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P2P Filesharing vs. The Web
The Importance of writes "The recent RIAA lawsuits have raised many questions and issues, but the focus has been on P2P filesharing. Before there was P2P, though, there was filesharing via webservers. There doesn't seem to be much complaint about the RIAA shutting down people who upload MP3s to their homepage. Why do many people seem to treat http filesharing different than P2P filesharing? LawMeme has one answer."
We need to use P2P as the official file distribution system for Linux. I think we should replace the whole ftp web based style with a clicknrun gui style P2P system for file distribution.
I post my MP3s on my personal webserver in a streaming Jukebox so I can listen to my rightfully licensed music at work. but Google got ahold of my collection and returns my site with certain searches. I then ended up on a few H4x0r5 WAREZ-MP3 lists. Needless to say, within a week of this "publicity" my bandwidth was shot to hell. The RIAA doesn't need to shut down those that put MP3s on servers. Other leeches will take care of that for them.
On a side not, I still get occasional mails from people that find a google listing and ask for access to a certain song. I can deal with that.
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"First things first -- but not necessarily in that order"
-- The Doctor, "Doctor
I think Mr. Miller at Lawmeme has it right: filesharing is more personal. A user can watch people upload the files, and enjoy the feeling that others enjoy the same music as he does; he can see what other people are searching for (primarily pr0n from my own experience); he can add, modify, delete files on the fly - in short it's a much more personal experience to share files from your PC using P2P than it is to offer them up on a website. Particularly if the website, like most, is hosted by a computer that you don't directly control. Further P2P is new. It still has that "new car smell" about it. It's also easier for the average user to install some software, fire it up, and click-and-share away. Most users are probably intimidated by HTML - even if they don't have to generate any, the idea of it will drive people away. They have the feeling that creating websites is hard, and that it's something they cannot do. They can, however, share files. Pierre
While P2P and HTTP may be excellent ways of file sharing, for better or for worse, the RIAA _will_ stop them. Right now they have attacked legally, which is leading P2P developers to make some advancements in the way of encryption, anonymity, etc. The RIAA seems to realize, now, that there really is no way to stop technology. We have already won.
Now they are taking the overused advice of "adopt a new business model", which seems to be services such as Apple's iTunes Music Store (Soon for Windows), BuyMusic.com, Rhapsody, and soon Roxio Napster 2.0.
The new RIAA attack plan is to offer B2P services. The problem? DRM. If I buy a CD from iTMS, for example, it may be $9.99. I would buy the same CD in store for $14.99. No, I'm NOT paying five bucks for the album art, professionally burned CD, etc. I'm paying for the right to do with it what I want. There's something about having "SOMETHING" in your hands. They can't take that away from you, like they can with digital music.
P2P for me is a way of sampling music before buying the CD. This will never be replaced by a $0.99 deal, since I like to download it, and listen to the song throughout the day. At work I listen to different music than at home. At night, different music from the day. Walking music is different from sittin' or driving music. Rhapsody fails here, so does iTMS... you can only sample certain portions, while in front of your computer. It's not the same.
Why P2P is better than HTTP? It's easier. More people use it, than HTTP was used for MP3 trading. Does it matter? No, B2P will overtake them both. There IS a large number of people who ONLY want digital music, that's why they turn to P2P. These people will turn to B2P once it becomes "mainstream."
For the most part the RIAA doesn't have to do legal battles any more (though it is a nice source of income), they can attack it by offering new online services, just as EVERYONE has been saying for years. Me, I'll stick to brick and mortar, and P2P though.
I confess I'm a pirate. So are my friends.
We download, we vet the downloads. We upload songs to private FTP servers with the bandwidth we're not using when we're at work.
We have a trust based, friend based, non peer to peer, but distributed, quality controlled file sharing experience.
It's great. It doesn't get flooded with crap, it doesn't get flooded with music we don't like. Anyone with an account on the machines is known to everyone else.
Gosh it sounds just like some warez servers back when I used to have an interest in warez, or hacker BBS's when I had an interest in that.
The web? That's all a bit new fangled for us..
I don't read your sig, why do you read mine?
I point everyone to NameProtect. Their NPBot hit my page a couple of times before I told it not to. Basically, it scours your website and looks for songs. It then collects the links (not the music) and tries to get a bounty from the artist (?) by showing you that someone is sharing their music. It's other business model is that it can be contracted to find your music on websites.
from robots.txt:
User-agent: NPBot
Disallow: /
Get Firefox!
Most major universities (mine is in that crowd) turn a blind eye to P2P traffic... until they get a C&D complaint. The policy here: the networking people immediately cut off the connection. They will not turn it back on until a student says the offending file has been removed (honor code is involved - very serious honor code). And, if it really was the student's fault - that is, the student can't prove the letter was a mistake - it's a $80 reconnect fee.
The university I'm at has ~15,000 students. They get several C&D letters a week - many are repeat offenders. Just about everyone I know (or rather, who understands how) cuts off their upload and leeches in order to avoid C&D-type problems.
Get a single C&D letter, be out $80... whoops, there went the month's beer money. College students ain't stupid, not when it comes to getting that beer...
A witty [sig] proves nothing. --Voltaire