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Harnessing the Power of P2P, Looking Back
brajesh writes "It has been seven years since Napster, the first widely-used peer-to-peer music sharing service, was released, and it made a major impact on how people, used the Internet. NY Times has an article about Napster and how it quickly grew into an Internet phenomenon - not to mention the music industry's bête noire until it was shut down by the courts four years ago. The article also mentions Shawn Fanning, the creator of Napster and his new venture, along with other efforts like new version of Grokster, Apple's iTunes, trying to cope up with growing concerns of Copyright Violations and corresponding backlash against P2P file-sharing."
and it made a major impact on how people, used the Internet.
Sure it did. From that day on, people using the new protocol were all guilty before proven guilty. All people hear today are 'cutting sales', 'innovation', 'rootkit' for that matter. This is a new age I guess. And if you're not one of the 'big guys', it's not really fun...
I wonder how Shawn feels about letting loose the RIAA and the massive flood of lawsuits and etc that exists today...
What 'repruhsent' is referring to (and what I was about to comment about) is that the article should read: "major impact on how people used the Internet." - The comma that is there right now is not only unnecessary, but actually completely incorrect. Try reading the sentence outloud, pausing at the comma. (Long enough to count to one.) When I read a sentence like that, it makes me retch. Additionally, there is the error at: "Fanning, the creator of Napster", which needs a comma after 'Napster'. It is not currently present. I recommend (additionally) that some of these sentences be shortened, or separated into multiple clauses with the use of a semi-colon. Additionally, I suggest reading "Eats, Shoots & Leaves" for more information (in an amusing medium) on the wonderful tool known as the comma.
Windows is like decaf - it tastes like the real thing, but it won't get you through the day.
Actualy if Napsters had has many lawyers and money as the Majors "babels", they would be where iTunes is right now. The ways laws work should be changed so people with the most ressources don't get an advantage over those without.
Is that you?
I'd say that Napster shaped how people use the Internet. It was the greatest advancement in Internet use since the invention of the WWW for browsing. SETI@Home came out about the same time as Napster, and it paved the way for other distributed computing projects which have had some impact on the Internet's usage, but even the popular screensaver has been dwarfed by P2P sharing programs.
I think SETI@Home would have been the biggest thing since sliced bread if they found a way to search for alien music online while looking for alien signals in space. And the Voltrons don't even have obscure earth copyright laws for downloaders to worry about, although their tenors do make your head explode if you crank the volume.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Shawn Fanning is a Communist sellout!
Everyone who used Napster thought it was the coolest thing that had happened to music in a long, long time. How messed up is our system when something that universally praised met it's demise?
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
It's amazing how napster and the other p2p programs have really revolutionized the internet, before home pc's were common I knew no-one who would have over maybe 50 CDs. Now when I talk to anyone, they have a full iPod and tons of songs. Instead of hounding the net, the music industry should be celebrating how it has helped people find new bands and new genres that they like.
Business Voyeur
Why don't all the artists gather and refuse to play?
The subscription model is good. I still don't trust buying something digital that I can't copy. I also tend to have tastes that change all the time. For $10 per month I get "everything". Even if the DRM is crackable, why would I bother doing it? I'm still going to want to get new music and $10 per month isn't going to break the bank.
Napster downloads fast and it's simple. Limewire and the like are cheaper, but they're slightly more of a hassle and my time is worth something to me.
It does have a few problems though...
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``Actualy if Napsters had has many lawyers and money as the Majors "babels", they would be where iTunes is right now.''
No, it's in the way they set it up. iTunes worked with the labels to get a deal satisfactory for both parties. Napster ignored the label's wishes until the labels dragged Napster to court. Twist it how you will, but Napster shutting down and iTunes thriving is exactly how it should be.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
It's funny how history repeats itself here.
Before Napster, people downloaded music from websites, and usually paid for it.
Then Napster came, and it was a revolution. Suddenly, downloading music got big. Unfortunately, the widespread illegal practices on the network were used to force Napster to shut down.
Many people have tried to set up services similar to Napster in spirit. Virtually all of these get attacked by the **AA sooner or later, usually resulting in them shutting down. That's the short cycle.
In the meantime, many people have gone back to downloading music from websites. That's the long cycle.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
I don't see how they even have a case. First off CDs are recorded in PCM, files are usually traded in MP3, if you compare the files side to side they are totally diffrent. If you convert the MP3 to PCM you will still see that both files are not the same. When a copyright is applied it is applied to THAT recording, not the varations that are made by computers to make the file smaller. While my defense might not hold up in court, it makes everyone stop and think.
That's one for The Onion:
Furious lawyers representing the Recording Industries Association of Neptune arrived on planet earth today to initiate litigation in response to the latest internet file-sharing phenomenon - Search for Extra-Terrestrial Music @ Home ...
"12-years old or not", snarled Zgilrolivolgh, "this little pipsqueak is leeching off our deprived artists who can barely afford a breath of CO2 between releases".
OK so maybe I shouldn't write it but the idea's there.
Most of the replies seem to be focused on music file sharing. This is a result of the RIAA and MPAA demonizing P2P in order to protect themselves without regard to the legal uses of P2P. I believe that P2P democratizes the Internet, it gives a developer the opportunity to distribute something that he/she has created without incurring the costs of bandwidth. It gives a new band without a recording contract a way to distribute their music. It gives a filmmaker without a studio "deal" an affordable way to distribute a film . In the 90s the mantra of many businesses was that by using the Internet a small business could look like one of the big guys and compete on quality, service and price. The fight to keep P2P alive is about a lot more than stealing. Their are many ways to prevent the illegal use of P2P without destroying it. Let's get on that bandwagon before it is destroyed so that a few very rich companies and individuals can protect their wealth.
A big problem with the current genre of "p2p" editorials, here on /. and elsewhere, is that "p2p" has become synonymous with "file sharing", or "illegal file sharing". Whether the result of conspiracy or accident, the result is that the foundation stone of the internet, point to point communication, without central control, is being constantly disparaged. P2P, in the general sense, means that you and I, whether we are next door neighbors, or live halfway around the world, can negotiate and conduct transactions without some meddling intermediary. This is the real promise of the internet, the promise that that is being subverted by this constant barrage of "p2p" hype pieces.
Point to point means you can deal with the artist directly. Point to point means Viacom, Fox, MSNBC, Sprint, etc. have absolutely nothing to do with how you communicate with your friends in India. With your purchase of Christina Aguilara's next hit. With the distribution of source code, virtual machines, software radios, and so forth.
P2P is what we want. Don't let Big Media subvert the meaning of the word in furtherance of their own selfish self-centered centrist objectives.
I'd stop reading slashdot if I retched every time I read a grammatically incorrect sentence. But that's just me.
So, Fanning's new venture Snocap, sounds like their trying to get people to pay for music on a p2p network?
So, I get to pay for low bitrate, inconsistantly labled and unorganized music? What a steal!
Is it just me or does it seem like this new venture hasn't a snoballs chance in hell of success?
td
hard core geek-ware
About the DRM. If you don't like it, that's your beef, but I see no problem in principle. Their DRM lets me download my music to a player and take it with me. I see no problem. iTMS lets you download your music to a player and take it with you. Again, no problem. I just prefer subscription to a la carte.
I DO see problems with DRM in an iTMS style purchase model. If I buy a song I want to actually be able to do anything I want with it. (Use Winamp, whatever). But with Napster I'm not buying the music. I don't want to buy it. As soon as I'm unhappy with the service or I see something I prefer, I quit. In a model like that, DRM makes sense. Without DRM that model wouldn't be available to me.
I doubt you'll get an iTMS plug-in because I suspect that Apple would have to agree to it. Why would they do that? They like the iPod-iTunes duo.
About the too much clicking though, I think you misunderstood me. No clicking at all in an interface? That wouldn't work for me. I'm just talking about the fact that I have to click a drop down menu to indicate a search for artist or track or whatever, click again in the text box for my search terms, and click again to begin the search. iTunes has a single box that refines my search every time I type a character. Much nicer.
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Napster changed the distribution of the product, but not the nature of the product itself. The product being, in this case, an unchangeable audio recording. The true revolution of P2P will happen when people start assuming that what they are downloading is not a finished selling product, but a musical piece that is constantly changing and in development. Present technology doesn't allow the recording to be changed after it has been 'solidified' into a finished product. Future technology may allow this to happen. For example, if you don't like the guitar solo in a song, you can't change it, delete it, rerecord it, and upload your version. The best that you can do now is paste your change on top of what is there already. Nor does P2P like Kazaa have any way to keep track of or let others know in detail what you have done to the recording. It can only transfer the actual file from one PC to another.
The music industry has to get out of the 20th century mode of thinking that what they offer is a solidified unchangeable audio recording and start thinking in 21st century terms of marketing access to an artistic process. Their efforts to prevent the exchange of fixed recordings is bound to fail because of the nature of the new technology; its unlimited copying and distribution character of fixed unchanging files.
What the music industry really needs to worry about is that someone else will develop a means to financially profit from the concept that music can become a mass-collaborative process instead of the distribution of disks with unchangeable audio recordings. Were that to happen, then the current music recording companies would become irrelevant to the new music scene. A new scene that doesn't depend around the 20th-century concept of superstars. If that happens, then they may find themselves in a position where they couldn't give away their musical product for free even if they tried.
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Even if that argument were to gain traction, ( I do happen to agree with you on that one ) there is still the issue of 'unauthorized performances', which is also part of copyright law.
It can bite you even if you played all the instruments yourself, and had nothing to do with 'copying'. Remember they are licensing content for 'private performances', not the medium/encoding formats.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I plan on continuing to use p2p as a method of distributing online content created by ....myself. I run a low-power website. If there is only one person trying to get content, then fine, ftp or http are fine. If there are more, (and at times more can mean tens of millions more), then neither my site, nor my ISP cannot handle the load. I created the content. I licenced it, and I get to distribute it if I want to. Bittorrent is an *OUTSTANDING* way for individuals to push content to the masses. The only people who don't want it, are those who own traditional means of content distribution and have a very very hard time sharing power with others. Bittorrent in itself isn't illegal. The content I put on it isn't illegal. I drive my car safely, others speed (I've seen them). I don't want you to take away my car because some people speed, and I don't want you to take away my Bittorrent because other people steal. Next thing you will try to take away someones gun because some people can use it to steal.
- File-sharing programs & networks...
- SKype's VoIP...
- (etc.)
There must be some commonality between
the many P2P protocols out there, yes?
Isn't it time, now, to handle P2P
as a unified "layer" in Linux, etc.?
There must be a way to make all the
P2P programs run more efficiently,
in less memory space than they do
today...
My 2 cents... hopefuly not -too- far
Off-Topic to be considered by dev'rs.
Or downloading music "from" websites for free, courtesy of BitTorrent
Damn, it's the best transmission system full stop, for the fully legal use I put it to as well! *cough*
Am I the only one in the world who didn't use Napster because I'd already discovered that other service and it was so much freakin' better? Does anyone know what I'm talking about? I can't remember the name of it, but it wasn't iMesh or any of the current P2P networks. No, these guys got shut down shortly before Napster did. They had a really nice client, and all kinds of content, not just MP3s.
If I remember correctly, they cached the files on their servers, so if you had broadband, you got blazing fast download speeds. It had to have been around '99 or 2000, 'cause I was living with my ex at the time. Argh. It frustrates me to no end that I never hear anyone mention it in these Napster discussions. It was the bomb.I was at a market today and there were maybe 20 or more stalls packed with ps2 xbox games, dvd's cd's full of mp3's. Dvd's generally go at £5 or 3 for £10. Quality seems to be quite high sleeve work tends to be reasonable.
The question I really have is how does it make any sense to be prosecuting kids and blackmailing parents for file sharing for free. When adults are making thousands every weekend selling the content. I would guess people prepared to fork cash over for a pirate copy might be legitamately counted as a lost sale...
Blarney Quality Restaurant, Plants
Morpheus didn't come out until a while after Napster hit it big, and there was a Mopheus alike that was iMesh I think, although it might have been called something else. Those were the first 2 P2P programs that I used. Then Gnutella in 2000, using dialup.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Yes, please.
http://pixelcort.com/
Yes, please. Pretty please.
http://pixelcort.com/