Contributed from Readers  (Last Updated:  November 21, 2002)

5.   General Purpose Location Protocol (gpulp; previously known as ex-gnutellaNG):  A p2p system for locating services (posted March 19, 2002)

Erratum (May 16,  2002):  This site previously said that gpulp was defunt.  In fact, it is not dead, and new working drafts should be published soon (please see www.gpulp.org  for more information).

The essential idea of gPulp was to modify the gnutella query system to allow for intelligent querying of a diverse range of services.  At that time the gnutellaNG group was looking at the ‘Next Generation’ gnet.  This covered a diverse range of issues, such as network topology and peer location.  gPulp formed from gnutellaNG and was concentrating mostly on intelligent service queries.

gPulp was to be a non-infringing use of gnet because it allowed for the location of any type of service (both infringing and non-infringing) in much the same way that DNS allows for location of websites that contain infringing and non-infringing information.

The saving grace for gPulp was that (like DNS, unlike Napster) the vast majority of services/information found using gPulp would be non-infringing. i.e. That gPulp was not a system primarily designed or predominately used in an infringing manner.

                                    - Member of gPulp mailing list

6.  Trusted Peer-to-Peer Systems (posted April 13, 2002)

As one of the initiatives in the P2P systems research group here at Stanford, we are working to build a trusted computing base based on a peer-to-peer approach.  We believe that P2P systems have the potential to become highly trusted due to their lack of central control, dynamic reconfigurability, and local autonomy.  The absence of central control can be used to create an absence of single or multiple points of failure.  The dynamic reconfigurability characteristic of the network can be exploited to disconnect malicious nodes while maintaining the stability of the network, and the local autonomy of each node allows it to choose which other nodes on the network it trusts for which services.

However, there are number of technical challenges that must be overcome to realize the potential of peer-to-peer systems to become a trusted computing base.  The Gnutella network and its evolving protocols provide a robust research test-bed to study the necessary distributed systems issues surrounding search, information loss, vulnerability to denial-of-service attacks, information authenticity, and intellectual property management.  By studying the current operation of the Gnutella network, and through ongoing research, enhancements to the existing Gnutella protocols as well as new protocols can be developed to overcome these technical challenges.

These new protocols can be added to open-source Gnutella implementations, and can then be deployed to create a trusted peer-to-peer network that provides efficient search, perpetually preserves information, tolerates attacks by malicious nodes, guarantees authentic information, and enforces intellectual property rights.  Of course, without a large "real-life" deployment of a peer-to-peer network such as Gnutella, it would be difficult to understand the characteristics of a peer-to-peer network, and there would not exist a significant test-bed in which new protocols could be tested for scalability.

The goal of building a peer-to-peer trusted computing base as well as other research directions being pursued by our research group (see http://www-db.stanford.edu/peers/) currently benefit from the Gnutella network, and provides a starting point for ongoing research in the area of distributed systems.

-Ph.D. Student at Stanford University, Department of Computer Science

7.   Gnutella Snapshot: What Users are Downloading at a Particular Moment (posted June 27, 2002)

At any moment, one can observe plenty of substantial non-infringing uses of Gnutella.  A snapshot taken on June 27, 2002 at 12:30PM PDT reveals users downloading the following:

1. WTC videos
2. President Bush speeches
3. home-made videos
4. jokes
5. FAQs
6. instructions on various things
7. lyrics
8. essays
9. RPMs for linux
10. shareware for windows
11. non-copyrighted images
12. maps
13. java / developer tools
14. tutorials
15. HTML pages

- Open-Source Software Engineer

8.  Excerpted from “Streamcast/EFF memorandum of points and authorities in support of motion for partial summary judgment, in MGM et al. v. Grokster et al. (Jan. 22, 2002)”, http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/MGM_v_Grokster/20020122_streamcast_memo_sum_judg.html (posted July 12, 2002)

1. Search, obtain and disseminate a wide variety of digital content, including software, video, audio, graphics, and documents
2. Make public domain works easily available to the public
3. Distribute government documents, including historical and current Presidential addresses
4. Distribute non-infringing entertainment media, potentially benefiting musicians and authors by broadening and improving distribution opportunities
5. Distribute social and political commentary

Please see EFF’s memorandum for more details.

9.  Using P2P to Distribute Software (posted September 7, 2002)

I have been developing software for a number of years.  In the last couple of years, I've seen my software sales fall to nearly zero.  I began thinking about my original mission, which is to develop a product and offer it to people who are interested. The idea of making money for my work came after being approached by companies who offered to sell my work for a fee of course.

To make a long story short, I realized that I only accomplished half of my original mission. I developed the product, but no one is using it because the cost acts as a barrier.  I decided to offer the software for free using p2p technology. The cost to the user has been completely balanced with my cost, time and effort.

P2P technology is an excellent distribution channel for a free-information exchange.                           

Please see http://www.leeware.com for more information.

- President of LeeWare Development

*10.  Using P2P to Distribute and Collect Music (posted November 21, 2002)

I am a professional musician active in touring, performing, composing and publishing for over 28 years.

I would like to use Gnutella to do research and to collect the freely distributed works (with the authors' permission) that I am interested in.

In the future I would like to use Gnutella to distribute my CDs, audio recordings of some of my concerts, video recordings of some concerts and some instructional videos, and papers documenting the results of some of my research.

There should be areas in our society where ideas and information are free for the use of everyone.  This is especially true of creative ideas and inspired thought. I see Gnutella as one possible ideal platform for the distribution and sharing of such ideas. Ideas should be shared and I view my music as a sonic language containing ideas. I create this language to share these ideas with others, therefore the ideas need to be heard. My original goal was not to become wealthy doing this music. I would like to make a living and create as best I can to make a contribution to creativity in general and musical language in particular.

More about my ideas in this area can be found at http://www.m-base.org/mp3_philosophy.html

- Professional Musician

Do you have more to add?

Additional references:

http://www.zeropaid.com/php/9online/gene0518.php

http://www.limewire.org/project/www/CEO_Message.html

http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/MGM_v_Grokster/20020122_streamcast_memo_sum_judg.html