Oh yes the blocking done by universities. Do you also know that you can get around that by using something like Socks2http and use a proxy.. Its a pain to get working but it works. Isps/universities blocking is a problem for all of P2P and isnt specific to just gnutella...

Why i think that the riaa wont succeed. One because unlike all the other networks out there gnutella is truely decentralized because its open, has many more uses than just file sharing and do to the protocol it is impossible to shut down.

Your right the RIAA does have deep pockets which is why they are pushing for things like DRM and SMDI to be standard and manadatory on everything.

As for this comment "RIAA could try to abuse the network, flood the net with fakes (read Harry Potter floods on Slashdot) or DoS or.... is Gnutella really that strong?"

Replace try to with is doing. The RIAA has been doing that for a while now flooding gnutella, abusing the network and etc. The RIAA has been monitoring gnutella for months. Gnutella is still here and as the protcol gets better i firmly believe that it will be able to withstand because its holding up now..

Right now i think the best way to improve gnutella is to improve the speed and capacity of the network with things like supernodes. Really until things like that are added which are going to in the near future its kinda pointless for me to think up ideas when others have allready sloved them. Metadata should include more than just mp3s.

Packethound is software already in use at the University of Missouri (if not others).

It examines the contents of each packet and already has rules to identify and block Gnutella data. Once it see's a single packet with a pattern that matches GNet data, the connection to the remote computer is immediately dropped.

Rachel

No Electronic Theft Law (NET Act)

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)

Rachel

It's a big problem. Let's imagine 1000 students have been blocked, only a few computer geeks manage to set up a working tunneling (and might get caught). The majority, let's say 900 student are off or will move to an alternative P2P system. With every university or ISP the RIAA convinces/forces to block, gnutella will loose users, bandwith and files.
However I got your point, you think Gnutella is safe and has more umportant problems, okay.

Personally I would be interest in ideas how to make Gnutella stronger and remove possible weak spots. Anyone has ideas?

I know this may sound slightly silly, but I've heard that it can work reasonably well elsewhere...

How about each client, when asked to upload a file, also get's a chance if it decides (for whatever reason, say for example, it's never uploaded to this IP address before) to upload a message that has to be OK'd before the upload commences.

This message could be something along the lines of 'I agree that I do not work for any law enforcement agency, nor for trade organizations such as the WIPO, RIAA (etc etc) and that I agree to indemnify both the owner or owners of the remote computer currently identified as having IP address x.x.x.x from any legal action as a direct or indirection consequence of this or any subsequent download download that I, or the organization I represent, perform. I further agree that I am solely responsible for ensuring that any and all copyright infringements are not violated by performing this or subsequent downloads and that I/we do not hold the owner of the remote computer responsible in any way, shape manner or form.' (Yada, yada, yada)

Long winded? Yes. Turgid? Certainly. Protective? Possibly...

Perhaps something like this would then put the onus on the uploader to ensure that no copyright infringement takes place. Since the uploader is significantly harder to ID than the sharer, this might make the job of the RIAA harder to perform...

Just an idea is all. Perhaps my head is somewhat in cloud cuckoo land here, but you never know...

Rachel

Anyway you look at it whoever pays the bills can do what they want. And chances are they will or are block many of the other file shairng programs too and not just gnutella. Whenever i see someone complaining about blocking its very common that they have tried 3-4 other programs too with no success.

If gnutella developers did do some measure to circumvent blocking all thats going to happen is that they are going to block gnutella differently like with things like packethound which was mentioned. It'd work for a while but wouldnt be a long term solution.

The disclaimer idea is something that indivdual programs would have to do most have ones kinda similar too it not that extreeme though. I've seen similar disclaimers like that on xxx sites.

This is probably a good reason why gnutella should try to be more than just file sharing which probably wont happen for a while.

Hi Sephiroth, also Bearshare moderators have different opinions about Gnutella and RIAA attacks?
Btw, it seems this discusison found an end: RIAA has shutdown the first Gnutella client, Xolox. Read more http://www.zeropaid.com/news/article.../11292001a.php

I am not as good with words as Rachel, but here are my two cents:

Have the legal notice as part of the Gnutella License agreement (have servants do this during install?). The agreement would absolve all servant's users from responsibility saying something like:
"By using the Gnutella network, you agree to the following - You may only download file(s) that you are legally entitled to own. The Gnutella network is here to share files for educational purposes, and for the legal transfer of information. If you are downloading a file, you are stating that you legally own a licence for the product, you know the software is freeware.... bla bla bla".

My servant could be set up to varify that you have "Pre-Agreed" to the generic disclaimer before I send a file to you. I think this "blanket" disclaimer would be easier than having a disclaimer pop up every time I want to download a file from another server.... just say "I agree" once and be done with it.

Furthermore, this will also keep abuse down. Because if every user sent a disclamer, it won't be long before some smart a** starts sending 'check out my porn site' notices when you try to download a file.

In general, I think the discaimer idea is a super idea though... just need to figure out the bugs???

Can't speak for other servants, but I do know Gnotella already has this.

You are absolutly right, this feature does have the potential to be used for the wrong reasons. I had not thought of that side. Good point. I suppose if the message were 'built-in' and gave the user no chance to modify it then that might work.

Rachel

Sounds promising for install time.

Does anyone knows a lawyer with multi national experience? Btw I have seen some of the old MP3 sites have a similar disclaimer, saying every file is for private archive and available for legal owner of the original only... you have to agree to download... also everyone working for RIAA etc is forbidden to enter or use the site in any way. I could remember because the funny part is, they refer to an DMCA article, which made this kind of disclaimer possible...