mardi, octobre 19, 2004 Just five years (or so) ago, Shawn Fanning created and distributed Napster, the original mortal-friendly Peer-to-Peer (P2P) search tool which spawned a whole host of copycats - Kazaa, Grokster, Morpheus, LimeWire, the works. From what I can remember of its technology, the largest mistake that Napster made was owning a central server which handled requests for files (or actually stored the files on disk - concretising their liability problem from virtual bits and bytes into a real, physical, prosecutable object), which made them the perfect target for illegal content distribution prosecution. (Now it's legal.)Kazaa, Grokster, Morpheus, LimeWire, etc. improved on Napster by having their sharing clients handle real P2P connections - file swappers connected directly with each other, instead of downloading their requests to a centralised computer which dished out the files. However, they failed too, due to one of the many technological quirks which exist when computers are added to humanity. The first problem was that of failed/partial downloads - Computer A (downloader) connects to Computer B (downloadee). Computer A downloads about 50% of the file, but then Computer B suffers a hard disk crash, and never boots up again. Ever. Again. Computer A is stuck with a never-to-be-completed 50% of a download, and unless the person behind Computer A is tech-savvy enough to know how to tweak a file to have it continue downloading from someone else's computer, it's into the trashcan for the 50% file. The other problem which led to the failure of the Downloading: 2nd Wave (tm ME!) software group was selfishness: who wanted to share any files and lose precious bandwidth when one could just download and leech off everyone else? The problem wasn't rampant when the 2nd Wave first started - the community was close-knit, and understood the rules of the game: Be Nice. But once the kick-off was announced, all the players started making up their own rules of the pitch - just download from other people, and don't share anything. Very dog-eat-dog. Naturally, the Seeders (the people who got the files first, either from ripping their own CDs which they had bought with their own money, or from capturing TV programmes off HDTV) got fed up after a while - who wouldn't, when your computer could be uploading to 20 different computers at the same time, while the file you were downloading came in at a snail's pace due to the uploading rates? (Another failure of the system - no compensation for high uploaders.) Enter Downloading: the 3rd Wave. (tm ME again.) BitTorrent has pretty much set the tone for the 3rd Wave. It combines the supposed Next Big Thing: open-source software (which has been the Next Big Thing for about 5 years now, meaning that it might never really achieve it’s true potential), with a radical evolution of the programming mindset for writing download clients. Now all that kicks off the downloading frenzy is one Seeder with a complete information file. Three people connect to the torrent (including the Seeder, which makes it a four-person network), and they download from each other - assuming Person A downloads PIECE753 from the Seeder, and Person B downloads PIECE951 from the Seeder, and Person C downloads PIECE 456 from the Seeder, their computers can interconnect, and they may download these particular PIECES from each other, instead of downloading from the Seeder. This takes the load off the Seeder, and streamlines the download process because you can have a complete piece of information among 200 different persons, all mutually downloading from each other - WITHOUT ANY ONE PERSON HAVING A COMPLETE COPY YET. What makes BitTorrent more exciting is that high uploaders get payoff: your download rate is proportional to your upload rate. The more you share, the faster you get to download. So the onus is on you - your generosity will know no bounds once you get the hang of this. The problem with BitTorrent is that sites hosting the links to the torrent files are few and far between - you have your regular larger sites which torrent users will know about, but there's no particular central database you can search, unlike Kazaa or Napster. Not only is this a major drag when you're itching to hear that new song to search for a website which lists the torrents, these sites are also vulnerable as they can be targeted by IPR and copyright groups. They’re safe so far because there’s nothing illegal (again, so far) about listing torrents, which are at best, nothing more than file indicators*, but this also makes them easy to block – just jam the entire IP address and its subdomains. (*There have been cases in which website owners have been taken to task by their ISPs for linking to illegal material. Whether this trend continues and escalates into a legal battle is still an open issue.) The other problem with BitTorrent is that if a file is popular, such as a newly released episode on TV, or the hottest new album by Hoobastank, it downloads at light speed because of the sheer number of users – remember, the more users who download, the more people you have to choose to download from. When it comes to older stuff, you might have to sniff around a bit to find a usable torrent – many do end up as obsolete links. (You can ask for someone to “re-Seed” a file, as one mIRC/torrent website kindly suggests, but it also requests that you limit such requests to one a day for each particular file.) Another predicament which BitTorrent users face is the sheer amount of stuff which they end up downloading. Due to the nature of the downloading, most people upload an entire album instead of just a single song (or an entire SEASON of f.r.i.e.n.d.s. instead of just one episode – so if you’re a 56K dialup modem user dying to listen to the new Alicia Keys song, or you just want to watch one particular episode of something, here’s wishing you good luck, and a whole load of patience, because you’re likely to be online for a week (or a year), downloading the entire album/season, just to hear/see that one song/episode you want. There are a couple more avenues for downloading which I haven’t personally explored, like the eDonkey/Overnet network – I’ve installed it once, but didn’t like the interface (which doesn’t look any much different from Kazaa), and hated hated hated the spyware and other 3rd party software which came bundled with the installation. I uninstalled it, and will refrain from posting anything about its functionality. I’m not sure how the future of downloading will go – I still see a large gap between users’ wants and what media networks can provide, which is my justification for supporting the continued proliferation of downloading tools. Take (for example), the recent hullabaloo about English Premier League (EPL) matches and Starhub cable. It already sucks that we don’t have the Lake District to wander through when we’re bored, and Kallang Stadium is no Old Trafford or Ansfield, but when cable users are deprived of EPL matches because Starhub cable can’t provide a solution to their corporate problems, I think it’s reason enough to support the semi-legality of download clients (that is, assuming that the download clients provide live broadcasts of EPL matches, which – quite frankly – is a little far-fetched.) Perhaps an illustration that is closer to my heart – Gilmore Girls. I would pay to get the series in on my television, but hey, the series is in its fifth season (5x04, to be exact, and 5x05 is set to air this evening in the US), and our public television is showing 4x17 (out of 22 episodes) this Sunday afternoon. Not to mention that as of 7th December 2004, Season 2’s DVD will be out in US stores – who knows when our HMV will bring it in, if ever? This means that I’ll probably have to wait till 2005 to watch season 5 on public television, and wait till 2010 in order to get my season 5 DVDs in our country. All this while refraining from participating in all the extremely scintillating forum board conversations on TWOP or the like. For you fashionistas out there, it’s like discussing how great the pashmina shawl is NOW, in 2004, when it went out of fashion all the way back in 2001. THAT’s how bad the gap between the user and media networks. What I’m hoping is for this gap to be somehow rectified before we start prosecuting people for using download clients. There’s obviously a niche to be filled – it just doesn’t seem fair when you take away the download clients, or threaten prosecution on perfectly law-abiding people when they’re willing to pay money for a service which nobody provides.* The Apple industry has already taken some steps in the right direction – US$1 for a song download is reasonable, and solves the problem of expense – you pay $20 for 20 songs which you want to hear, rather than $20 for one song and 19 other songs on an album which you might not really like. (There are problems of “musical determinism” inherent within this particular business model, but that is another discussion for another time.) But what of the other media like movies and television? (* Please note that I am using this logic to apply to file downloading only, and am particularly interested on its application to free-to-air television shows. The argument does not extend to truly contraband material, like drugs.) # This is a blog post which had a gestation period of two months. It’s complete, but only as a blog post. If this were a real essay, it would be the first draft, as there are still holes in the arguments. Nonetheless, should you want to use it in an academic essay, feel free, but remember to cite properly. # 1,649 words. In other words: I am mad. [An argument for file-sharing] |
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