File sharing
File-sharing software is used to directly or indirectly transfer files from one computer to another over the Internet, over a smaller Intranet, or across simple networks following the peer-to-peer model.
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2 File sharing and copyright 3 List of file-sharing utilities 4 Credit |
File-sharing Programs
A variety of filesharing programss are available on several different networks. Availability depends partly on operating system, and different networks have different features (for example, multiple-source downloads, different sorts of search limiting, and so on). Several major filesharing programs contain spyware, which many users wish to avoid.
Nearly all filesharing programs request that you share files of your own, as users sharing files is the basis of the network.
Anonymous, Internet file-sharing (such as Gnutella and Napster) grew in popularity with the proliferation of high speed Internet connections and the (relatively) small and high quality MP3 audio format. Although file sharing is a legal technology with legal uses, some people have used it to download copyrighted materials. This has led to counter-attacks against file-sharing in general from some copyright owners.
Through 2001 and 2002, the entire file-sharing community has been in a state of flux, since record companies and RIAA try to shut down as much of this as possible. Even though they have forced Napster into cooperating against copyright violations, they are way behind, since the community has flourished and produced lots of different clients, though not as many different underlying protocols. The second generation of P2P protocols, such as Freenet are not as dependent as Napster is on a central server, making it much harder to shut down these systems through court actions. Another attempt (used by the maintainers of KaZaA) is to change the company's organization so that it is impossible or useless to attack it legally.
File sharing and copyright
List of file-sharing utilities
Credit
This article was partly based on public domain material from the infoAnarchy wiki. Update as needed.
