Kazaa to be shut down?

darkpriest writes "According to this article on The Register, the file sharing software KazaA has been ordered to cease copyright infringment. They have two weeks to comply with the Judges ruling or face a penalty of $40,000 a day." CD: We've gotten a number of submissions about this, I had no idea Kazaa was this popular (must be all those a's in their name). I bet anyday that the RIAA will sue cisco for making routers that could be used to infringe.

Comments

Popularity

[spectral]

Actually, according to download.com, kazaa and morpheus (which are the same program/network, really..) are the top two most downloaded programs.. Which makes me wonder if it's just Kazaa that was ordered to cease and desist, or does musiccity have to comply also? It's the same p2p network, with decentralized servers (I believe? I don't know all that much about their network), unlike napster's centrally controlled server farms.

Re:Popularity

[nsample]

We did a study in the P2P group at Stanford two months ago... with pretty interesting results. Kazaa (as monitored through a Morpheus client gateway) consistently topped out at over 50 terabytes of data and peeked at just over 1.1 million active clients. It's becoming truly ubiquitous, and it's growth rates (in terms of both users and size) indicate that they will be the unquestionable king of P2P in short order.

It's pretty clear that it's a big part of the reason they're being targetted by the BSA, RIAA, etc. currently... I can only hope that University research into these things doesn't fuel the corporate interests backing the anti-P2P movement.

Until we get universal television stations...

[bonoboy]

This will just keep happening.

Ok, maybe people will always want something for free, but the Internet file-sharing phenomenon is the single best argument for having simultaneous worldwide release of as many products as possible.

Now, to you North Americans, this isn't such a big issue, and you've probably never given it much thought. But to a native New Zealander and resident Australian like myself, who knows the pain of waiting a year or two to see episodes of Buffy (etc, etc, etc) that you could easily download for free, it is of paramount importance!

And another thing: a buddy of mine is a technical director on LOTR, and it's supposed to be a simultaneous worldwide release on December 19th. How is it then, that in Austalia, it's being released on December 26th? Was he wrong, or is the Australian Motion Picture League of Bastards screwing us again??

Re:Until we get universal television stations...

[Sloppy]

And another thing: a buddy of mine is a technical director on LOTR, and it's supposed to be a simultaneous worldwide release on December 19th. How is it then, that in Austalia, it's being released on December 26th?

That sucks! By the time you get to see it on the 26th, you'll have been exposed to a week's worth of spoilers from the internet, so you'll already know that Sauron Did It.

Re:Until we get universal television stations...

[mpe]

Ok, maybe people will always want something for free, but the Internet file-sharing phenomenon is the single best argument for having simultaneous worldwide release of as many products as possible.

What you are effectivly arging for would be a consumer/retailer "globalisation". Which would also do away with the concept of "grey imports", things such as DVD region coding and other ways in which large multinationals attempt to divide up the market (when it suits them.)

Now, to you North Americans, this isn't such a big issue, and you've probably never given it much thought. But to a native New Zealander and resident Australian like myself, who knows the pain of waiting a year or two to see episodes of Buffy (etc, etc, etc) that you could easily download for free, it is of paramount importance!

There appear to be two issues here. The first is an apparent requirement for the first showing to be in North America in many cases (more often the US than Canada dispite a lot of programme production taking place in Canada.) The other is that series are shown in an utterly strange sequence in North America. Such that if every series started showing at the same time worldwide it would be people from the US and Canada who would be clammering to download episodes they wouldn't get to see for a while on TV. Or youd have the rest of the world being showr series North American style which viewers in the rest of the world simply will not accept.
Effectivly we have a case of trying to make new technology emulate the limitations of the old way of doing things. Because the industry does not want to reconsider their business models.

eyepatch department?

[Have Blue]

Sorry, chrisd, it is piracy unless you own the originals.

Re:eyepatch department?

[Accelerated Joe]

Sorry, chrisd, it is piracy unless you own the originals.

In this one specific area, I definitely agree with Richard Stallman. Piracy is a marketing word, with many connotations. I wish the community would use terms more like "unauthorized copying" or "illegal copies". Even plagiarism sounds better than piracy, semantically. The english language can in its current form duplicate many of the worst features of doublespeak.

Re:eyepatch department?

[Elbereth]

Unfortunately, calling people out on their arguments doesn't really do any good on Slashdot. People don't want easy accessible music; they want free music. They don't want lower prices; they want to get something for nothing.

If you're going to pirate something, at least admit to yourself that you're ripping off someone, not a victimized consumer standing up his rights.

Gimme a break.

Re:eyepatch department?

[Rogerborg]

• If you're going to pirate something, at least admit to yourself that you're ripping off someone

And there's the problem. To you, it's utterly clear that this is "ripping off", by which I assume you mean theft, that I am depriving someone of something which they have or to which you think they are absolutely entitled. You believe that I should see it this way, and that I am merely fooling myself, or pretending to fool myself otherwise.

The problem is, you're wrong on all counts. You're wrong that I'm fooling myself, and you're wrong that it's theft. I'll just assert that latter one, because that's all you did. It's clearly obvious to me that if the copyright owner (a music company, not an artist) failed to persuade me to pay the amount that they demand for access to the work on their terms, then they've already lost the sale, and so there's nothing left for me to deprive them of.

So you can sit there wagging your finger sternly and saying "This is right, this is wrong, that's the way it's always been, that's the way it always will be" while a new generation of music listeners sniggers quietly behind their hands - or laughs out loud at you - and gets on with doing what people have really always done, which is to redefine both morality and legality by the weight of their actions and opinions.

Re:eyepatch department?

[elflord]

And there's the problem. To you, it's utterly clear that this is "ripping off", by which I assume you mean theft, that I am depriving someone of something which they have or to which you think they are absolutely entitled. You believe that I should see it this way, and that I am merely fooling myself, or pretending to fool myself otherwise.

The real issue here is, how should authors of creative works be compensated ? The advocates of Napster appear to believe that they are entitled to free entertainment, and that no-one is morally obliged to compensate authors whose works they benefit from. Authors, they believe, should work without compensation. However, most of these leeches would fiercely object if their employer decided that they shouldn't be compensated for their labor.

The problem is, you're wrong on all counts. You're wrong that I'm fooling myself, and you're wrong that it's theft. I'll just assert that latter one, because that's all you did.

No he didn't. You asserted it on his behalf.

while a new generation of music listeners sniggers quietly behind their hands - or laughs out loud at you - and gets on with doing what people have really always done, which is to redefine both morality and legality by the weight of their actions and opinions.

No, they are defining "morality" by retroactively inventing half-assed rationalisations for immoral actions, and they're not the first people to do it.

Re:eyepatch department?

[tb3]

Piracy is an act of robbery committed at sea. Any other use of the word is an attempt to make a minor crime sound a lot more heinous than it really is. Thank the spin doctors at the BSA, MPAA, and RIAA for this wonderful use of language.

Re:eyepatch department?

[Greg W.]

OK, I'll take the bait.

People don't want easy accessible music; they want free music.

Of course we do. Who wouldn't want free stuff?

But there's more to it than that. A lot more.

First of all, we want to be able to hear the music in the first place. Have you tried listening to commercial radio lately? For how long? The simple fact is that if we want to hear something that's been mentioned by a friend (either in "real life" or online), we can't get it from the radio. Radio doesn't play anything that anyone would ever recommend to anyone else. It's simply a marketing arm of the record companies trying to increase sales of the Pop-Star-of-The-Month.

Let's say I tell you how much I loved Tori Amos's third album Boys For Pele. Are you going to rush to the store and buy it based on that recommendation? Probably not. You'll at least want to hear it for yourself first.

So what choices does that give you?

1. Turn on the local alternative radio station and wait for them to play Tori. Hah! The last time I heard anything I'd describe as "alternative" on the radio was about 5 years ago. There aren't any "alternative" format stations in Cleveland now. There's one station that plays Limp Bizkit rap/metal, but nothing that plays "adult alternative" like Tori or REM. Nothing.
2. Turn on MTV and wait for them to play Tori. A-HAHAHA! See above. And below.
3. Turn on M2. What M2? Where is it on my cable channel list? Oh yeah, it's not there. If MTV wanted me to hear music, they'd play some fucking music instead of "reality shows". They wouldn't have moved all the music to a different channel that nobody actually gets. They'd just play music on MTV, and then put all the crap TV on the other station. But that's not what they want to do -- they don't want to play music any more. They want to show crap, because they think crap generates more money for them. Maybe it does -- but it's sure as hell not my money that they're pulling in.
4. Find samples on CDNOW or some other online vendor. This is sometimes feasible, but your chances of getting a sample of decent length (e.g., a whole song) are pretty low. The samples also tend to be low quality recordings. But the worst problem here is that they tend to be shackled in one or more ways. They may require you to submit an email address so they can spam you. Or they may require you to turn on Javascript and cookies. Or they may disallow access from non-Microsoft web browsers. Or they may release samples only in Microsoft/Real media formats (Real Audio, WMA, etc.). So you can't play them on Linux, even if you can download them in the first place, which is problematic.
5. You could buy a CD, listen to it a few times, and then return it to the store. Most stores don't let you do this. And even if you did, you're costing the store money for your own convenience. It's basically dishonest, and real people will be hurt by your actions. That makes it wrong.
6. You could find a copy of the song on an independent promotional site (what you're calling "pirate") and download it and listen to it. The problem here is that you might not find the song, and you might not be able to get it quickly (independent music promoters tend to have low-bandwidth upstream Internet links, like cable modems) or reliably (cable modems, dial-up). The ripping or the encoding (or both) might be flawed, or low-quality.
7. You could find a friend in meatspace who has the CD, and ask him or her to let you borrow it, or to make a copy for you. This has the obvious drawback that it only works if you happen to know someone who has the CD.

Which of these have the greatest likelihood of letting you hear the music? Probably the last two. Which have the greatest likelihood of leading to a monetary transaction between you and the artist? Well, none of them, so let me rephrase. Which of them have the greatest chance of getting you to send money to the record company who, in theory, passes money on to the artist? Probably #5: if you buy a CD from the store, all you have to do to "make a purchase" is keep it instead of returning it. But #6 is also good: if you like that Ogg file you downloaded, you might decide to buy a CD.

You sure as hell aren't going to be enriching the artist or the record company if you follow any of the first 3 models. And #4 is potluck, and your odds have gotten worse over time. #7 will depend on whether you got a cassette copy from your friend, or a burned CD, or whether you just borrowed his CD with the intention of returning it. If you got a burned CD copy, you may just keep that instead of buying your own.

So by my reckoning, downloading "pirate" music is at least the second-best money-making promotional model there is (or possibly the best) for the type of music that isn't played on commercial radio and MTV.

And that's at least 99% of all the music in the world.

If you're going to pirate something, at least admit to yourself that you're ripping off someone, not a victimized consumer standing up his rights.

If you're going to troll slashdot users, at least admit to yourself that you're a tool of the record companies and their hired public relations psychologists. And that you're helping them rip off 99% of the musicians in the world by systematically destroying all but the 1% who achieve "Star" status and therefore simply die poor instead of flat broke.

If you'd rather help artists, then donate money directly to them, or buy CDs straight from the artists instead of through the record companies (for the artists who are able to do that).

Re:eyepatch department?

[StormyMonday]

The real issue here is, how should authors of creative works be compensated ?

No. The real issue is "how should the owners of creative works be compensated?". Music nowadays (at least for the big labels) is "work for hire". The musicians have no ownership rights to the music. Anything that goes to the creators is a matter of contract negotiations, and, I suspect, creative accounting. (The average musician is no more an accountant than the average accountant is a musician.)

None of the money that you pay for a CD goes directly to the musicians. (Unless, of course, you listen to indie bands, like sensible people.) It goes to the label, who determines how much the band gets.

more info...

[thanq]

There is a little bit more information about it on cnet:

http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-8022666.html? tag=mn_hd

although it does not contain too many facts beyond the actual case and the judgement.

Distributors aren't responsible for content, no??

[Djere]

I seem to recall the music industry railing pretty hard against being held responsible for artists' content. They just distribute content, they're not responsible for filtering it to make sure nothing bad is in there.

Of course, the difference is that music is protected speech, but from a logical standpoint, it's a pretty ... unusual. Of course, thinking that our laws should have some kind of logic to them is a sure path to madness.

-djere
"Where subtlety fails us, we must simply resort to cream pies."

Re:Not decentralized?

[DarkZero]

It's mostly decentralized (I believe there are some moderately large servers hosted by the program's creators that handle a lot of traffic), but they're identifiable. As long as there's someone for the RIAA to tell, "Stop making new versions of this program, and try to get rid of what's already there or you'll go to jail/be fined into poverty!", these services can be stopped. What we really need is for someone to make a P2P program anonymously and then get it to download.com or something without EVER letting their name be known. When that happens (coupled with a decentralized network, of course), we'll have a truly immortal form of P2P.

I't s a Dutch court making the order..

[Bitsy Boffin]

For those who didn't read the artikle, it's a Dutch court who ordered the Dutch company to cease & desist.

More to the point, Kazaa (the file sharing system) and FastTrack (the network (and libraries for accessing it)) are one and the same, so this should also affect Morpehus and Grokster (not to mention the buggy linux Kazaa client) !

This is bad bad news. Quick to the Kazaa before it goes away !

Re:I't s a Dutch court making the order..

[psych031337]

This is bad bad news. Quick to the Kazaa before it goes away !

...and the good news is, that it will take at least two weeks. Also the court has ordered the IFPI (the Dutch RIAA companion) to hold talks with "Consumer Empowerment" (the company that developed FastTrack protocol on which all clients rely) about the formation of a legal music-distribution service.

So there might be a lot of water flowing down the Rhine before something happens. And then again, it is a Durch court. They are not really known to be a corporate whores. Hell, they smoke pot in that country so you might as well expect a sensible outcome from this...

Cisco is too big for the bully

[CaptainCarrot]

From chrisd: I bet anyday that the RIAA will sue cisco for making routers that could be used to infringe.

The RIAA is very careful to only pick on groups that can't afford better lawyers than they can. I wish they would sue; Cisco might well succeed in creating some sort of binding precedent that would put a stop to all this nonsense. The RIAA will never do that, of course...

Re:Cisco is too big for the bully

[NearlyHeadless]

From chrisd: I bet anyday that the RIAA will sue cisco for making routers that could be used to infringe.

The RIAA is very careful to only pick on groups that can't afford better lawyers than they can. I wish they would sue; Cisco might well succeed in creating some sort of binding precedent that would put a stop to all this nonsense. The RIAA will never do that, of course...

What crap! The law makes the distinction all the time between things whose main use is illegal and things that incidentally can be used for breaking the law. Laws against selling burglary tools have not been used to prosecute Ace Hardware.

All the cases Slashdot has covered--DeCSS, Napster, Sklyarov, KazaA, the one in Korea--are programs designed primarily to enable mass copyright infringement, even though they also have non-infringing uses. Get over this straw man argument that next they'll be coming after Cisco and FTP. It's nonsense.

Re:Cisco is too big for the bully

[Sarcasmooo!]

Explain to me what the difference is. You can use search engines to find copyrighted work to download from FTP's and websites. The only difference I see is that P2P programs are designed to funnel those people who want to share media and information on the internet into one place. Maybe you're just trolling, because it's rediculous to suggest that any of these programs were designed for copyright infringement. None of them come with programs for cracking copy-protections, or links to warez and cracking sites. Many could have that information automatically pop-up on a browser in the program, and they don't. What's nonsense is the way that programs like these, that have very substantial, legit uses, are being shutdown as an excuse for fighting 'pirates'. The end result is just to give the industry control of online sharing of media. Think about it; since you apparently haven't done enough of that. Any P2P program that pops up is going to immediately have users who share the mainstream popular media that the industry claims to be protecting. There are 500,000 people who have the latest Britney Spears album on mp3. No one who ever used Napster or Kazaa needed it to find music and video owned by the RIAA/MPAA. What those popular programs provided, was so much goddamn quantity that you could spend the whole day listening to garage bands and obscure music you heard in a commercial when you were 5 years old. Without these programs, artists who try to use the internet to spread their work become victims of an 'anti-piracy' war, and it's not a coincidence. Because now, P2P programs will stay small and obscure (grow and get sued), and we return to the pre-internet status-quo where you either do business with the RIAA or you don't do business.

Re:Cisco is too big for the bully

[CaptainCarrot]

You're ignorant.

DeCSS? Explicitly developed to enable playing DVDs on Open Source computers with DVD drives. It's hardly practical to share full-length movies over networks or even to store them locally on hard drives -- although you should note that the latter use is not infringing. I for one can't think of a single use for DeCSS that's infringing under the traditional doctrine of fair use, given the current practical technological limitations. It may well be in violation of the DMCA, but that's a seriously broken law that undermines rights that consumers of intellectual property have enjoyed for a very long time. The DMCA isn't Norweigian law, anyway.

Skylarov? His product is entirely legal in the country where he wrote it. In fact, without his company's product it's Adobe's software that's illegal. It's against the law to erect technological barriers to fair use in Russia, but that's what Adobe's so-called encryption does. It's his company that ought to have been held accountable for marketing the product in the US where it was illegal; Skylarov himself as an employee had nothing to do with that. If he's guilty of anything, it's of demonstrating that Adobe's claims about the security of their encryption scheme was a total crock. Embarrassing corporations isn't illegal -- yet.

Peer-to-peer networks? All of them run on top of the Internet, which, in the event you haven't noticed, is one vast peer-to-peer network designed for freely sharing information. None of the other indexing schemes for available information, such as Gopher or even some web pages, are not fundamentally different from networks like Gnutella.

Yawn.

[drix]

Now seems like an opportune time to remind everybody that the FastTrack protocol was reverse-engineered some months ago by these guys (definitely a highly impressive RE feat, IMHO). gIFT is a fully functional, open source FastTrack implementation which happily coexisted with Kazaa and Morpheus until FastTrack decided to break it by further obfuscating their protocol. Which is a shame, because in doing so they make the FastTrack protocol reliant on centrally run servers to obtain a cryptographic key... this is all covered in detail on the gIFT website. Long story short, Kazaa can go down in flames for all I care, even though I use it almost every day. gIFT is in the public domain and here to stay. It's not ever going to be taken away from us. It works like a charm. It's decentralized. And it's just waiting to load up on content so it can gain that critical mass of users needed for widespread acceptance. Kind of a chicken or the egg problem, I suppose. So my advice to everyone is to start running gIFT and develop OpenFT network. This sounds like bluster but it's true for the time being: gIFT is the be-all-end-all of P2P filesharing.

Not decentralized...

[StormySky]

I don't think any of the MusicCity protocol clients are decentralized. Or are our peers serving up those ADs? There was file sharing prior to Napster and friends --- anyone remember the days of searching Audiogalaxy for ftp sites, or, IRC? The problem with all the current crop of 'solutions' out there are that they're huge targets (Morpheus/Kazaa), don't work very well (gnutella), are good ideas but fail to work even a quarter of the time (Freenet) or are absolute utter crap (Mojonation). Any system designed specifically for file sharing will *have* to be a target to the idiots who don't comprehend that the genie's out of the bag. Notice that they're not tackling file trading on IRC, or, heck, even usenet as hard? I wonder what's going to happen when there's a nice convenient client that does chat (100% legit use), IMs (100% legit use) AND allows one to search for files of any type, without advertising and central servers? Certainly something I'd love to code if I could figure out, and something that would be near impossible to 'take down'. (Yes, the devil is in the details, but it is feasible, if you think about it.) Surely at some point there will be a p2p client not operated by any company (read: target), and even the RIAA and friends would eventually have to admit the futility of shutting down millions of nodes... especially when you can't identify easily which people are just chatting and which are actually trading files.

Centralized Servers == Bad

[E1ven]

The hard part about this is that the FT stack was designed to be distributed, like Gnutella.
There is not central server, like there was with Napster.

It's all peer->peer->Superpeer, where the SuperClient helps to route things, solving the scaling problems of Gnutella.

So there isn't a Server to shut down.
A least, there never USED to be.

When GiFT came out, Kazaa and Morpheus switched to authorizing people through a centralized sever, before accessing the peer->peer network.

Coincidentally, shortly after they implemented this filter, they were sued.

Let's look who's been sued over this.
Napster, Imesh, Kazaa post-auth server
Who hasn't been sued
Bearshare, Limewire, Kazaa pre-auth server, GiFT, Freenet, WinMX

It seems that the RIAA knows that they don't have a chance of shutting down a network that doesn't use a central server, so they aren't trying.

You may also have a stronger legal case that way. In the napster hearings, one of the key points was that napsters servers let it happen. Napster had control.

I think that what we're learning from this is if you never touch the packets yourself, just release the client and hope for the best, you're in much safer waters.

Colin

Re:Centralized Servers == Bad

[nabucco]

Yes - Fasttrack (Kazaa/Morpheus) has centralized servers which require authentication, which means it's easy to shut down, like Napster was. Gnutella (Bearshare, Limewire) has no such centralization/authentication, which makes it near impossible to shut down. It's protocol is published, so anyone can write an open source or commerical application to access Gnutella. Gnutella server/clients (servents) are popular - Bearshare and Limewire are the 10th and 11th most popular downloads on Download.com, and both have been on the top 50 list for longer than Kazaa or Morpheus. Gnutella developers have been working together and seperately to solve problems such as automatically getting high-speed hosts into the center of the network, preventing too much freeloading, allowing multi-sourced downloading and so forth. They have already had success in all of these areas. The protocol is published, and there are many excellent Gnutella server/clients that are open sourced (Limewire, Gnucleus, gnut etc.)

I find publishing networks like Freenet and Mojo Nation interesting as well. They are not as functional as Gnutella or FastTrack networks currently, but they are very interesting. Freenet gets a lot of press, but in my opinion Mojo Nation is much more functional currently, and has had more development put into it. If you are interested in P2P networks, you should download Mojo Nation to see how much crazy stuff they have already put into it. Mojo Nation is the most functional publishing network I've seen thus far, and it's quite interesting. It's more for techies interested in the possibilities of P2P however, for functionality, stick with Gnutella.

WinMX

[DarkZero]

For anyone that's unfortunately bound to Windows and is looking for a new file sharing service to jump to, I'd recommend WinMX. It's a great P2P program that has always had whatever I'm looking for (and what I look for is pretty damn obscure, i.e. Asian pop and such), yet has still remained firmly under the radars of the RIAA and MPAA. Of course, at the rate the RIAA is going, every currently existing P2P program will be gone eventually (though they will be replaced with new ones in the mean time), but I estimate that you'll get at least six or ten months of use, and possibly much more, out of this one.

And by the way, for those that are modding this... I do not work for WinMX in any capacity, nor do I have any financial or personal stake in it. I'm just trying to help the people that looked at this article and thought, "Well, damn. What's left for me to go to now that doesn't suck?".

Not according to my dictionary.

[Error27]

From THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARY ((C)1911 Released April 15 1993) [devils]:

PIRACY, n. Commerce without its folly-swaddles, just as God made it.

openFT an alternative?

[fault0]

Last I heard, not only were the giFT folks made an open sourced version of fasttrack (used by both kazaa and morpheus), but also, they were developing openFT, which is compeletely independent of kazaa, so if it were to go down, then we could still use it. there'd be no way to block it either, and it works much better (as in more reliably) than gnutella.

note that a few days after kazaa blocked giFT, they were sued by the RIAA. this was because they switched to a partially centralized network from a network that had previously only used central servers for authentication (which giFT had never used).

yeh, apparently these apps arn't server dependent

[DABANSHEE]

Fast-track (Kazar, Morpheus, Grokster) apparently use some sort of P2P 'supernode' setup, where clients on computers with large bandwidth (like on-campus student networks) act as 'supernode', ie they act as servers, transparently to the user/s.

Also Xolox uses the Gnutella network, so each client behaves like a transparent server.

Because of that, you log on right now & even though Xolox says that they have shutdown because of the legal situation, the app still searches/downloads/uploads files perfectly well via the Gnutella network.

So as far as my take on this is concerned, all these law suites can do is stop new revisions of these apps - they can't stop people using these apps even if the licensies/distributers of those apps shutdown.

Good riddance to spyware

[Sarcasmooo!]

I don't like the copyright cartel anymore than most people here; in fact I probably hate them a lot more than most people do. But I also hate having spyware installed on my system without my knowledge. Like Kazaa does with Cydoor. So to all the guys at Kazaa, you can't see it, but at this very instant I'm giving you the big middle finger.

Multiple A Logic

[Jugalator]

"I had no idea Kazaa was this popular (must be all those a's in their name)."

Proof That A's Don't Determine Popularity

Kazaa = 3 A's.

RIAA + MPAA = 4 A's.

Still, Kazaa is more popular than RIAA and MPAA together.

This post is XHTML 1.0 compliant!

Slashdot editors live under rocks?

[Trepidity]

I had no idea Kazaa was this popular

It's good to see Slashdot editors keep up with technology. FWIW, the FastTrack network (through the Kazaa and Morpheus clients) has consistently been the single largest bandwidth user amongst colleges and universities for the past few months.

webwereld.nl

[leuk_he]

The register points to this article on webwereld.nl . Since i am not aware of any automated translaters:

Rechter: KaZaA over twee weken dicht
judge:Kaza must close in 2 weeks

This is the remarkable outcome of a "kort geding" (court where outcome is in a short time) between kazaA and music right organisation "Buma/Stemra". If kazaa does not comply they must pay 100.00 guildens (~45.000 euro) a day with a max of 2 Million guildens. This outcome can end the Kazaa, that is one of the biggest music exchane services since the departure of napster.

The judge also dertermined that BUMA/stemra must meet with Kazaa to negotiate a contract where Kaaza can legaly offer misc via the internet. Accoridng to kazaa there was already a oral agreement with the buma/stemra the they canceled the engotioations.

Loyer Christiaan Alberdingk Thijm sees the judgement as a vicotry , in spite of the closing threat. "it is fantastic that they have to negotioate with us again. That means we still have enough time to make an agreement."
...

about the passage in the verdict about the "auteursrecht" [copy right? ] he is less to speak. "in the verdict is that kazaa breachtes the copyright. This is nonsense. The users are responsible for this. With the same argument one could close the suppliers of video recorders"

. . . appeal. . .

according to Alberdingk Thijm the verdict only has consequense for the software. This means that the network where also morpheur and grokster make use of stay 'open'. Poeple who already have installed kazaa soule be able to continue with using the network.

.
.
.
Buma/stemra did not react. "we do that when we studied the verdict"

[sorry for speliing errors and parts left out]

It's no big deal ...

[uebernewby]

... really.

The RIAA (well, in this case their Dutch counterparts BUMA/STEMRA, actually) are fighting a losing battle, as they probably know very well. At least, they should know this from looking at recent events surrounding napster.

First, there's a thing called GNUtella. Doesn't work very well, but it works, but, well, it doesn't work very well. Then, for a while (how long did Napster actually last? A few months or so?) something comes along that does the same as GNUtella, but it's much easier to use. So everyone switches over, because, well, freedom and decentralization are nice ideas and all, but ease of use is nice too. For a few months, everyone uses the ultra friendly Napster thing 'till the RIAA takes note and sues Napster. Exit Napster. Tons of internet (l)users have, however, by now learnt of the joys of P2P filesharing, so they go to GNUtella, which may suck, but it's still better than nothing.

Along comes FastTrack (KaZaa/Morpheus/Grokster). It's really easy to use, so everyone and their mom installs it. For a few months, users are happy. Then the RIAA takes note, orders FastTrack shutdown ... you can finish the rest.

This will keep happening until the RIAA finally gives up. Since that's rather unlikely, the cycle "sucky Gnutella -> nice GUI app -> nice GUI app shut down -> sucky Gnutella" will continue forever.

Re:Time to unholster the clue stick

[ZxCv]

If there exists a law that blatantly contradicts the constitution, is that law actually valid?

Yup, unfortunately. It depends on where the jurisdiction of the law is, but it requires some court (usually the Supreme Court) to overturn it before its actually invalid.

Some background on the FT network

[jquirke]

The FastTrack network has a very scalable two-level structure. Every computer on the network is initially a 'node', however nodes with significant bandwidth are promoted to 'supernode' status.

The KaZaa/Morpheus servers handle logging in and refer the node to a supernode, where the node sends its list of files it wants to share. These super-nodes store these lists, and search queries are forwarded to the supernodes.

A supernode also gives the lists of some of the clients its connected to, so if the supernode disappears nodes can talk to other nodes about supernodes without getting kicked off the network.

So, effectively the network is controlled by the supernodes, which can be just ordinary PCs with reasonable bandwidth. The KaZaa servers only handle the logging in pretty much, so I doubt the FastTrack network could ever technically be shut down. Unfortunately the FastTrack protocol is very proprietary, and uses some closed-source algorithms. It would be good to see someone create an open-source 'equivalent' of the p2p protocol with the excellent features of FastTrack.

Anyway that's just my understanding of the FastTrack network, correct me if I'm wrong.

Re:Some background on the FT network

[steve_bryan]

The open protocol equivalent of the FastTrack network is Gnutella. From all appearences the FastTrack network uses a slightly modified gnutella protocol. It is tricky to pin down exactly what improves the FastTrack experience but I would say it is the two-tiered network where only the supernodes have the responsibility of routing most packet traffic.

Ironically this modification of the gnutella protocol was introduced about a year ago by Clip2 when they introduced their Reflector. FastTrack made the observation that this sort of enhancement should be an organizing principle for the entire network rather than a marginal enhancement. It helps to minimize network traffic while extending network visibility horizon by orders of magnitude (by the ratio of nodes : supernodes).

Even as these events transpire the various gnutella clients are in the process of implementing the two layer structure in a very public presentation and review of the needed protocol modifications. Simultaneously we are in the process of adding full file hash values in order to improve the quality of files that can be found and downloaded over gnutella. When hash information has been successfully deployed on the gnutella network we will also be able to implement swarm downloads.

It is a slower process to have a public protocol evolve to respond to empirical results for a variety of clients. But in the end it might be a more robust method.

ARRRRRRRR

[Asicath]

I didnt even know ye olde Kazaa werrrre arrround. arrrrrrrh. - A music Pirate

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Better(?) translation of original webwereld.nl art

[toadnine]

A more complete and better(?) translation of the webwereld.nl article.

Judge: KaZaA must close in two weeks

Thursday, 29 November 2001 - KaZaA must stop making copyright infringements of music artists in two weeks with, a judge decided today.

That's the remarkable outcome of summary proceedings between KaZaA and Buma/Stemra [Dutch RIAA]. If KaZaA ignores the decision they are forced to pay 100,000 Dutch guilders per day, with a maximum of 2 million guilders [1 NLG = about 0.40 USD]. The verdict can mean the end of KaZaA, the largest peer to peer network after Napster.

The judge also decided Buma/Stemra must negotiate with KaZaA within two days about a treaty that will allow KaZaA to legally 'distribute' music. According to KaZaA there already was an oral agreement with Buma/Stemra when Buma/Stemra canceled negotiations at the last moment.

Victory

KaZaA's lawyer, Christiaan Alberdingk Thijm sees the verdict as a victory, despite the threat of KaZaA being forced to close. "It's of course really nice that Buma/Stemra has to negotiate with us again. That means we still have enough time to make an agreement.

Whether Buma/Stemra and KaZaA will be able to make an agreement within two weeks, Alberdingk Thijm can't say. "I find it difficult to estimate"

But Alberdingk Thijm isn't happy about the passage in the verdict about copyright infringement. "The passage says that KaZaA itself makes copyright infrigments. That's of course nonsense. The users of KaZaA are responsible for that. You could also close down companies that make VCR's with that argument."

Appeal

"You can only have a point when you say KaZaA gives users the possibility to break copyrights, the same argument used against Napster. I have the feeling the judge bungled that part of the verdict", says Alberdingk Thijm.

Thus KaZaA is thinking to appeal against that part of the verdict. "But before we make a decision we'll have to study the verdict again, calmly."

According to Alberdingk Thijm the verdict only has consequences for KaZaA's software. That means the network the company uses [FastTrack], which is also used by Morpheus (MusicCity) and Grokster, will stay 'open'.

People who already installed KaZaA on their computer, would still be able to use the network. KaZaA doesn't use central servers [they do! but it's still 'optional'] as Napster did, so stopping the service is difficult.

Buma/Stemra doesn't want to comment the verdict yet. "We will do that after wes tudied the verdict thoroughly", as George Knops of Buma/Stemra says.

Copyright (c) 2001 - WebWereld / Maarten Reijnders

Translation by Eelco Lempsink

Re:Popularity (Here's How)

[FatChuck]

If I'm a judge, it's supremely easy to shut down Kazaa, et al. First, I shut down the servers where the program is downloaded because it leads to contributory copyright infringement, -or- I order Kazaa to come out with a new version of their software and force all previous versions to not work with the "decentralized" servers. Second, I mandate that the Kazaa people incorporate filters into their servers to screen out copyrighted files as happened with Napster. If they fail to comply with my orders, I fine 'em and jail 'em for contempt of court or massive copyright infringement.

Last, remember that Kazaa and their ilk are *not* truly p2p networks - the software they run *does* require that the program check in with Kazaa occasionally. Sure, Joe Hacker can bypass that, but good luck running this p2p network when 98 of every 100 people are off of it because they aren't hackers.

OpenFT is what you seek!

[WD]

It would be good to see someone create an open-source 'equivalent' of the p2p protocol with the excellent features of FastTrack.

Try OpenFT / giFT.

Its what you get for supporting a closed network..

[Jagasian]

...support GNUtella instead. Noone can shut down that network, short of shutting down millions of users.

How the FastTrack P2P stack works (with pictures)

[wideangle]

Much like Napster and Gnutella, search results in Morpheus contain the IP addresses of peers sharing the files that match the search criteria, and file downloads are purely peer-to-peer. As is the case with Gnutella, file transfers are via the HTTP protocol. Because of this, each peer is essentially a Web server. With knowledge of the appropriate URLs, Clip2 was able to successfully download files from Morpheus peers using Microsoft Internet Explorer.

A typical Morpheus file download request looks like this:

GET /4431/Martin+Luther+King+Jr.+-
+I+have+a+dream.mp 3 HTTP/1.1
Host: 10.20.31.42:1214
UserAgent: KazaaClient May 7 2001 16:00:44
X-Kazaa-Username: anon
X-Kazaa-Network: MusicCity
X-Kazaa-IP: 102.12.97.42:1214
X-Kazaa-SupernodeIP: 113.103.15.82:1214
Connection: close
X-Kazaa-XferId: 2956456

Upon receiving the above download request, a Morpheus peer sends a response like this:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Length: 4381547
Accept-Ranges: bytes
Date: Thu, 07 Jun 2001 20:43:32 GMT
Server: KazaaClient May 7 2001 15:59:09
Connection: close
Last-Modified: Tue, 20 Feb 2001 22:31:02 GMT
X-Kazaa-Network: KaZaA
X-Kazaa-IP: 10.20.31.42:1214
X-Kazaa-SupernodeIP: 120.23.123.227:1214
X-KazaaTag: 5=274
X-KazaaTag: 21=128
X-KazaaTag: 4=I have a dream
X-KazaaTag: 6=Martin Luther King Jr.
X-KazaaTag: 14=Speeches
X-KazaaTag: 3=asqK3s/zY2oC4IaGYq3gJYWLcKo=
Content-Type: audio/mpeg

Note the use of metadata headers describing the requested file. Also, note the repeated occurrence of the "Kazaa" name in these headers.

Following the HTTP response, the number of bytes specified in the "Content-length" header is sent from the peer sharing the file to the one who sent the download request, and the connection is closed. [more...]

use IRC =)

[ZaBu911]

IRC networks are something that, I assure, won't be shut down any time soon at all. looking for music? pr0n? TV episodes? turn to the warez networks, like EFNet (irc.prison.net, irc.arcti.ca to name a few) and DALnet (astro.ga.us.dal.net, sniper.tx.us.dal.net). Works well.

Good alternative :-D

Re:2 am, it's time for a rambly ranting.

[crucini]

Thank you. That was the most intelligent thing I've read on this thread. Some thoughts:

1. By default, it should find and share all mp3's, vcd's, etc on the disk. Napster took off because it shared the downloads by default. It's reasonable to take this a step further, now that there's such a high chance that the user previously ran a different sharing program.
   
2. The program should take the user by the hand, like an installation wizard. On first starting, it should ask the user to pick two favorite genres of music. Then it should show the most popular downloads within those genres. If the user doesn't choose anything, and the connection is not being used heavily, the program should randomly pick and start downloading one of the most popular files in the genre. And this should be made visibly obvious to the user in a way that invites intervention.
   
3. We need a Tivo-like associative rating, where you can give things a thumbs-up or thumbs-down, causing other files to appear in the suggestion list (and possibly get downloaded automatically). This would be backed by a cryptographic network of trust, so the originators of the network would anonymously endorse users who have good associative judgement, who would in turn endorse more users.
   
4. We need an abuse-resistant mechanism to propogate relevant news items, complete with hyperlinks, within the program. So if congressman Greedo introduces legislation against p2p, an appropriate hyperlink to this story will pop up on each user's program. This will help polarize the "soccer moms" against the cartels.
   
5. We need a system that progressively restricts the IP addresses permitted to connect as the number of nodes grows. This makes it difficult to 'sweep' a network from one IP address and identify all the nodes. In other words, the number of nodes available to me should grow as the square root of the number of nodes in the network.
   

And now some problems:

1. People generally don't code Windows for fun.
2. At some point, the ability to search for material means you can identify an IP address that is offering copyrighted material for download. Thus, the user can be targeted and punished - adequate enforcement on this front could dry up the network. Encryption doesn't help here, because the information must be accessible to the client.
3. Corporations will release modified versions of the program with banner ads and privacy invasion, and these will be the norm due the corporations superior marketing reach.
4. RIAA/MPAA could finally do the intelligent thing (don't know why they haven't) and create thousands of bogus clients flooding the network with junk.