score:2, Informative)
The system described in the whitepaper has been implemented - its purpose is to enable anybody on a P2P network to support the artist while trading files legally with their friends and other people on the net. We have a very difficult balancing act to perform: help the artist and fan without removing any o
BitTorrent, Microsoft (Score:4, Insightful)
Strange, as it was recently used as an example of "a responsible and legitimate use of P2P" by distributing Microsoft's Windows XP SP2.
I don't suppose this has anything to do with the SP2 torrent seeds being 'pulled' from the organizer's website at Microsoft's request (read:order) ?
Re:BitTorrent, Microsoft (Score:2)
Didn't Microsoft send a DMCA take-down notice to someone disbributing SP2 with BitTorrent?
Re:BitTorrent, Microsoft (Score:3, Interesting)
This article sounds like more like FUD to distract from the existing file-sharing networks to me. Specific examples of lameness in the article:
"The paper claims that this system enables legal file trades, something that isn't guaranteed"
Their system doesn't "guarantee" it either -- for example even "copyright aware" tech can't know if Linux is covered by SCO copyr
Re:BitTorrent, Microsoft (Score:2)
Their system doesn't "guarantee" it either -- for example even "copyright aware" tech can't know if Linux is covered by SCO copyrights without help.
Their language is misleading. How do you "enable" legal file trades? Simply enabling *any* file trades automatically enables legal trades to happen. They happen all the time. [Un]fortunately, so do illegal file trades which also are enabled by enabling file tra
Re:BitTorrent, Microsoft (Score:2)
It has all the advantages of P2P, combined with the fact that, if you set up the tracker, you know *exactly* what's being distributed. You take load off your servers, users get files faster. Everyone wins. The client is small and has been ported to a gazillon systems aswell.
Re:BitTorrent (Score:2, Interesting)
Probably because it is based on/inspired by BitTorrent. Look at the diagram on page1 (introduction).
The "System load balansers" ARE trackers. The clients can share content, but only under the control of the tracker. What is new is that all connections are encripted.
You can see that if you want to distribute something you should make contract with them (probably not more sophisticated than eBey) and upload the content on their s
All This (Score:4, Funny)
It'll never work :) (Score:5, Funny)
more legitimate uses (Score:2, Informative)
Whitepaper (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Whitepaper (Score:2)
Agreed. In general "whitepaper" == "vacuous proposal".
Editors, you can do much better...
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:But why? (Score:3, Funny)
Furthermore (Score:2)
Great... (Score:3, Funny)
An honorable goal for the good of mankind (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:An honorable goal for the good of mankind (Score:2, Informative)
Re:An honorable goal for the good of mankind (Score:3, Funny)
Re:An honorable goal for the good of mankind (Score:2)
+4 insightful...
The good of mankind... (Score:2)
Not that you directly state that, but it is implied.
If you meant the good of mankind would be served by a more free (as in speech) exchange of intellectual property, then you should engage to act to change the laws and regulations governing, in this case, copyrights - rather than implying the good of mankind lies in breaking those laws and regulations.
( civil disobediance only goes so far, and tends to apply to government )
I have a similiar project.... (Score:4, Funny)
but mine is concentrated mostly on pr0n.
Re:I have a similiar project.... (Score:2, Insightful)
detect copyrighted works? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:detect copyrighted works? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:detect copyrighted works? (Score:2)
Stuff from outside that time frame, obviously. Unless the time frame is 5000 years or so, I'd say the majority of "stuff" people have created is not under copyright.
Re:detect copyrighted works? (Score:2)
I think most of the works we're talking about here are artistic in nature, and I don't see that the rate of production of art has changed greatly as the population has exploded...
Idiotic (Score:4, Insightful)
Also, how will it "detect" copyrighted works? I can just zip up my favorite illegal MP3s and give them a name like "good.zip" and it would have to be manually flagged as "bad".
Re:Idiotic (Score:2)
Hey, I think you just violated the DMCA!
Re:Idiotic (Score:2, Informative)
No problem :).
"If as you say you supply me with a number (say 15) keys so that I can upload an album of my homegrown music (1 key per file if I understand you correctly)."
I must have said something confusing in my last post, I'm sorry. We don't give you keys for uploading music, we give out keys for software.
If you're simply interested in getting your music onto the network, you don't need to worry about keys at all. You simply signup as an artist and upload your mp3's
Verify? (Score:2)
We also make sure that you're the actual owner of whatever works you claim
How do you do that? How can a songwriter know [slashdot.org] that the songs he has written weren't subconsciously copied from something he heard on the radio?
LOVE the pictures on the fourth page (Score:5, Funny)
Note the
Questions about this illustration... (Score:2)
Yup. That's a pretty accurate representation of this system.
Re:LOVE the pictures on the fourth page (Score:2)
Re:LOVE the pictures on the fourth page (Score:2)
It is an interesting idea, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
However, in addition to technical and scale issues mentioned elsewhere, I can see some points of controversy:
Hmm... Come think of it, there's something fishy here. Let's say I download the song and I get to play it as much as I want. Let's assume I can't share it over non-protected P2P, but hey, I can sell it again when I no longer want to listen to it (as if there's no way to copy to another, unencumbered format, but bear with me...) Why on earth should the artist get a piece of it every time the same copy is sold? I understand they are trying to appease to RIAA & Co with this but this is not fair. It's not like they get a dime if I re-sell my CDs.
Furthermore, it may well be that the label claims copyright over the songs, thus keeping any proceeds from methods like this and not really helping the artist.
Very interesting - I would really like to see it or some equivalent take off, but until then I'll wait with plenty of healthy skepticism.
Well, sounds nice but... (Score:5, Insightful)
In the meantime, there are a few sites attempting it on a smaller scale - the Prelinger Archives over on archive.org [archive.org] are definitely worth a look for anyone interested in old American war, educational and propaganda films for example (like the (in)famous "Duck & Cover" movie)...
Re:Well, sounds nice but... (Score:2)
I've bought quite a few public domain movies on DVD. They cost me $5 each. That's to cover the dvd, printing and distribution costs. Which seems fair to me. What I'm interested in is that I can now make a copy of the films on these D
Re:Well, sounds nice but... (Score:2)
Re:Well, sounds nice but... (Score:2)
Hehe (Score:3, Funny)
"P2P whitepaper" indeed (Score:4, Insightful)
Second: How is this P2P when there's a big centralized "Authorization service" in the middle?
And guess who is supposedly running that service? Why the paper's authors..
What about the public domain? (Score:5, Insightful)
If not, then it will create a situation in which only works approved (directly or indirectly) by a cenralized signing authority can be distributed. Bad if such systems become legally mandated.
On the other hand, if unsigned PD works can be distributed, then there's not much point -- you can (via analog holes if nothing else) strip the signature from a copyrighted work and distribute it that way. So there wouldn't be much point.
Flawed: Wont work. (Score:3, Insightful)
Most people will pay for something they really want anyways. Most 'pirated' matterial is ditched. There are cryptographic methods to make micro-payments that don't require a 'bank'. This whole method may look clever to some, but absolutely __nothing__ is new! Don't forget the rule is "try before you buy". This is a general principle of copyright law (fair use) and its not likely to change anytime soon. Internet is 'airplay', 'airplay' is good advertising. When did that change?
Watermarking vector graphics? (Score:2, Interesting)
How would one watermark vector graphics, MIDI files, XML files, or any other file containing discrete expression rather than expression derived by sampling a signal?
Wrong direction... (Score:2)
I don't think MP3 was that important. (Score:2)
Capitalists will sell you rope to hang them with (Score:3, Insightful)
Anyway, I hope the Big Corporations ARE able to control p2p so that copyright material cannot be traded (even though I am a world-class Kazaa and usenet binaries dog myself). Because they once the corporate capitalists have it rigged so that distribution of audiovisual entertainment is all done by networks, client server and p2p, then that will set them up for a Big Fall.
The only reason that America is in the grip of corporate capitalism is that mass media has been able to propagate top-down, business friendly memes into American living rooms. Their community has become hollowed out, and is the domain of the corporations. THat is why we work like dogs compared to citizens of the other western nations.
But when the p2p networks cannot be used to trade copyrighted material for free, then that vacuum, that demand for free movies, documentaries, sitcoms will be filled by "amateurs". And ya know what? With a little practice, and using cheap digital cameras and editing software, and free music, amateur actors, we leftists can crank out entertainment with leftist, bottom-up memes, anti-corporate sentiment, and toss it out on the p2p networks at very little cost.
You think 200 channels of cable tv is a lot? Wait until there are a million channels on the net 4 years from now, when wireless broadband has forced broadband prices down to where 70% of America has broadband.
Steven Spielberg on the upcoming changes:
"Steven Spielberg has forecast that the Internet will eventually become the primary source for entertainment. Appearing on NBC's Today show on Thursday, Spielberg told cohost Katie Couric: "I think that the Internet is going to effect the most profound change on the entertainment industries combined. And we're all gonna be tuning into the most popular Internet show in the world, which will be coming from some place in Des Moines." When Couric remarked, "Great, I'm gonna lose my job," Spielberg interjected, "We're all gonna lose our jobs. We're all gonna be on the Internet trying to find an audience.""
Give Americans a few years where they are not subjected only to top-down corporate memes, and then see where the political direction goes. I think we will head in Sweden's direction....and the Big Corporations will have brought it on themselves through their own greed....
Re:Capitalists will sell you rope to hang them wit (Score:2)
I'm left with only one question: what is sto
Re:Capitalists will sell you rope to hang them wit (Score:2)
I'm going to be a senior at an art college and for my senior project I'm considering starting an online tv network of sorts. The way I see it now, my main competition are sites like atomfilms.com, etc.
I'm curious what business models people think will work for this sort of thing. I was thinking of embedding short, TASTEFUL (think cartoon network style) ads, about 10 seconds or less into the episodes of shows, and maybe at
Priorities... (Score:2)
This is being done to squeeze yet more money out of "consumers" for the copyright creators.
I don't overly fault the creators for doing this. I do fault ourselves for not finding a way to do something similar, although for different ends.
Specifically, referencing page 126 of Lawrence Lessig's Free Culture
"Perhaps the single most importan
Misunderstanding the System (Score:2, Insightful)
As I understand it, the system is not designed to emulate physical sale transactions. When a seller sells a song, for example, the seller is not then deprived of that song. In other words, the seller is not selling the song, but rather their time and bandwidth. This gives users of the system the insentive to continue using the system and help to distrib
How Bitmunk makes its money (Score:3, Interesting)
In addition to a per-transaction fee (a sample one is given as $0.15 on a song perchase), there is this paragraph at the very end of the How It Works Seller [bitmunk.com] document:
You can use the money you earn on Bitmunk to buy digital files that you want, or you can transfer the money in your Bitmunk financial account to a banking institution of your choice. It can take anywhere from two days (if you're a highly trusted seller) to one month (if you're new, are selling newly registered creative works, or have complaints logged against you) to withdraw your money to a banking institution.
So Bitmunk also makes money on interest. Not unreasonable in principle. For example, it defeats the purpose of micropayments if someone's credit card is hit on each purchase. On the other hand, 2 days to 1 month sounds long to outrageously long for a modern system. And much like a brokerage account, one might additionally expect interest for funds held there over some length of time.
great timing (Score:2, Interesting)
A proposal for a collective licensing scheme, complete with technical infrastructure.
Criteria:
1. minimizes the changes required to existing and future software
2. capable of being securely implemented in software released under open-source licenses.
3. runs on existing hardware and networks without modification
4. preserves the capability to innovate new software and hardware
5. provides consumers with the digital content access to which they have become accu
Bit torrent meets Napste v1.0 (Score:2, Interesting)
Perhaps files could be submitted to them reviewed and then authorized to enter the network. If it really t
MULTIMEDIA Wiki. NOW. (Score:2)
Makes me want MULTIMEDIA WIKI NOW. Edited / uploaded by everyone, for everyone. Like the articles on the normal wiki, just with image, sound, videos and everything else.
All we need is some geek to setup one of those popular wikis with a donate now button. I'm confident donations would pay the bandwidth..
corparight (Score:2)
There must be a balance against information monopolies currently protected by government.
The reaction could be:
-complain loudly enough so the goverment changes law to greatly limit the period over which a corporation can expoit information. ha.
-throw the tea back. Don't drink the tea, or download the tea and
Re:Just a giant sales organization ? (Score:2)
3 ways.
1. Use the <br> tag. As in HTML Just put it at the end of a line, where you want a line break.
2. Start your post with a <p> tag. Then just type away, it will be displayed as typed.
3. Change the post type (in the drop down box below the text box) to Plain old text, and then type as normal. The default can be set in your profile.
Re:Why EVERY human creation? (Score:2)
Or is the network going to require each participant to submit to a psychoanalytical examination before, during, and after use?
Pay attention here... it is completely and totally impossible to institute _ANY_ kind of technological measures to stop people from being dishonest, so the chance this technology has of actually