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Category Archives: How the Net Works
Risks and Rewards of File Sharing
Often when people hear the term “peer-to-peer file sharing”, they think of torrents, illegal swapping of the latest movies and music, and resulting lawsuits by the record or movie industries for piracy. That does happen; however, file sharing encompasses much more than ripping off the latest hits. Peer-to-Peer, or P2P, is the most widely used form of file sharing. It has become a big and growing part of the Internet, already accounting for 50-70% of consumer network traffic, with millions of P2P clients downloaded and in use. In 2004, an estimated 70 million people were busily sharing files, and doubtless many more now. But P2P is not the only means to share files over the Net. It should not be confused with file hosting, which uses the more familiar client-server architecture of the Internet to stream files to users from big, centralized Web servers. In its purest form, Peer-to-Peer is strictly that: users’ computers directly linked across the Net to their peers; that is, other users’ computers. They join in a network of equals, each machine devoting some fraction of its computing power, bandwidth, and memory to the network, ideally without any need for a central coordinator. In fact, P2P works pretty much the way the Web was originally intended to function. Collaborative computing Civilization is the story of how ever-larger tasks can be done, and done much more efficiently, with cooperation. As a form of collaborative computing between users, … Continue reading
Posted in How the Net Works, News, Security, Tips and Tricks
Tagged chat, DMCA, file sharing, instant messaging, peer-to-peer, Protect IP Act, security, SOPA, torrent, Wi-Fi
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IPv6: The Quiet Revolution in Internet Addresses Has Started
Many users may not be aware that the Internet is quickly running out of an essential element. The good news is that some very smart people have been working hard behind the scenes to make sure that it does not result in a crisis that could cripple the Net. The bad news is that it will be uncertain how well they have succeeded for some time. If everything works out as planned, users should not even notice the change. Moreover, it will allow everything – yes, theoretically, every thing in the entire world to be connected online one day. Simply put, the problem is that the Internet has run out of addresses. Despite all the metaphors, information on the Net is not floating around in some sci-fi cyberspace cloud. All that data is physically embodied as ones and zeroes in the electronic memory of millions of computers. And every bit and byte of it all needs an address in order to be found and used. To do this, each and every gizmo on the Net: all those PCs, laptops, smartphones, tablets, routers, gateways, and servers, must have its own unique Internet address, too. They must be matched up with all the websites and locations of other services in cyberspace as well. Then, and only then, can useful information be found. The clever solutions to this intricate and daunting problem have shaped the Internet as it exists today. Unfortunately, due to … Continue reading
Super Speed, Internet TV, and Net Neutrality
There’s a little old lady in Sweden who can surf the Internet at the astonishing speed of 40 gigabits per second. Thanks to an experimental technique developed by her son Peter, Sigbritt Lothberg has the fastest home Internet connection anywhere on the planet. She could download an entire movie in less than 2 seconds, many thousands of times faster than with most residential connections. But she only uses it to read web-based newspapers. Those who watch movies and TV programs over the Net can only be envious at this point. Someday, incredible broadband speeds like Ms. Lothberg’s may be commonly available, but not any time soon. A consortium of leading research institutions called Internet2 is developing one of the fastest networks around. It blazes along at “only” 10 gigabits along the “Abilene backbone”, a mere quarter of her speed. Like the original Internet, these links are restricted to universities and research labs for crunching vast amounts of data, for applications in fields like particle physics and imaging. However, regional telephone and Internet access providers have not yet announced any plans for increasing home DSL speeds beyond the snail-like-in-comparison 10-20 megabits per second currently offered. For super-fast links between major hubs is just part of the problem. Delivering such speeds down into the home is another matter. Effectively using such speeds is yet another issue. Speed is one of the major hurdles in using the Internet to provide seamless video content, … Continue reading