P2P Manifesto:Peer To Peer Study/Project

Marco Montemagno writes " P2P Manifesto is a P2P study that I've done and also a project, released under CC license. This study (30 pages, available on a dedicated blog, in pdf format or in .torrent/blogtorrent) explain why: - P2P is unstoppable - P2P is positive for Companies - P2P is positive for the market - P2P is good for users All the readers can create their own P2P Manifesto, free to edit this original P2P manifesto. The idea is to then collect on the blog all the different P2P Manifesto's releases, to create a good knowledge base point about P2P issues."

Comments

Dr. Bronner's Magic P2P Manifesto?

[sulli]

P2P is unstoppable - P2P is positive for Companies - P2P is positive for the market - P2P is good for users - All the readers can create their own P2P Manifesto

Dilute! Dilute! OK!

This "paper" is a mess

[Nugget]

Sorry Marco, but I don't see why I should respect the results of a "study" when the author doesn't distinguish between "P2P" and "people trading copyrighted data against the owner's wishes". This manifesto seems to perpetuate the myth that "P2P" is a synonym for "piracy". Heck, the paper can't even distinguish between a Macintosh computer and a MAC address.

With such obviously lacking intellectual rigor, why should we have any confidence in your conclusions on the overall issue, which is far more complicated than many of the trivial things which escaped you?

P2P should be about people freely choosing to share their creations with the world, not about consumers choosing to violate the license on commercial goods that they'd rather not pay for. You do a disservice to the future of P2P and information exchange when you perpetuate the myth that the two are the same thing.

The goal should be making free-distribution licenses mainstream, not making it easier to violate licenses.

Re:This "paper" is a mess

[Vaevictis666]

Additionally, he should have someone proof-read the essay before he posts it to the world. I gave up half way through point 1 after getting fet up with all the comma splices, missing words, redundant words... Just... ugh...

Re:This "paper" is a mess

[eln]

I agree. This whole paper seems like the unprofessional, semi-insane ramblings of a 14 year old kid. My only comfort is that he accurately titled it a Manifesto, although referring to it as a "study" at any point is disingenuous at best.

This paper is full of errors, uses language that only someone with no concept of business communication would use, and, if widely propagated, could do more damage to the PR side of P2P than anything the RIAA or MPAA could hope to accomplish.

Re:This "paper" is a mess

[Templaris]

"The goal should be making free-distribution licenses mainstream, not making it easier to violate licenses."

To go about this licensing scheme I proprose a new manifesto, a Communist Manifesto where the people own everything! oh...forgot..

Re:This "paper" is a mess

[Catbeller]

Ideas, images, movies and writings are not property.

Property has physical existence as its primary characteristic. A book may be physical property. But the stream of words and images within are is not.

Secondary characteristic: if you take a property away from the owner, the owner no longer has access to it. Take a book away from me, and you have stolen my property. Take an image of the book, and I still have the book; nothing has been stolen.

No memetic hijacking of the words "property" and "stealing", please.

Your point about "communism"? Jefferson and his allies wanted no copyrights in the constitution. Damned commie. Also, the U.S., until the 20th century, recognized no country's copyright laws save its own. The entire population and government of the U.S. were communistic thieves for over 125 years. We only cared about international copyright when we wanted to make more money.

Re:This "paper" is a mess

[javaxman]

If you want to create your own P2P Manifesto, you can. Feel free to edit the original P2P manifesto and send it at this email. All the different P2P Manifesto release wil be posted here.

While such language is common on Creative Commons-licensed stuff, in this case it's almost like the author is saying "Here is my first cut of a document I'd like to see produced, everyone else please edit it, fill in the ( huge ) gaps, give it some actual content and substance. Thanks."

It's the literary equivalent of setting up an open source software project with a not-really-functional 'prototype' codebase and hoping someone makes it actually work.

I know the topic of P2P ( and more generally, 'file sharing' ) has been studied by tons of smart folks at universities and corporations alike, what about some links to some of those? Oddly enough, the 'study' just has links to ( mostly ) opinion pieces and blogs ( including, of all things, a slashdot article ).

To speak to the parent posts' points of

the author doesn't distinguish between "P2P" and "people trading copyrighted data against the owner's wishes". This manifesto seems to perpetuate the myth that "P2P" is a synonym for "piracy".

well, that's an interesting topic all by itself.

Frankly, copyright-protected files are the most common files found on P2P networks. Rather than hiding from reality, we should seek to understand what reality means. In this case, I think reality means that copyright is a generally unenforcable law - like many other laws on the books, it's an example of bad law which in the long run wastes taxpayer money for the ( dubious ) benefit of a small segment of the population.

Copyright infringment is an old, old problem, vastly pre-dating the internet. Even without filesharing, there'd be lots of "piracy", as it's now labeled. As long as there is copyright protection for easily copied items, there will be piracy. It's a law which is extremely difficult to enforce- at best.

Re:This "paper" is a mess

[18769]

Property has physical existence as its primary characteristic. A book may be physical property. But the stream of words and images within are is not.

You present a particular definition of property. What exactly `property' is is not the point of the conversation. The piracy / file-sharing debate is about the extent to which we should be carrying over the rules associated with property to information. On one hand, it is important to reward people for creating information. Without a positive expected value, what reasonable person is going to put effort into creating ideas? Where will the ideas come from? On the other hand, most IP laws are designed to give the idea's creator an effective monopoly, which is frequently unfairly exploited. Instead of raving about semantics, try addressing the issue of creating a system where people will develop ideas in a world where P2P limits the advantage that can be gained from those ideas. Perhaps you think that those people will still be compensated for their efforts, but you must have some idea why that is...

Re:This "paper" is a mess

[Angostura]

Because we all know that information, knowledge and ideas - and the effort required to devise, create and embody it/them have zero value, correct?

Oh that's not what you meant.

So you meant that anybody who expends work creating something that isn't primarily a physical object, has no rights over the fruits of their labours?

Well, apparently that might be what you mean, but I disagree,

I'm perfectly happy to stop using the words 'theft' and 'property' when someone suggests alternative words that adequately express the loss that the creator of a work suffers when control of that work is ripped from their hands without their say so.

Any suggestions?

Re:This "paper" is a mess

[shark72]

"I'm perfectly happy to stop using the words 'theft' and 'property' when someone suggests alternative words that adequately express the loss that the creator of a work suffers when control of that work is ripped from their hands without their say so."

I'd say that the response to this by many people reading this would be fuck them. If they're greedy enough to subscribe to this silly notion of expecting to be paid for their creative output, then they deserve what they can get.

Putting all concepts of right and wrong aside for a moment, I think many reading this will agree that said greedy content creators are a bit like the American Indians in the 18th and 19th century with their similar notions of "we were here first." Again, right/wrong aside, you simply can't win against a much larger group of people who have technology on their side, whether they're a bunch of settlers with guns who want your land, or a bunch of teenagers with P2P apps who want your song. This is how it has always worked. Obviously, there's an insurmountable gulf between a songwriter missing a few rent payments and an entire tribe being massacred, but the fundamentals of group behavior are the same.

Propaganda can be a useful tool here. Eradicating the Indian problem was made easier for our ancestors when they were fed the notion of Indians being diseased, drunken savages who raped our women. Likewise, today, although smart people know that the lifestyle of the typical artist is not a glamorous one, note how often it is that "artists are greedy, yadda yadda, limousines, yadda yadda, cocaine habits, yadda yadda they should just shut up and learn that P2P helps them" posts are modded +5, Insightful.

Fools

[Donny Smith]

That childish crap is totally useless to their cause.

No sane person denies that P2P is useful for certain purposes. The problem is about the bad side of P2P which is that it is unrestricted playground for IPR violations.

They would be better off by
a) creating PR campaign against P2P abuse (quite useless as well, but still...)
b) working with interested parties to include anti-piracy code in P2P clients (of course, they don't want to do that)

So, the effect of their action will be naught - those who use P2P will continue using it, those who don't will not use it.

Oh, and one more thing

[daniil]

Manifestos are so 1909.

Interesting

[Fizzlewhiff]

But I think I will wait 8 or 9 years for the Brian Hook analysis.

The problem is...

[PornMaster]

...it is a crazy man's ramblings.

Nothing new...

[Lepaca Kliffoth]

http://crypto.stanford.edu/DRM2002/darknet5.doc That's from 2 years ago, a very well made study by Microsoft about the darknets. The "bad guys" already know that P2P is unstoppable, the battle we're watching day by day is only a facade.

Not to mention the lack of English skills

[System.out.println()]

I can respect the fact that the author is not a native English speaker, but at least get a respectable translation! I think the last google automatic translation I got was more legible than this.

Re:Connotation

[Anonymous Coward]

The tern "Manifesto" has negative connotations, primarily in the United States of America and, to a lesser extent, the countries which share its spere of influence. This is due to the Communist Manifesto, penned by Karl Marx. Interestingly enough, Communist has devolved into a derogatory term in the same areas. In the areas where Communist is not a swear word, Manifesto also does not infer the incoherent ramblings of a lunatic, placed in print to corrupt the world

Do you see a correlation?

..."Study"?

[Stween]

This guy doesn't seem to be aware that Peer-to-Peer application design is simply not new, it's only that people have become aware of "P2P" concepts thanks to Napster and successive file-sharing networks.

Page 13:
"Take back technology of let's say 20 years"... yet 30 years ago, peer-to-peer protocols were dominant in the Internet. Hmm.

Further, for a study, I'd expect some references. With interesting things such as, you know, FACTS and FIGURES. He seems to present an argument, with no data to back it up. This is like a high school report.

He seems to write.

In such a manner that William Shatner.

Would be proud of.

I'm not entirely sure what the point of this story is. Can someone please enlighten me?

Re:..."Study"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can someone please enlighten me?

Mu.

Re:..."Study"?

[slinky259]

I'm not sure what you did in high school, but this sounds more like 6th grade writing. Even the ninth graders at my school would laugh at this.

danger

[AnonymousCactus]

I think there is a very real danger of this only being contributed to by hardcore proponents of P2P and the danger in that is that no one will subjectively evaluate alternatives. The academic research seems to suggest that P2P isn't necessarily the best alternative and that something more centralized like Napster or really centralized like a client-server model but where anyone can upload/download is better in terms of overall cost...at least for legal stuff.

For this to be useful both sides must be presented well and P2P still win...if that doesn't happen then it's not worth much of anything.

Re:danger

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

Of course centralization is more efficient on several points. Decentralization was the fool's answer to legal attacks. Now the lawyer's are busy chasing down this individual or that individual. Decentralization offers no legal safety, no political safety. They should have been working on anonymity.

No one can sue you, if they can't figure out who you are.

They should also have been working on deniability. Freenet may offer anonymity, but when freenet is outlawed, it will be pretty obvious what IP addresses are participating in freenet. If the only software you run seems to be legitimate, and if everyone doesn't have to use the same software as everyone else to participate...

Resistance is futile

[moonboi]

with P2P app as small as 15 line of code and broadband in more than 50% of Amerian houses File sharing is here to stay

Infringement "solutions"

[StupidKatz]

How about simply telling people not to copy what they didn't pay for? Nope, it won't be effective, but the alternative, working with interested parties to include anti-piracy code in P2P clients, makes it sound like it's the software author's fault.

What sort of "anti-piracy code" sdo you think will work?
Filters? Nope, there have been past stories here about the borkups caused by content owners not checking the results filters gave them.
Tie the software into a big content comparison DB? Let's see that one scale.
A back-door pass to control which files can or can't be traded? Hell no.

No simple solution. Best thing is to keep doing that the RIAA is doing... sue the infringing users. Of course, I wish they'd actually make sure that the folks they sue actually have been infringing.

jesus h.

[maxpublic]

Who wrote this crap? A 12-year-old with a hard-on for free porn and illegal warez? The quality of the 'manifesto' made me think there should be a "like, dude!" at the end of every sentence.

Max

Wikipedia

[burbankmarc]

I think you should submit this to Wikipedia, I think all knowledge on the planet should be put into Wikipedia...

Re:Wikipedia

[koniosis]

If he submits it to Wikipedia I'd go straight on there and delete the whole thing and replace it with a picture of a huge steaming turd, since they are equivilent and the turd takes less time to view.

P2P is Awesome

[BarryNorton]

"My name is Marco and I can't stop thinking about P2P. P2P is cool; and by cool I mean totally sweet."

Re:P2P is Awesome

[Nspace13]

Facts:

1. P2P are softwareses.
2. P2P spews bits ALL the time.
3. The purpose of the P2P is to flip out and hurt Metallica's bottom line.

Testimonial:

P2P can kill any band's ability to make money! P2P can cut off the flow of money ALL the time and don't even think twice about it. These programs are so crazy and awesome that they flip out ALL the time. I heard that there was this P2P program that was running on a computer in a diner. And when some dude dropped a spoon it downloaded the whole britney spears collection in like 5 seconds. My friend Mark said that he saw a P2P program totally suck up all his bandwidth just because he tried to download anna kornikova naked.

And that's what I call REAL Ultimate Power!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you don't believe that P2P has REAL Ultimate Power you better get a life right now or they will chop WASD fingers right off!!! It's an easy choice, if you ask me.

P2P is sooooooooooo sweet that I want to crap my pants. I can't believe it sometimes, but I feel it inside my heart. These programs are totally awesome and that's a fact. P2P is fast, smooth, cool, strong, powerful, and sweet. I love P2P with all of my body (including my pee pee).

my p2p manifesto

[br00tus]

I've a developed p2p program (Gnutizen - it can search and download files in Gnutella, but it's still beta and buggy) and have many ideas of where p2p can go in a technical sense. But if one puts sharing copyrighted works aside, there seems to be one main purpose to p2p - lowering distribution costs. If I am some kid in Portugal who writes a great Linux distribution, but can't afford to pay for the bandwidth of many people download 700MB ISO's from a web server every day, I can instead put up a torrent and leave it with one seed, throttling the speed to whatever I want.

Of course, p2p right now is often thought of as a single file - an ISO, an mpg, an mp3, a zip file). I see nugget has posted in this thread - the peer-to-peer programs which he currently helps maintain use p2p to do operation distribution, not file distribution. As does Folding@Home (which studies protein/gene problems in a distributed manner) and SETI. GPU is interesting in this respect as you are the one deciding what operations to perform - from adding 1 and 1, to calculating pi, to whatever. I really like Freenet - it is a very versatile protocol so that web pages, Usenet type forums, and even (small) file trading are all possible. I've even seen people play chess games over frost. And as a bonus, there is the option of (some degree of) anonymity on Freenet, so that is an added bonus.

I really would love to see someone with no money to host such thing create something as complex as Slashdot, with moderation system and all, and do it over p2p, maybe on something like Freenet, or maybe something else. The same with things like Wikipedia. Nowadays, the little guy is punished by high bandwidth costs if what he made is popular. With p2p this is not a problem any more.

Oh here it goes again

[paranode]

Every time this comes up the trolls sneak out of the woodwork to say that "copyright infringement isn't stealing because they still have the original!". While technically you are not depriving them of this, you will have to face the idea that the language and the medium is changing in front of your eyes. You don't think there is such a thing as intellectual property at all? Just because there are some people who distribute ideas, images, movies and writings to the general public for free doesn't mean everyone should have to. Don't you think the original author should be the one to make that choice? In a digital era, there must exist laws to protect the ideas of people for their intended purposes, not to be copied and redistrubuted without consent.

If I "steal" cable (which is a quite common phrase), am I depriving the cable company of their "property"? No, I'm not. Does that make it alright? No, it really doesn't. Playing semantics on the words "steal" and "property" is no excuse for doing something you know is wrong.

Re:Oh here it goes again

[UserGoogol]

The Congress shall have Power [...] to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries; (Article I, Section 8)

Re:Hmm

[Taladar]

Only if you try to sell information for more than their perceived worth.

Give this guy a break...

[autarkeia]

It appears from browsing the rest of his site that this guy is Italian and has a weak grasp of English. FWIW, he has apparently appeared on several different Italian television shows whilst discussing P2P. And he's not too harsh on the eyes, either.

While I agree that this translation sucks, don't ride him so hard on his poor English skills.

Re:Give this guy a break...

[syousef]

You're joking right? Give him a break because he's "pretty". This is /. not the young and the bloody restless. Its not just the translation that's poor. His grasp of the concepts is poor, and he's claiming to be an expert in technology. He's an arts professor! As far as I'm concerned he's a conman with a winning smile, and you're falling for it!