p2pnet - rss feed: Goodbye ed2k and bittorrent
p2p news / p2pnet: It happened to Napster, Grokster, eDonkey (eMule is next) and finally BitTorrent.
Now the Dutch Supreme Court hammered down another nail. Peer 2 Peer has not died but most of its vital functions have seized under relentless attacks and is now on life-support.
What the hell happen in 2005?
Know your history
Napster, in hindsight the most efficient peer sharing system, succumbed to legal pressure. Napster, because of its centralized architecture, could have become the Google of peer sharing technologies. The Industry for better or worst feared that and made sure it will never resurface.
What followed was a legal hurricane on sites, services, individuals and business models which left the peer-sharing community devastated and unlikely to rebound.
Lessons learned
As a technologies matures, so do the individuals who develop them. Meaning ideologies would soon make way for economic sensibilities.
My point: p2p doesn’t pay rent. The P2P, it’s wrong three-part series explained this in depth. Survival Guides I and II tried to warn and other FK2W articles argued to stop this downfall.
Yet, it was, as they say, inevitable.
Where we stand? As we’re nearing the end of 2005 and maybe the end of the care-free peer-sharing experience, maybe it’s time to recap our position:
Is p2p wrong? No
Is p2p illegal? No
Is p2p legal? No
Wait, back up and let’s parse and run this again:
Is p2p right? Yes
Is p2p illegal? Yes
Is p2p legal? Yes
Well, so much for logic. This simple little packet of Legal code is the root(kit) of all evil.
Explanation: No court has ever ruled or can ever rule that peer sharing technology is illegal. Yet, the content shared could make it illegal.
Why? Because content owners can stop any and all unauthorized copying of their content …even in an infinite digital space as the Internet where copying is vital.
It’s all about perception
Philip Petit of WIPO: "Copyright is no monopoly because copyright owners are free to donate their rights if they want to."
Yes, and chickens can fly because they have wings.
Let’s face it: it was never about what’s right or wrong, it’s only our perception of legality that matters.
If everyone beliefs it’s wrong then it is. If Bram Cohen and Shawn Fanning join the Industry, isn’t that saying it was illegal all along?
Lycos vs. Pessers
The Dutch Supreme Court basically stated three things in there Lycos vs. Pessers ruling:
1) Not only if an action (or non-action for that matter) is unmistakably unlawful but also if it might be unlawful; ISP should handout ID’s.
2) ISP’s should and must perform the above mentioned test. Court intervention isn’t needed nor warranted.
3) Nevertheless, ISP’s should perform this test in good faith and acknowledged the basic human right of free speech.
Side notes
- Unlawful goes beyond illegal. Unlawful behaviour is not codified and is based on current perceptions of lawful behaviour e.g. file-sharing.
- Non-action is this case means sites failing to take action against perceived unlawful behaviour e.g. Newnova.org
- ISP’s are now in fact the lowest courts of justice in the Netherlands.
- Will somebody please explain to me what the heck they mean with free speech and when does free speech matter? You know what? Never mind.
The Result
The Netherlands (and Europe) now unofficially have a Patriot Act. While others might see this as a gross overstatement I’ll dare them to look at the facts. Combine this ruling with all other measures taken and you effectively have a DMCA / Patriot Act-like atmosphere in Europe.
The Impact
Brein is already claiming victory and vowed to rein terror on Kazaa users. Yes, those few dozen who still use Kazaa. While their case is still bogged down in court this judgment is a clear signal; Brein doesn’t need courts, it just needs probable cause.
The question is: In whose perception is this probable cause measured?
The End?
If we breakdown the year 2005 and make up the balance, this is it:
The Industry has successfully fought and claimed a public domain technology called P2P (Grokster et al).
The ends will justify the means (Sony Rootkit).
The insurgents have become or will become parents with mortgages.
This is not a quagmire. It’s over. Now let’s all behave as loyal capitalist-consumer drones and buy iPods, shop at iTunes…and wait for the next revolution.
Raymond Blijd - fk2w
=============
Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don’t buy their ‘product’. Do bug your local political representatives. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you’re into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep’s doorstep, making sure you’ve contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance.
November 26th, 2005 at 7:51 pm
I think this might be a bit premature. Yes, corporate monopolies are making dangerous gains in their ability to stop any and all competition, with the willing aid of lawmakers. But the industry hasn’t “claimed” the public-domain p2p technology. They’ve succeeded in shutting down several commercial enterprises that made use of that technology. That’s not the same thing at all.
The technology itself is out there, and the applications won’t be killed.
November 26th, 2005 at 8:27 pm
love to see em try and shut down emule when it is totally serverless!!!
November 26th, 2005 at 9:43 pm
Read Grokster et al closely; it doesn’t matter if we completely ‘decentralize’. Its now all about filtering
November 27th, 2005 at 3:36 am
Thats not strictly true. ED2K uses many distributed servers, although you could still classify it as decentralized.
The idea of shutting down the hundreds/thousands of servers out there would be impossible, so yes shutting down ed2k/emule is not viable from the RIAA’s perpective. They are trying to remove the commercial elements from the equation, and in doing so, they remove the implied legitimacy.
Without a commercial arm to p2p, the RIAA/MPAA will attempt to classify it as underground, somewhat like pirate radio stations. It’s a psychological and idealogical war they are trying to fight. If they succeed in convincing the masses that p2p is a blackmarket/underground activity, then gaining political support for action will be simplified.
Now im in no way in favour of the RIAA/MPAA, but im trying to look at it from their standpoint in terms of goals. As the old saying goes, know your enemy, this could not be more accurate in this case.
The truth is, all these legal cases are for the benefit of their political PR campaign.
November 27th, 2005 at 5:31 am
Thankyou, I was looking for a ray of hope in this depressing article. What you said makes perfect sense.
Cheers.
November 27th, 2005 at 5:37 am
htf is emule next? LMFAO.. this article is total BS.. open source CANNOT BE STOPPED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
November 27th, 2005 at 8:12 am
First of all, read Grokster et al more closely, it is not about decentralizing anymore. Its about the filtering ability. If there’s no filtering ability then the technology by default will be illegal.
Secondly, you can’t hide in open source.
Read more: “Survival Guide II” http://www.fk2w.com/html/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=113
November 27th, 2005 at 10:15 am
Er… let me think… BitTorrent is open source and use of Bram Cohen’s BT client pales into insignificance compared to the user numbers of BitComet, Azureus etc. Stop talking crap!
November 27th, 2005 at 11:40 am
“First of all, read Grokster et al more closely, it is not about decentralizing anymore. Its about the filtering ability. If there’s no filtering ability then the technology by default will be illegal.”
I disagree, it’s all about decentralization. Thats why the entertainment industry is having such a difficult time stopping the p2p network services, resorting to lawsuits against individual file sharers instead. If they were not decentralized, they could eliminate p2p in one foul swoop.
When you talk about filtering, you actually mean inducement. Again, because p2p networks are so decentralized, the entertainment industry is attempting to prevent infringement at the network client level. Of course the ruling of grokster only applies in the USA (where we all know the music/film industry controls politicans/judges/courts like puppets).
Inducement as classified by the MPAA/RIAA, is of course, ridiculous. Simply by not allowing the entertainment industry to control how a user applies the software, can be classed as inducement. How pathetic.
“Secondly, you can’t hide in open source.”
You are missing the point, open source is not intended for hiding. It’s simply the next evolution of p2p. There is no one company or figure head behind it, it’s a collaboration of skills to create free, stable and transparent software.
The MPAA/RIAA know they can’t force open source projects to use filtering technology, however much they would like to.
Limewire for example, although it was authored by a company, it is open source. So as soon as the tide turned and they decided to add filtering, a fork project emerged called frostwire, which of course will never contain filtering technology.
November 27th, 2005 at 2:54 pm
In France, rumours say that a new law proposed by the governement will simply make illegal all open source stuff and criminalize those who publish their source code. This law were the response to those who say eMule will never die because it’s not a company but an open source programm.
Sad days…
November 27th, 2005 at 4:03 pm
Let them try to make such a law. Lets see if some uses the Human Rights Law’s in Europen courts. Stop people publish there ideas ie Source code would be in breach such laws.
November 27th, 2005 at 4:05 pm
The MPAA/RIAA know they can’t force open source projects to use filtering technology, however much they would like to.
True, but also there nothing stoping from MPAA/RIAA from open sourcing a version with such system.
November 27th, 2005 at 6:03 pm
What our greedy governement forgot is that among the 8 million alleged filesharers in France, and the many more who use the internet anyway, many of them have voting cards and already told the governement that if such laws pass, they’ll know for whom NOT to vote.
Some smart guys in the opposition already included EFF’s license in their electroral programm.
The situation has gone mad about this, and it has nothing to do about piracy, it’s about controlling how music is spread. They aren’t afraid from those who pirate the latest Britney Spears, they are afraid by the fact that the future Britney Spears who could make their living without them !
Funny, but all those people who vote such laws claim themselves as capitalists, liberals (in the economic sense of the word), but true capitalism and economic liberalism also means that if some middlemen are not necessary anymore, they have to disappear. And guess who’s the unnecessary middlemen in the music world…
November 27th, 2005 at 6:05 pm
P2P is a wave that can’t be stopped. In the end, the “bad-guys” (Music Industry, Motion Picture Industry etc…) will lose.
The problem is, until some brave court finally stamps their foot down and says enough is enough, this conflict will continue.
Yes, copyrights are being violated. However, VCR’s have violated this for years. As long as the copied copyrighted material is not being sold, there is no real legal violation.
If I lend you the latest Rolling Stones CD… and you don’t even copy it… you just listen to it… have we violated any laws? According to the “Big Baddies” mentality…Yes.
This all began because Metallica (they were a crappy, talentless band anyway) wanted more money. So… they took a shot at Napster. They got lucky beacause the legal system was inexperienced with file sharing and P2P. And, because of one foolish decision, the floodgates were opened.
To reiterate, in the end… P2P won’t be stopped and neither will sharing of copyrighted material. People will still record soap-operas and photocopy books at the local library.
In the mean-time, we’ll get a little dirty.
November 27th, 2005 at 6:20 pm
What a load of ill-informed bullshit.
Goodbye ed2k? With the existence of Kad the future of ed2k depends on nobody now.
You would have to scare every user away for the network to cease function.
Napster and other technologies ceased because they had dependent hearts that could be targetted. Kad does not, it is therefore not subject to the same fate. Idiot.
November 27th, 2005 at 6:23 pm
er, no it does not make perfect sense. It’s the ill-informed rantings of a sensationalist fool who appears to have a largely clouded understanding of the underlying technologies driving the networks he is so quick to pass judgement on.
November 27th, 2005 at 6:45 pm
Considering that such a law would criminalize development on Linux, BSD, Apache et al, upon which the Internet entirely depends, I kind of doubt it
And that’s especially true considering that France has demonstrated a historical openness and interest in open-source software.
I’d love to see a link, though. Sounds like an urban legend.
November 27th, 2005 at 7:41 pm
http://www.fsffrance.org/news/article2005-11-25.fr.html
In french only, but published by the Free software fundation
November 27th, 2005 at 8:21 pm
The RIAA will fail to close down GNUTella 1 and 2. They’re wasting their time going after users, because it’s collapsing all by itself. Why? Try downloading a binary. You’ll get little files that are trojans, porn dialers and other spam type files. Change the name to something else, and the servers change the name of the malware and offer it up on your next search. Try downloading a track, yeah right. At times I’v seen my 3Mb connection download at dialup speeds, while swarming from 8 servers. I wanted to know what was causing this, so, on a hunch I downloaded some porn and put it up for sharing. BANG! My upstream was brought to it’s knees and my downstream was cut in half from all the hits, alone. No, it’s not an evil plot by the IRAA, it’s the users, spammers and malignant hackers with their porn, trojans, spam and greed that will kill P2P.
ed2K is no different, it takes hours to download one puny 4MB mp3, but stick a porn .avi up and you’re instantly everybodies favorite server.
Bittorrent’s a total laugh, my old Unreal Gold CDROM developed a crack some time ago and I didn’t want to waste $10 US on another CD. No problem, right? Wrong. I go to ISO Hunter to download another image. BAH! After a couple of weeks of waiting for the downloads to complete, if they did, all I got was a bunch of corrupted binary BS. I finally got lucky with GNUTella, after a couple of days waiting for a puny 230 some odd MB .zip download.
Let’s face it, it’s uncomfortable for most to admit it, but obsessions with sex, greed and breaking into anothers computer at any cost will succeed where the IRAA will fail, count on it.
There is a ray of hope, check out http://mute-net.sourceforge.net/ , http://konspire.sourceforge.net/ and http://freenet.sourceforge.net/ . Of course, whats to stop these services to from taking it on the chin, bandwidth wise, from peoples obsessions with porn and greed? Freenet is secure from the IRAA by storing bit’s and pieces of files accross peers, but if it’s all porn and spam, well, what good is security? For now, Mute seems secure but can suffer the same fate and Konspire[2b] is channelized, so if you don’t want this crud, you won’t get it. But, spammers and malignant hackers are a stubbern bunch and they’ll find a way to screw these services up, too.
Look, I like sex, having some money and learning about computers as much as anyone else. But really, there’s a big, fat hairy line between “like” and “obsessed”.
“I have seen the enemy, and it is ourselves.”
November 27th, 2005 at 9:27 pm
Congratulations on this excellent piece of surrealist art.
I can hardly wait to see your next article entitled “Goodbye Microsoft and Google”.
November 27th, 2005 at 9:47 pm
Palomar Jack sounds like you have your emule set up wrong, i bag gigs of stuff with no problem at all with no porn.
November 27th, 2005 at 10:00 pm
Thanks for the link. I remain highly skeptical that this would ever get through — foolish legislation is proposed all the time in many countries, most of which ends up dying deserved deaths.
November 27th, 2005 at 10:06 pm
Also give µTorrent a whirl, Jack.
http://www.utorrent.com/
Cheers!
(PS - You like Pogo too, huh? heh)
November 28th, 2005 at 12:18 am
The must the comply with the open source licencing terms, which usually requires sharing of changes with the community. Failure to comply with this opens them up to legal proceedings.
November 28th, 2005 at 12:23 am
I believe the terms capitailsm and liberal and mutually exclusive, atleast in todays climate.
November 28th, 2005 at 12:44 am
Not really.
As George Will (hardly a liberal himself) said, “capitalism is a government program”.
Liberals simply believe that capitalism doens’t work without government intervention, regulation and management. Modern liberals are democratic capitalists through and through.
Modern-day conservatives, by contrast, think government is basically unnecessary, and are fine with corporations running and owning everything.
November 28th, 2005 at 2:44 am
It might be worth a look. I don’t blame the different file transfer clients for corrupted binaries. They only do what’s asked. But then you get these folks that accedently DL a corrupted file and don’t clean it out, then, it happens again and again. I only got lucky with the Unreal image from off GNUTella, all the others before were corrupted, too. By the way, I did turn around and put it back on after I confirmed it clean.
November 28th, 2005 at 2:51 am
I don’t know, might be. I tried it with my old dialup, thought maybe that was it. Tried the DSL at work, then here at home when we got it, but no luck. Supposedly it’ll work for downloads without openning a port in my firewall, but who knows. There was no firewall when I had dialup and I had the same problem, there. I did get DLs, they just took days for a few MBs. Maybe the client(?), it was eDonkey.
November 28th, 2005 at 3:30 am
>> Modern-day conservatives, by contrast, think government is basically unnecessary, and are fine with corporations running and owning everything.
I don’t know what “Modern-Day Conservatives” you talk to, but you’re full of crap. This Conservative realizes modern society needs some government, without which there’d be no infrastructure. I don’t, by the way, consider free housing and welfare givaways infrastructure. By the way, if the government were run a little more like a corporation there wouldn’t be a US national debt bigger that most other countries GNP.
>> Liberals simply believe that capitalism doens’t work without government intervention, regulation and management. Modern liberals are democratic capitalists through and through.
Wrong, Liberals simply believe goverment should control everything. That way, in their twisted view, they wouldn’t have to work for anything. The government will just give it to you. Idiots, that money has to come from somewhere. How many times does socialism, communism, marxism and the older centralized governments like monarchies have to fail before they’re given up on? I know that may hurt some feelings, but tough, there it is.
November 28th, 2005 at 12:00 pm
Well, I can tell you that I’ve been arguing politics online for roughly 10 years, and am a political activist. The Grover Norquist-type “modern day conservative” is a mix of libertarianism and other far-right ideologies. It’s a person who lives in an alternate reality, and yes, basically believes government should be small to non-existent (with functions pretty much restricted to national defense, and even then, outsourced as much as possible).
Speaking of alternate reality, the notion that “liberals simply believe government should control everything” is simply, demonstrably false.
You might try getting your information from a source besides the Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity crew. They’re not in the business of telling the truth, you know.
November 28th, 2005 at 1:35 pm
Bud, you haven’t a clue what you’re saying.
Socialism is a system in which the means of production (e.g. businesses, factories) are publicly owned, usually through the government.
Communism is a system in which pretty much all private property is publicly owned.
I don’t know of anyone who thinks that’s a good idea, much less any liberals. And trust me: I am one.
By contrast, here we are with balooning deficits, urgent needs (e.g. Katrina aftermath, meeting our obligations with Social Security and Medicare, the war in Iraq), the lowest tax rates of all industrialized nations (much lower than U.S. historical rates under which we experienced tremendous economic growth), and rampant corporate corruption, yet you guys still just can’t stop slashing taxes and gutting regulations.
Tell me again how you think modern society “needs some government”.
Now, if you’re not talking economics, then I actually agree with you: modern conservatives pretty much think government should be mucking around in our bedrooms, our churches, etc. Just about everywhere the Constitution says it shouldn’t be, instead of where it says it should and where history says government has competence: managing the national economy and protecting civil rights.
Oh, and one more thing: I happen to be a federal employee who’s also worked in the private sector. And I have to tell you: the more government gets to look like a corporation (as it has been over the last several years), the worse things are getting in terms of efficiency, clean government and public service.
Sounds like you have a lot to learn.
November 28th, 2005 at 2:01 pm
I have to agree. P2p and much of the Internet is nothing but malware and spam or websites trying to sell something. I only have dialup at home and I have no desire for anything else. Does that mean that i am no longer able to find content that I like? No, I can find plenty of content. I just no longer rely on the Internet. This is where Muni-nets, and Freewans (as well as sneaker nets) fill the void. I have seen a couple of articles about student run local area networks online. The owners of the LAN are the ones that set the rules in order to keep the crap out. This is where the real action is. Yes, good information can be found on the Internet, but it is becoming less and less friendly. When I use the Internet, it is usually to connect to another one of these networks that I just described.
November 29th, 2005 at 11:04 am
I’m sorry to say but if you download executables from services like Gnutella/fastrack/ed2k then you deserve all the spyware and viruses you receive.
Anyone with half a brain knows those services are flooded wth malware and should be avoided like the plauge as far as programs are concerned.
I only use irc/bittorrent for executables. I Ensure the comments are favourable before i download as well as making sure it has atleast 100 downloaders/seeds. Even then, aftering downloading i run virus/spyware scans on them (Well i used to atleast, i use linux now, so viruses ect are not a problem).
“Look, I like sex, having some money and learning about computers as much as anyone else. But really, there’s a big, fat hairy line between “like” and “obsessed”.”
If you hadn’t noticed the world is obsessed by sex. Downloading some porn is normal and heathly. These are biological drives don’t forget.
November 29th, 2005 at 6:50 pm
Except when you do everything to have the legislation voted just before christmas, when there’s no one but some lobby-paid representatives in the house, and that the state made this an “urgent law”, which means that the house of representatives & the senate will vote on it WITHOUT debates and in 2 nights in a row…
My opinion : Let them vote it, and see how unappliable it is afterwards. The “Syndicat de la magistrature” (The judge’s & prosecutors guild) already said they are not willing to enforce such laws…
November 29th, 2005 at 10:17 pm
Very funny! Took me a while to clip!
September 9th, 2007 at 7:50 pm
coolwebsearch sux