I would like the option of having only people who let you browse their shared folders download from me only. I don't like people who don't share or let me browse. I am sure most feel that way.

I for one want the browse host option. Not to see what they are sharing. I want to know if they are sharing and how much. If I can not browse a host I will kill their upload. If they are not sharing anything then I will kill their upload. Sometimes you can bring a host up on chat and explain what I just said. If the host ignores my queries. I kill their upload. See a pattern developing here? Share with me or I won't share with you.
I am sharing about 5gigs. Not much compared to some. But I do not have a very large hard-drive. Thanks for letting me rant.

This is a very idiotic way to think. Gnutella is a free and open network. If people do not want to share, cannot share etc. that's perfectly fine. They might share in the future or share the files they have downloaded. If you think that someone's a free loader or selfish just because he doesn't share at any given moment, you have a very narrow mind. If people cannot download because of that, they'll consider Gnutella unfriendly and switch to something else. Once someone is familiar with Gnutella and starts to really like it, it's very likely that he starts sharing some content.

Do you think people without a homepage should not be able to browse the web?

So if you if I don't agree with your way of thinking I am immeadiately branded an idiot and called names? Who is the one with the narrow mind? I say again. You don't share with me/ I won't share with you. Call me more names if it improves your self-esteem.

P2P networks--especially the open-standard ones--should rely as much as possible on the network rather than the client to provide fairness and efifciency, because someone will inevitably write a malicious client--in this case, one that doesn't upload its shared files list.

For that matter, the upload preference given to hosts who share at least a certain number of files is also suspicious: a malicious host can lie about the number; and if his shared files list is checked for verification, then he can share lots of useless files; and if file usefulness is a criterion, then he can say he has useful files that he doesn't.

Personally, I would like the option to not upload my shared files list. There's no guarantee that a host's files will be in any way related, and people may not want everyone to know some of the things they're into, if the other host isn't also into it himself (and hence downloading one of the pertinent files). And as far as anyone knows, the rìaa likely checks shared-files lists to decide whom to sue.

I am aware that my proposal would not hide shared files altogether, and of the resulting risk of a false sense of security. But that just means more user education is called for.

I am disturbed by stief's particular brand of laziness: think of the time it would take him to rename his files, versus the time and bandwidth that any number of users are spending, only to (say) download DCF-1234.JPG, only to decide it's not what they wanted.

Seriously if you don't want to be browsed don't share any folders. Seems simple enough. I like to browse people sometimes just to see what other files they have more out of curiosity than anything. Though I do like the idea of having a private folder to share with invited guests.

pac

First off....I don't have any files that I can legally share. YET. Actually...I completely mis-understood the service when I signed up. So I'm looking around right now. It's not like I find something...and then hide it so nobody else can get it from me...I just don't have anything. Also...Host Browsing? I like it for one good reason. If you find something you want...you can browse the host and find things you never thought of. Doesn't mean you have to drain just one person....but you take a look...find something you like...then do a search.

You because you didn't understand my post at all and probably didn't even try.

That's fine. Just fvck off. We don't people with your attitude in this world at all. I've probably shared and uploaded much more than you ever will, so cut the cr4p.

If I had to compile a list of people who's attitude really made the world a better place, your name probably wouldn't be on it either.

If somebody doesn't want to upload to freeloaders that's fine. It seems a lot less arbitrary than not uploading to Shareaza users because their software sucks... (which I do anyway).

Before the confusion & misunderstanding at the start of the thread, (get my breath back lol ), there's a lot of people who find browsing a very important tool. Some misunderstand it. The browse tool is not perfect. I've browsed someone i was downlding from but even though the browse search completed with the search tab still up (not stop b/c they were not online or not browsable at that particular moment), there were zero results. This has happened many times. Yet these people are obviously sharing. The same applies to those who are uplding from me. Sometimes you can browse them & sometimes they give zero results (when they have the chat icon visible). But this doesn't necessarily mean they aren't sharing.

I use browse very, very frequently! I may browse someone & then browse the multiple results in the browse b/c I'm looking for particular files or hard to get files. And if these other people have similar then they may share what I'm looking for. If the browse function was taken away or limited even more from what it is then it would take away my abilities to find what i'm looking for & my general techniques for searching for particular material.

I respect some people may want to have some files they wish to keep private for just a certain group of people to share with. Perhaps a group of friends for example. This ability gives some people more confidence with their security with what they share. But at the same time, I believe that for the others who may desire the same files, they are out of the loop & will unnecessarily miss out at no fault of their own. So will that deteriorate the general accessibility of files to the general user. It certainly could.

So how do you balance it?