Political and Technical Implications of GitTorrent

lkcl writes "The GitTorrent Protocol (GTP) is a protocol for collaborative git repository distribution across the Internet. Git promises to be a distributed software management tool, where a repository can be distributed. Yet, the mechanisms used to date to actually 'distribute,' such as ssh, are very much still centralized. GitTorrent makes Git truly distributed. The initial plans are for reducing mirror loading, however the full plans include totally distributed development: no central mirrors whatsoever. PGP signing (an existing feature of git) and other web-of-trust-based mechanisms will take over from protocols on ports (e.g. ssh) as the access control 'clearing house.' The implications of a truly distributed revision control system are truly staggering: unrestricted software freedom. The playing field is leveled in so many ways, as 'The Web Site' no longer becomes the central choke-point of control. Coming just in time for that all-encompassing Free Software revolution hinted at by The Rebellion Against Vista, this article will explain more fully some of the implications that make this quiet and technically brilliant project, GitTorrent, so important to Software Freedom, from both technical and political perspectives."

Comments

This is why people don't take you seriously.

[Anonymous Coward]

The hyperbole makes you look like a frothing idiot.

if your product is so useful

[circletimessquare]

you don't need the hype. linking it to the downfall of vista makes us laugh at you

just describe what it does, dryly, concisely, technically. if it is worthy of the hype, we will supply the hype for you

but when you supply the hype, we are inclined to believe there's not much really going on with your project. which might not be true. so change your tone, for your own sake

Re:Why?

[lkcl]

The primary purpose of peer to peer systems are to either avoid censorship or provide lots of cheap/free bandwidth.

the primary purposes _now_ are to avoid censorship and to provide lots of cheap/free bandwidth.

the last major upgrade of debian REDLINED the world's internet backbone infrastructure for a WEEK.

with the total linux usage only being - what... 1% of the world's desktop systems, and debian being a small fraction of that, the debian mirror system are ALREADY creaking under the load.

Neither of these really apply to source code management.

why not?

Hosting is easily sponsored and the files aren't very big anyway. Few projects will face censorship anywhere other than the most regressive regimes (ie, China or the US).

i don't _want_ "sponsorship". i don't _want_ my pet project hosted by a large corporation. i want it completely independent.

i want my web site content hosted and automatically mirrored across the world, along with its bugs database and its wiki all linked together.

i want people in the emerging markets and the third world to be able to have exactly the same kind of luxury that we do - and they DO NOT have "continuous access to the web site or access to the lovely sponsored hosting".

think much bigger and you will start to see why this is so damn important.

Re:Piracy

[compro01]

Observe the Ubuntu website this coming April when they release a new version and see if you still feel that a website is appropriate to the task. The site gets hammered so hard that it's problematic to even get the .torrent files directly from them, nevermind the ISOs, and it's not feasible to have that kind of bandwidth sitting around unused except for a few days every 6 months, nor is it currently feasible to get that much bandwidth on-demand for a website, but bittorrent allows for just that, as you're pooling the bandwidth of everyone downloading it. You can easily gets amounts of bandwidth that would cost tens of thousands of dollars to have in a conventional manner.