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BitTorrent Accounts for 35% of Traffic
Pranjal writes "According to a reuters article on Yahoo, BitTorrent accounts for an astounding 35 percent of all the traffic on the Internet -- more than all other peer-to-peer programs combined -- and dwarfs mainstream traffic like Web pages." The article goes on to talk about how BT is no longer beneath the radar of those who like to sue file sharers.
Given that BT requires a link to a .torrent, how hard is it for companies to send a C&D to the ISP/owner of any site hosting illegal .torrent links?
...we'll all have to change p2p apps again soon, right?
I'm confused. Are they saying that mainstream web traffic accounts for far less than 35% of the bandwidth the internet consumes? By saying that BT is "dwarfing" the web traffic, that would make me think that something like 5-10% of traffic is HTTP. Am I wrong in finding that hard to believe?
My sig is blank, I typed this by hand.
What the FUCK does this have to do with my rights?
... that I live in Canada where this is still legal.
And you guys though that America was the home of the free.
DarkMantle I been bored, so I started a blog.
At least the article went into an aside that, indeed, BT's are not ONLY used for illegal purposes. *sigh* If you're a company, these are a WONDERFUL software dissemination device - you have your CUSTOMERS host your downloads, and you can pretty much tell when the "novelty has worn off", as the seeds will start to vanish with declining demand/use of your product. The distribution model (Peer-2-Peer) makes a lot of sense here, I think - or is it just me?
They are suing copyright infringers and only copyright infringers. Get it into your head if you wish to be taken seriously.
When the mainstream press finds out where to find illegal files (or the best P2P app to do so) then that site or app is quickly on its way to the grave.
I don't believe you.
Maybe people will find a better method for p2p warez stuff, but right now, BT is great for getting a file quickly because everyone's sharing some of the load.
"file sharing" != "warez file sharing"
It's not illegal in the U.S., either. Any lawyer worth the paper their degree is printed on should be able to defend such a case without backrupting anyone.
Sorry, but this anti-U.S. FUD will be a self fullfilling prophecy if you all keep it up. It's not illegal in the U.S., once in a while, a developer might have to bit the bullet and go to court. It's not the end of the world.
The answer in in the question itself: don't develop/store in USA.
This kind of software is not ilegal here in Brazil, for instance.
It's not "illegal" in the United States either. I was saying they would be sued not charged. Huge difference. Anybody can sue you for anything. Unless they are grossly abusing the system (and the Judge orders them to pay defense costs) it is going to cost you money to mount your legal defense.
And the "just write this software overseas" argument is old. Most of us aren't willing to give up our American citizenship and move overseas just to escape legal liabilities. I'm not saying that to flame -- it's just the truth. There are more constructive suggestions then "do it elsewhere".
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Actually, it's a great thing - since it's so transparent, there is absolutely no excuse for attacking anyone but the illegal sharers! Good riddance.
AFAIK, non-anonymity was a design _feature_ of BT for exactly this reason.
IANAL but I would assume that even though you're not providing the entire work (even if you are seeding a torrent), you could be in trouble.
You have the following situations:
You're a seeder of a torrent, so you posses the whole file - at which point you're obviously busted, because you possess copyrighted material obtained illegally.
You're a peer on the network (or a leech as most are) and you're downloading a given torrent, and uploading to others as well. You're intent is obviously to get the entire file or collection of files. I would have to imagine you're busted here as well, a copyrighted piece of material is just that, and unless you're using it for education purposes - copyright law treats one second the same as a minute or an hour of material. Since your intent is to obtain the whole file, and aid others in the same, I think they have you.
Again IANAL, but it seems logical...
--J
Cynical, aren't we?
Doesn't it make more sense to get these from "the source"?
In case you haven't been paying attention, the "source" is usually providing the torrent. (Go to any major Linux distribution to check. I dare you.)
The gutenburg mirrors seem like the best place for this.
But God-aweful slow. Distributing the bandwidth allows for a larger number of files to be moved faster.
Might as well add that with BT there is a chance that your GTA demo is really a mis-labelled Halo demo.
Again, many of these torrents are now provided by "the source". Since they seed the torrent, you can be sure that it's properly labeled. Improper labeling is usually a side-effect of getting it from "questionable" channels.
Google would be better for most of this.
Poppycock. Google only caches HTML. It's difficult to say if even they have the bandwidth to cache multimedia files.
For most of this, it makes more sense to get the files elsewhere. For now, BT makes the most sense for copyright infringement materials, where for the most part no-one dares to host them on typical static web pages or download sites.
Again, this is poppycock. PDF files can be *huge* for freely available information. "The BeFS FileSystem" and "Mozilla Platform Developers Guide" are just two examples off the top of my head. And only a few months ago, I mirrored creative commons PDFs for Slashdot, although I don't remember what they were.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Anime which hasn't/won't come out in the US is legal to download unless it has been licensed. It is probably the most popular use of legal bit torrent due to shear volume of episodes.
..where they call *anyone* participating in the enterprise a "co-conspirator" and everybody gets the full punishment, despite only a small participation in the actual "crime".
"will be essentially shut down"
;P
WTF?
it's like:
"WWW will be essentially shut down"
BT is an open protocol, with it's clients and servers. will they shutdown my OWN tracker, with my OWN data? they can hunt down illegal trackers, but they cannot shut down BT
The study comes from CacheLogic (http://www.cachelogic.com), which sells bandwidth throttling appliances to ISPs, schools, companies, etc. Considering that their business is to scare large-scale internet users into throttling the bandwidth use of your typical BT user, I don't find it at all surprising that they are claiming somewhat inflated numbers for P2P use on the internet at large.
IANAL, but IIRC the ability to "Backup" a copywrited media is restricted to You personally backing up Your Own copy. Your friend who might have the same idential item, may *not* give you a "Backup" copy made from his own disk, for example.
Just like you can't legally download a digital copy of a movie you just watched on TV, even if it was broadcast over public airwaves and you were a good consumer and watched every commercial.
Guys Check out that graph againp hp
http://www.cachelogic.com/research/slide1.
(thx to whoever posted it for posting it)
Its for a Single ISP (TIER one)
And the total of the graph isnt even 1000mbit
This isnt a total internet survey hehe
"How about controversial documents, like arguments against the authenticity of the moon landing, or against evolutionary theory?"
I'm sorry....is someone trying to ban these? I think the biggest problem people who propose those ideas face is that their ideas are drivel.
even the entertainment industry could use BitTorrent-like technology to offer video or music on demand without having to invest truckloads of money into bandwidth
They *could*, but they won't, because it deprives them the means to control distribution.
This is an industry whose MO has been to resist *every* new technology, whether it's beneficial to them or not - look at the lawsuit launched by Disney/Universal against the VCR - they wanted it banned, caput, illegal... even though today home video sales make up a huge percentage of their profits, they still hate it, because they no longer control the distribution (once they sell a video, they can't stop you from selling it to someone else.)
Look at the music industry, who fought tooth-and-nail against *radio*, claiming it would end music (after all, who would pay to go to a concert when you can get the music for free in your own home, and if nobody will pay for live music, how will musicians earn money?) It wasn't until they discovered they could control the airwaves that they finally (and begrudgingly) gave in - until the advent of the home tape recorder gave them new reason to fear.
The entertainment industries don't *care* about any potential benefits new technology will bring them, they're stuck in their old business model ways, and fear anything that might possibly provide competition for their cartels.
It's a little annoying to have swarms of people try for days afterwards. I almost feel like writing a program to answer and provide a fuxor response to them.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Certainly no reason not believe them, its not like they have a conflict of interest or anything. Nothing to see here, move along please!
I do the same thing. My family never had cable so I never really watched TV, but once I discovered BitTorrent I used it to download shows like Dead Like Me and now I subscribe to cable so I can see the shows I used to download. If I was not able to download the shows in the first place, then I would never have gotten cable.
No no no. He said it was clear that BitTorrent wasn't designed with copyright infringement in mind. And that's why copyright infringers should use something else. Because it is sub-optimal for stealing. The distributors (supernova or whatever) will be wide open targets.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
True, but if you do what you say in your own home and no one else in the universe saw it or knew about it, then did it really happen?
its only your own 'guilt' which makes it bad.
Id like to classify it as 'offsite backup'
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
No, but it DOES allow them to see every single IP address of every single peer, seed, and client using that .torrent... which gives them enough ammo to go to ISPs and begin scaring people with threat letters.
Not necessarily. You can sue someone for breaching a contract, for example, but it's not illegal to breach one.
Who says anything about American's moving overseas? American's don't have to emigrate for development to happen overseas. What will happen though, as the US gets more and more tied down with stuff like software patents, and authors being sued when people dont like your customers, is that software development in the US will slow. And that means that when there is a demand for software, it won't be American that fulfils it. America is legislating away its dominant position in the software market.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
If you're not downloading copyrighted material, then you're not uploading it, either. Since BT was not built with any sort of security in mind, then the "man" (the *AA, your campus network admin, your boss) can check on the bits you're passing... and will see that you're not passing any copyrighted bits.
What's that, you say? You want to transmit copyrighted bits? Then be warned: with BT, the "man" is watching you, and if you're doing something illegal or unethical, you may be caught. There's enough freely distributable bits out there to keep you happy for the rest of your life. Try it out.
The cure for cancer is coming: Reovirus
Now tell me the practical difference between the two. If you have both the CD, and MP3s from that CD, what does it matter if you downloaded them or not, practically speaking? Sure, if you're one of these law fetishists, you might care, but the rest of the world doesn't give a rat's ass.
Obviously the keyboard makers are at fault for producing such blatantly enabling technology. Let them get sued.
Credo sim. - I think I am.
Errrm, when Joe User shuts down his client before the remote p2p client goes away and the IP is reassigned, his cache will hold the address as it was still valid.
When he then starts his client 3 days later, that IP will be there, and a connection attempted.
Multiply that by all the people who will only start their client every few days, and you get the situation where it can take a while for stale IP addreses to be lost - the client timeout will be irrelevant then - unless you also specify clients expire addresses on age - even if the client has been shutdown for a while - but in that case, a client that has been offline for a few days would come back up with no valid seeds!
Sig out of date
What proof do you have though that those IP addresses are actually sharing files?
Hypothetically, what if an announcer randomly injected IP addresses from another popular site they ran into the torrent files? The only way to confirm that a user actually is sharing the file is to download it.
That is why actual connection to a peer is more definitive.
Errr... this discussion is about BitTorrent.
You know, the P2P protocol for sharing large files?
OK, it went like this...
First there was Napster and Audiogalaxy (ye gods i miss that one)
Good for single songs - remember, at that time, most people were on dial-up @ c.20 minutes per track.
Then there was/is KaZaa, eDonkey, WinMX etc.
Still mostly single tracks, but with some rar/zipped albums, and with many users on xDSL or cable. 2 minutes/track, 20 for the whole album (although there may be trouble getting less popular tracks)
As for BT, well, just go look on Suprnova.
Very few single tracks, mainly albums, with many artists' entire discographies up for download.
Well, if I download 1 Grateful Dead show, that's more music, by volume, than 300 downloads of the latest from britany or christina. :)
It's more music by any measure
I scored a copy of the pilot, loaned it to a guy at work. He like it so much, he bought the season 1 DVD set. Unfortunately, he then loaned the set to a coworker. So file sharing is helping sales, but it's those evil loaners that are injuring sales.
Ironically, I still haven't watched that episode.
Not that this wasn't entirely predictable.
"what is the real difference between creating tools and using them"
Whoa, there. By that logic, we shouldn't be able to sue those evil companies that make those nasty guns. Are you saying that it's the USER, not the creator, that's at fault when a program or firearm is misused?! Preposterous!
[/sarcasm]
DRM 'manages access' in the same way that a prison 'manages freedom'
Wow, the government artifically increasing the price of using a product. You're a god damn genius. That definately won't hurt the technology market or even keep the US uncompetitive with other contries that won't do your genius plan. Fuck the people that develop Linux or host free websites, they should charge for there software anyway.
Besides with all the taxes we already have to worry about, what's one more?
I hate people that always think of great plans the government can force "solutions" upon you. You are an idiot.
As a programmer and software publisher, I can add my two cents to this situation, and I think it applies to all types of "software" including music and movies.
I had a successful software company throughout the 80s and the early 90s. We sold over 100k copies of our software (which wasn't bad for our tiny operation), and I estimate that there were at least ten to a hundred times more pirated copies in circulation. Even with the piracy, the market was plenty big to provide for us. Piracy actually helped promote our product, call attention to the company and spawn sales. We weren't happy about the piracy but we also knew that it compensated for a lack of resources to advertise on a large scale.
To increase revenue we continually improved our products and released upgrades. We also provided an ancient concept called "support" that our customers appreciated greatly.
To answer your question specifically, I don't think any "true" programmer would ever be discouraged by piracy. That's like asking a painter if he is bummed out that too many people were appreciating his art but not hanging it on their walls.
Generally speaking, profit margin in software is *enormous*. Any product worth large scale pirating will be a product that also generates substantial legitimate revenue. I suspect one reason why publishers are griping about piracy is that the quality of a lot of software today is such that it's not worth the price they're asking in the first place, and they rely on advertising and insider deals to move product, as opposed to the quality and value of the product itself.
My contention is that these days, piracy is more a form of protest than theft. Publishers are not producing products that have the same value they used to. You have companies like Quicken which shake down their customer base each year for a few hundred bucks to install a stupid tax table that should be free. That's bullshit.
The software business may be dying, but it's not dying because of piracy. It's dying because it has matured like other industries and become controlled by a small number of "mafia" publishers and distributors of inferior products who gain market share via unfair trade practices and massive ad campaigns. Those companies are compelled to fight piracy moreso to protect their dynasty and squelch competition, than they are at risk of suffering any substantive financial losses due to piracy.
Why? He's not liberal.
Not Kirk Cameron, no. But the fundamental irony of the conservative religious right is best summed up in the wisdom of a T-shirt: "Jesus was a liberal Jew".
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
The cable Internet providers are much less respectful of customer privacy.
And that, boys and girls, is why you should encrypt ALL traffic over your final hop, and only hit the plaintext internet from a remote box.
For instance you can get a cheap virtual private server semi-anonymously and then route all plaintext traffic to/from it using IPSec [1]. Your ISP will be left with virtually no info about what you do online.
This situation kind of beats exposing all traffic to cable/DSL companies, which are usually owned by major media conglomerates and have as much of your personal info as the IRS. Of course it won't stop the FBI if you do something massively illegal, but the MPAA/RIAA goons are, as you said, likely to pick on an easier target.
[1] alternatively, google "tor"