File Sharing Controversy

File sharing, the practice of distributing or providing access to digitally stored information, such as software, multi-media and documents. File sharing can be implemented through a variety of techniques, common methods include sharing removable media, purposely built distribution networks such as Apples 'iTunes' and the more popular method, peer-to-peer (P2P) networking. Peer-to-peer networks allow users to digitally distribute anything and everything, sounds simple, right?

Whilst in practice it is extremely straight forward and completely harmless, we can't hide from the fact that file sharing (aided by P2P networks) engineered a vast illegal network which is currently thriving. The increasing popularity of the mp3 music format in the late 1990's led to the release and growth of Napster. Napster is still highly regarded as the godfather of P2P file sharing, essentially paving the way for decentralized and semi-decentralised peer-to-peer file sharing networks such as Gnutella, Gnutella2, eDonkey2000 and the Kazaa network. Today, users are more familiar with the term "torrent downloads". Torrents are specialized files utilized in P2P network environments allowing users to download files at a faster rate. Whilst currently not considered illegal, torrents are extremely controversial largely due to the fact they are mainly used to distribute pirated data such as the latest films, music and computer games.

I can see what you're thinking, why not just close down the "networks"? To put it simply, it's impossible. To understand this claim, you have to understand how torrents actually work. Torrents use a toolkit called a "tracker", it's the trackers job to coordinate the P2P transfer of files among users, tracker applications typically run on websites. When initiating the download of a torrent, a user clicks on a link pointing to a torrent meta-data file. These meta-data files are not stored on the torrent trackers server, but are distributed among a number of torrent file servers. Each torrent file points to a tracker, which keeps a global registry of all the downloaders and seeds of the file in question. The tracker then responds to a download request with a list of peers who have (or a part of) the requested file, the user can then establish a direct connection and basically asks for chunks of the download.

To put it simply you are downloading from other users who possess the requested file, also known as peers. The "network" is essentially the entire world, how is one supposed to moderate what the planet is sharing? Putting an end to illegal file sharing and preventing piracy would take something exceptionally groundbreaking and somewhat drastic.

Todays news is littered with short films produced by the media designed to belittle illegal downloaders and "educate" joe public on the damage being caused by such actions. Bold claims are often outlined, "up to 800,000 jobs in the creative industries out of 1.8 million in total are threatened...", "billions has been lost due to piracy...", "record companies forced into liquidation...". More recently the media has been focusing on fines directed towards illegal downloaders, fines ranging anywhere from $1000 to $250,00000, all abit over the top isn't it? Well, according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) it's only the beginning.

In 2003 the RIAA began legal proceedings againts Jammie Thomas-Rasset for infringing the copyrights of two dozen major-label songs on the popular P2P network Kazaa. The punishment? A cringeworthy fine of $80,000, per song. For the lables themselves, that's roughly equivalent to selling 114,000 songs at Apple's iTunes Store. Thomas-Rasset's was the first trial in the campaign against individual file-sharers that the RIAA began in 2003 and ended late last year. As such, it was one of the few tests of the legal underpinnings of that campaign, including the argument that making tracks available to others online (by keeping them in a folder that was available for sharing) was a form of infringement. Is Jammie's excessive penalty enough to deter you from downloading pirated data?

So, legal action is been presented and taken againts illegal downloaders, but is it enough? Various procedures have been put into place to help combat piracy. Internet service providers (ISPs) for example have been forced to crack down on repeat offenders who insist on constantly downloading pirated data by implementing a "three strikes and your gone" type system. Not exactly $80,000 is it? Whilst we could spend a lifetime discussing possible solutions to preventing piracy, we can't hide from the fact that file sharing in it's most basic terms is here to stay for some time to come.

The economic turmoil throughout our world is financially damaging and hitting familys hard, the solution to this is to spend as little money as possible. Think of it this way, you have had a tough month, scrimped and scraped to pay the bills, you're working six days a week but for what? Survival? To top it off this years most anticipated game has just been released and you can't afford it, but wait, it's available for FREE online, you could be playing it within the hour! We've all been there, whether it's a game, a film, maybe some software.. it's convenient for us to sit on our backsides and wait for said download to reach 100%.

It's all very well ISPs threatening to cut their customers off from the world wide web and large record labels taking legal action, the world in it's entirety is to blame, filesharing is an extremely lucrative market and it's here to stay.