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ISPs & P2P, Getting Along Without Getting Cozy

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the why-can't-we-all-just-get-along dept.

penguin-geek writes "Researchers at Northwestern University have discovered a way to ease the tension between ISPs and P2P users. As we all know, there's been a growing tension between Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and their customers' P2P file-sharing services, and this has driven service providers to forcefully reduce P2P traffic at the expense of unhappy subscribers and the risk of government investigations. Recently, some ISPs have tried to fix the problem through partnerships with certain P2P applications. The Ono project represents an alternative solution: a software service that allows P2P clients to efficiently identify nearby peers, without requiring any kind of cozy relationship between ISPs and P2P users. Using results collected from over 150,000 users, they have found that their system locates peers along paths that have two orders of magnitude lower latency and 30% lower loss rates than those picked at random by BitTorrent, and that these high-quality paths can lead to significant improvements in transfer rates. In challenged settings where peers are overloaded in terms of available bandwidth, Ono provides a 31% average download-rate improvement; in environments with large available bandwidth, Ono increases download rates by 207% on average (and improves median rates by 883%). Ono is available as a plugin for the Azureus BitTorrent client, an open tracker and an standalone service you can integrate into any P2P system."

11 of 118 comments (clear)

  1. The problem is that it is stupid. by khasim · · Score: 3, Informative

    They are looking at the PHYSICAL location of the machines.

    As far as I am aware, most bittorrent clients already search for the machines with the fewest hops and lowest latency. Translation: machines on the same NETWORK as them.

    Because if I am on Comcast at home and you have DSL through ATT at home and our homes are within 500' of each other ... that means NOTHING with regard to hops and latency between us.

    1. Re:The problem is that it is stupid. by snowraver1 · · Score: 4, Informative

      I have been using Ono for about 6 months now. When I installed it, it made very little difference at all. I usually get pretty good speeds though, with or without. I am still using the plugin now (with azureus) and am using it more because i'm too lazy to uninstall it, then for the speed increase (if any).

      It sounded cool, but didn't work for me. I am curious if anyone else noticed similar findings, or if I am all alone.

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    2. Re:The problem is that it is stupid. by CountZer0 · · Score: 5, Informative

      Except they aren't only looking at the physical location of the machines. They are basically merging both network and physical location to come up with a hybrid location mapping that provides the lowest latency route.

      From the FAQ:
      Does this really work? In a paper pending publication, we show that our lightweight approach significantly reduces cross-ISP traffic and over 33% of the time it selects peers along paths that are within a single autonomous system (AS). Further, we find that our system locates peers along paths that have two orders of magnitude lower latency and 30% lower loss rates than those picked at random, and that these high-quality paths can lead to significant improvements in transfer rates.

  2. Re:Paranoia by sm62704 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Sorry Mr AC, but in the US downloading MP3s is legal. Distributin copyrighted works without the copyright holder's permission isn't legal, but downloading anything except child pornography is legal.

    The FBI may or may not come after you for uploading, but they will NOT come after you for downloading.

    --
    mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
  3. Re:Well, that took long enough by Shakrai · · Score: 1, Informative

    Multicast would do wonders on the internet for anything with a high volume.

    We see some variation of this thought expressed in every p2p/bandwidth related story but would it actually help that much?

    How is multicast going to reduce the bandwidth requirements of video on demand (i.e: Netflix instant view) applications? You request something, the server sends it to you. Unless somebody else is requesting that exact same movie (and requesting it at the exact same time as you) how the hell does multicast help?

    It might be useful for live events (think of the Presidential Debates) that are being streamed but I don't think it's a magic bullet that's going to solve all of our bandwidth problems.

    --
    I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
    We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  4. Re:So Hold the handle, not the sharp edges by Shakrai · · Score: 2, Informative

    Bittorrent and most other P2P systems today are designed to avoid having a centralized database, because it was a target.

    Uhh, bittorrent does have a 'centralized database' -- it's called a tracker.

    Granted, there are some trackerless implementations but bittorrent wasn't "designed" to avoid having a "target". It was designed to efficiently share large files.

    --
    I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
    We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  5. Good Morning Internet by Strange+Ranger · · Score: 3, Informative

    AFAIK there are often ISPs in BFE that can give you a decent ttl. It's just a PITA getting them to honor their TOS so your packets don't go MIA.

    --

    Operator, give me the number for 911!
  6. Re:So Hold the handle, not the sharp edges by Apple+Acolyte · · Score: 2, Informative

    tracker's aren't centralized databases in the way Napster's database was. Napster's central database served as a single global tracker. That doesn't exist in torrent land. Downloaders were inconvenienced by Demonoid going down for a period of time, but BT wasn't threatened.

    --
    Part of the hardcore faithful who believed in Apple long before it was cool again to do so
  7. Re:Well, that took long enough by nuzak · · Score: 2, Informative

    > Unless somebody else is requesting that exact same movie (and requesting it at the exact same time as you) how the hell does multicast help

    Someone probably is requesting the exact same movie at roughly the same time. Have a few multicast streams going that are offset by some interval. You request the chunks that aren't being multicast, then synchronize to the first available multicast stream when it's available.

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    Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
  8. 10 minute tape delay by tepples · · Score: 2, Informative

    How is multicast going to reduce the bandwidth requirements of video on demand (i.e: Netflix instant view) applications? You request something, the server sends it to you. Unless somebody else is requesting that exact same movie (and requesting it at the exact same time as you) how the hell does multicast help? The first ten minutes are streamed normally. At some time during this ten-minute period, everyone else watching the same movie as you and who started within the same ten-minute period gets a multicast stream of the second ten minutes. Continue until the entire movie has been streamed in ten-minute blocks.
  9. Re:Paranoia by Sancho · · Score: 2, Informative

    Do you have any sort of citation for that? I don't believe that such a legal precedent exists, either in the courts or on the law books.

    As far as I can tell, this is one of those urban legends which follows similar lines to the, "You can download this, but you have to delete it in 24 hours or buy it legally." There's no precedent for that, either, but it propagated for several years on the web.