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Wikipedia

File sharing

January 19, 2023

File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digital media, such as computer programs, multimedia (audio, images and video), documents or electronic books. Common methods of storage, transmission and dispersion include removable media, centralized servers on computer networks, Internet-based hyperlinked documents, and the use of distributed peer-to-peer networking.

File sharing technologies, such as BitTorrent, are integral to modern media piracy, as well as the sharing of scientific data and other free content.

History

For a chronological guide, see Timeline of file sharing.

Files were first exchanged on removable media. Computers were able to access remote files using filesystem mounting, bulletin board systems (1978), Usenet (1979), and FTP servers (1970's). Internet Relay Chat (1988) and Hotline (1997) enabled users to communicate remotely through chat and to exchange files. The mp3 encoding, which was standardized in 1991 and substantially reduced the size of audio files, grew to widespread use in the late 1990s. In 1998, MP3.com and Audiogalaxy were established, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act was unanimously passed, and the first mp3 player devices were launched.[1]

In June 1999, Napster was released as an unstructured centralized peer-to-peer system,[2] requiring a central server for indexing and peer discovery. It is generally credited as being the first peer-to-peer file sharing system. In December 1999, Napster was sued by several recording companies and lost in A&M Records, Inc. v. Napster, Inc..[3] In the case of Napster, it has been ruled that an online service provider could not use the "transitory network transmission" safe harbor in the DMCA if they had control of the network with a server.[4]

Gnutella, eDonkey2000, and Freenet were released in 2000, as MP3.com and Napster were facing litigation. Gnutella, released in March, was the first decentralized file-sharing network. In the Gnutella network, all connecting software was considered equal, and therefore the network had no central point of failure. In July, Freenet was released and became the first anonymity network. In September the eDonkey2000 client and server software was released.[citation needed]

In March 2001, Kazaa was released. Its FastTrack network was distributed, though, unlike Gnutella, it assigned more traffic to 'supernodes' to increase routing efficiency. The network was proprietary and encrypted, and the Kazaa team made substantial efforts to keep other clients such as Morpheus off of the FastTrack network.[citation needed] In October 2001, the MPAA and the RIAA filed a lawsuit against the developers of Kazaa, Morpheus and Grokster[5][6] that would lead to the US Supreme Court's MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd. decision in 2005.

Shortly after its loss in court, Napster was shut down to comply with a court order. This drove users to other P2P applications and file sharing continued its growth.[7] The Audiogalaxy Satellite client grew in popularity, and the LimeWire client and BitTorrent protocol were released. Until its decline in 2004, Kazaa was the most popular file-sharing program despite bundled malware and legal battles in the Netherlands, Australia, and the United States. In 2002, a Tokyo district court ruling shut down File Rogue, and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) filed a lawsuit that effectively shut down Audiogalaxy.

 
Demonstrators protesting The Pirate Bay raid in 2006

From 2002 through 2003, a number of BitTorrent services were established, including Suprnova.org, isoHunt, TorrentSpy, and The Pirate Bay. In September 2003, the RIAA began filing lawsuits against users of P2P file sharing networks such as Kazaa.[8] As a result of such lawsuits, many universities added file sharing regulations in their school administrative codes (though some students managed to circumvent them during after school hours). Also in 2003, the MPAA started to take action against BitTorrent sites, leading to the shutdown of Torrentse and Sharelive in July 2003.[9] With the shutdown of eDonkey in 2005, eMule became the dominant client of the eDonkey network. In 2006, police raids took down the Razorback2 eDonkey server and temporarily took down The Pirate Bay.[citation needed]

“The File Sharing Act was launched by Chairman Towns in 2009, this act prohibited the use of applications that allowed individuals to share federal information amongst one another. On the other hand, only specific file sharing applications were made available to federal computers” (the United States.Congress.House). In 2009, the Pirate Bay trial ended in a guilty verdict for the primary founders of the tracker. The decision was appealed, leading to a second guilty verdict in November 2010. In October 2010, Limewire was forced to shut down following a court order in Arista Records LLC v. Lime Group LLC but the Gnutella network remains active through open source clients like FrostWire and gtk-gnutella. Furthermore, multi-protocol file-sharing software such as MLDonkey and Shareaza adapted to support all the major file-sharing protocols, so users no longer had to install and configure multiple file-sharing programs.[citation needed]

On January 19, 2012, the United States Department of Justice shut down the popular domain of Megaupload (established 2005). The file sharing site has claimed to have over 50,000,000 people a day.[10] Kim Dotcom (formerly Kim Schmitz) was arrested with three associates in New Zealand on January 20, 2012 and is awaiting extradition.[11][12] The case involving the downfall of the world's largest and most popular file sharing site was not well received, with hacker group Anonymous bringing down several sites associated with the take-down.[10] In the following days, other file sharing sites began to cease services; Filesonic blocked public downloads on January 22, with Fileserve following suit on January 23.[citation needed]

In 2021 a European Citizens' Initiative "Freedom to Share"[13] started collecting signatures in order to get the European Commission to discuss (and eventually make rules) on this subject, which is controversial.[14]

Techniques used for video sharing

From the early 2000s until the mid 2010s, online video streaming was usually based on the Adobe Flash Player. After more and more vulnerabilities in Adobe's flash became known, YouTube switched to HTML5 based video playback in January 2015.[15]

Types

Peer-to-peer file sharing

Peer-to-peer file sharing is based on the peer-to-peer (P2P) application architecture. Shared files on the computers of other users are indexed on directory servers. P2P technology was used by popular services like Napster and LimeWire. The most popular protocol for P2P sharing is BitTorrent.

File sync and sharing services

 
Screenshot of an open-source file-sharing software Shareaza

Cloud-based file syncing and sharing services implement automated file transfers by updating files from a dedicated sharing directory on each user's networked devices. Files placed in this folder also are typically accessible through a website and mobile app and can be easily shared with other users for viewing or collaboration. Such services have become popular via consumer-oriented file hosting services such as Dropbox and Google Drive. With the rising need of sharing big files online easily, new open access sharing platforms have appeared, adding even more services to their core business (cloud storage, multi-device synchronization, online collaboration), such as ShareFile, Tresorit, WeTransfer, or Hightail.

rsync is a more traditional program released in 1996 which synchronizes files on a direct machine-to-machine basis.

Data synchronization in general can use other approaches to share files, such as distributed file systems, version control, or mirrors.

Academic file sharing

In addition to file sharing for the purposes of entertainment, academic file sharing has become a topic of increasing concern,[16][17][18] as it is deemed to be a violation of academic integrity at many schools.[16][17][19] Academic file sharing by companies such as Chegg and Course Hero has become a point of particular controversy in recent years.[20] This has led some institutions to provide explicit guidance to students and faculty regarding academic integrity expectations relating to academic file sharing.[21][22]

Public opinion of file sharing

In 2004, there were an estimated 70 million people participating in online file sharing.[23] According to a CBS News poll in 2009, 58% of Americans who follow the file-sharing issue, considered it acceptable "if a person owns the music CD and shares it with a limited number of friends and acquaintances"; with 18- to 29-year-olds, this percentage reached as much as 70%.[24]

In his survey of file-sharing culture, Caraway (2012) noted that 74.4% of participants believed musicians should accept file sharing as a means for promotion and distribution.[25] This file-sharing culture was termed as cyber socialism, whose legalisation was not the expected cyber-utopia.[clarification needed].[26][27]

Economic impact

According to David Glenn, writing in The Chronicle of Higher Education, "A majority of economic studies have concluded that file-sharing hurts sales".[28] A literature review by Professor Peter Tschmuck found 22 independent studies on the effects of music file sharing. "Of these 22 studies, 14 – roughly two-thirds – conclude that unauthorized downloads have a 'negative or even highly negative impact' on recorded music sales. Three of the studies found no significant impact while the remaining five found a positive impact."[29][30]

A study by economists Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Koleman Strumpf in 2004 concluded that music file sharing's effect on sales was "statistically indistinguishable from zero".[31][32] This research was disputed by other economists, most notably Stan Liebowitz, who said Oberholzer-Gee and Strumpf had made multiple assumptions about the music industry "that are just not correct."[31][33][34] In June 2010, Billboard reported that Oberholzer-Gee and Strumpf had "changed their minds", now finding "no more than 20% of the recent decline in sales is due to sharing".[35] However, citing Nielsen SoundScan as their source, the co-authors maintained that illegal downloading had not deterred people from being original. "In many creative industries, monetary incentives play a reduced role in motivating authors to remain creative. Data on the supply of new works are consistent with the argument that file-sharing did not discourage authors and publishers. Since the advent of file sharing, the production of music, books, and movies has increased sharply."[36] Glenn Peoples of Billboard disputed the underlying data, saying "SoundScan's number for new releases in any given year represents new commercial titles, not necessarily new creative works."[37] The RIAA likewise responded that "new releases" and "new creative works" are two separate things. "[T]his figure includes re-releases, new compilations of existing songs, and new digital-only versions of catalog albums. SoundScan has also steadily increased the number of retailers (especially non-traditional retailers) in their sample over the years, better capturing the number of new releases brought to market. What Oberholzer and Strumpf found was better ability to track new album releases, not greater incentive to create them."[38]

A 2006 study prepared by Birgitte Andersen and Marion Frenz, published by Industry Canada, was "unable to discover any direct relationship between P2P file-sharing and CD purchases in Canada".[39] The results of this survey were similarly criticized by academics and a subsequent revaluation of the same data by Dr. George R. Barker of the Australian National University reached the opposite conclusion.[40] "In total, 75% of P2P downloaders responded that if P2P were not available they would have purchased either through paid sites only (9%), CDs only (17%) or through CDs and pay sites (49%). Only 25% of people say they would not have bought the music if it were not available on P2P for free." Barker thus concludes; "This clearly suggests P2P network availability is reducing music demand of 75% of music downloaders which is quite contrary to Andersen and Frenz's much published claim."[41]

According to the 2017 paper "Estimating displacement rates of copyrighted content in the EU" by the European Commission, illegal usage increases game sales, stating "The overall conclusion is that for games, illegal online transactions induce more legal transactions."[42]

Market dominance

A paper in the journal Management Science found that file-sharing decreased the chance of survival for low ranked albums on music charts and increased exposure to albums that were ranked high on the music charts, allowing popular and well-known artists to remain on the music charts more often. This hurt new and less-known artists while promoting the work of already popular artists and celebrities.[43]

A more recent study that examined pre-release file-sharing of music albums, using BitTorrent software, also discovered positive impacts for "established and popular artists but not newer and smaller artists." According to Robert G. Hammond of North Carolina State University, an album that leaked one month early would see a modest increase in sales. "This increase in sales is small relative to other factors that have been found to affect album sales."

"File-sharing proponents commonly argue that file-sharing democratizes music consumption by 'levelling the playing field' for new/small artists relative to established/popular artists, by allowing artists to have their work heard by a wider audience, lessening the advantage held by established/popular artists in terms of promotional and other support. My results suggest that the opposite is happening, which is consistent with evidence on file-sharing behaviour."[44]

Billboard cautioned that this research looked only at the pre-release period and not continuous file sharing following a release date. "The problem in believing piracy helps sales is deciding where to draw the line between legal and illegal ... Implicit in the study is the fact that both buyers and sellers are required in order for pre-release file sharing to have a positive impact on album sales. Without iTunes, Amazon, and Best Buy, file-sharers would be just file sharers rather than purchasers. If you carry out the 'file-sharing should be legal' argument to its logical conclusion, today's retailers will be tomorrow's file-sharing services that integrate with their respective cloud storage services."[45]

Availability

Many argue that file-sharing has forced the owners of entertainment content to make it more widely available legally through fees or advertising on-demand on the internet. In a 2011 report by Sandvine showed that Netflix traffic had come to surpass that of BitTorrent.[46]

Copyright issues

Main article: Legal aspects of file sharing

File sharing raises copyright issues and has led to many lawsuits. In the United States, some of these lawsuits have even reached the Supreme Court. For example, in MGM v. Grokster, the Supreme Court ruled that the creators of P2P networks can be held liable if their software is marketed as a tool for copyright infringement.

On the other hand, not all file sharing is illegal. Content in the public domain can be freely shared. Even works covered by copyright can be shared under certain circumstances. For example, some artists, publishers, and record labels grant the public a license for unlimited distribution of certain works, sometimes with conditions, and they advocate free content and file sharing as a promotional tool.[47]

See also

References

  1. ^ Adner, Ron (March 5, 2012). "From Walkman to iPod: What Music Tech Teaches Us About Innovation". The Atlantic. from the original on September 21, 2022. Retrieved October 12, 2021.
  2. ^ Elser, Amy (March 25, 2005). Reliable distributed systems: technologies, Web services, and applications - Kenneth P. Birman - Google Books. ISBN 9780387215099. from the original on September 5, 2017. Retrieved January 20, 2012 – via Google Books.
  3. ^ Menta, Richard (December 9, 1999). "RIAA Sues Music Startup Napster for $20 Billion". MP3 Newswire. from the original on June 1, 2013.
  4. ^ . W2.eff.org. Archived from the original on January 15, 2012. Retrieved January 20, 2012.
  5. ^ Woody, Todd (February 1, 2003). "The Race to Kill Kazaa". Wired.
  6. ^ Menta, Richard (October 3, 2001). "RIAA and MPAA sue Morpheus, Grokster and KaZaa". MP3 Newswire. from the original on July 31, 2020. Retrieved October 16, 2019.
  7. ^ Menta, Richard (July 20, 2001). "Napster Clones Crush Napster. Take 6 out of the Top 10 Downloads on CNet". MP3 Newswire. from the original on March 28, 2012.
  8. ^ Dean, Katie (September 8, 2003). "RIAA Legal Landslide Begins". Wired. from the original on March 8, 2021. Retrieved November 1, 2019.
  9. ^ Röttgers, Janko (July 26, 2003). "Bittorrent-Webseiten unter Druck" [Bittorrent websites under pressure] (in German). heise online. from the original on October 16, 2019. Retrieved October 16, 2019.
  10. ^ a b Mufson, Steven (January 20, 2012). "Department of Justice site hacked after Megaupload shutdown, Anonymous claims credit. Washington Post". Washingtonpost.com. from the original on January 23, 2012. Retrieved January 30, 2012.
  11. ^ Schneider, Joe (January 24, 2012). "Megaupload's Dotcom in Custody as New Zealand Awaits Extradition Request, Bloomberg". Bloomberg.com. from the original on January 27, 2012. Retrieved January 30, 2012.
  12. ^ Leask, Anna (January 23, 2012). "Dotcom in custody ahead of bail decision". The New Zealand Herald. from the original on March 13, 2018. Retrieved March 13, 2018.
  13. ^ "Free sharing of protected works while compensating creators".
  14. ^ Ernesto Van der Sar (December 17, 2020). ""Freedom to Share" Launches EU Citizens' Initiative to Legalize File-Sharing". TorrentFreak. from the original on February 18, 2021. Retrieved February 22, 2021.
  15. ^ McCormick, Rich (January 27, 2015). "YouTube drops Flash for HTML5 video as default". The Verge. from the original on April 2, 2019. Retrieved February 5, 2020.
  16. ^ a b Rogerson, A. M. (2014, June). Detecting the work of essay mills and file swapping sites: some clues they leave behind. Paper presented at the 6th International Integrity and Plagiarism Conference, Newcastle-on-Tyne, United Kingdom.
  17. ^ a b Rogerson, A. M., & Basanta, G. (2016). Peer-to-peer file sharing and academic integrity in the Internet age. In T. Bretag (Ed.), Handbook of Academic Integrity (pp. 273-285). Singapore: Springer.
  18. ^ Eaton, S. E. (2020). Academic Integrity During COVID-19: Reflections from the University of Calgary. International Studies in Educational Administration, 48(1), 80-85. Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca/handle/1880/112293
  19. ^ Butler, J. (2020, April 15). Arts & Sciences investigates Physics 192 academic integrity breach. Student Life. Retrieved from https://www.studlife.com/news/2020/04/15/arts-sciences-investigates-physics-192-academic-integrity-breach/
  20. ^ McKenzie, L. (2018, May 14). Learning tool or cheating aid? Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/05/14/professors-warned-about-popular-learning-tool-used-students-cheat
  21. ^ Sheridan College. (n.d.). Information for faculty: Note-sharing sites. Retrieved from https://sheridancollege.libguides.com/ld.php?content_id=34999338
  22. ^ Sheridan College. (2020). Copyright Services Guide: Note-Sharing Websites. Retrieved from https://sheridancollege.libguides.com/copyright/notesharingsites
  23. ^ Delgado, Ray (March 17, 2004). "Law professors examine ethical controversies of peer-to-peer file sharing". Stanford Report. Stanford University. from the original on June 25, 2008. Retrieved January 20, 2012.
  24. ^ "Poll: Young Say File Sharing OK". CBS News. February 11, 2009. from the original on November 30, 2011. Retrieved January 20, 2012.
  25. ^ Caraway, Brett Robert (2012). "Survey of File-Sharing Culture". International Journal of Communication. USC Annenberg Press, Creative Commons license (by-nc-nd). from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved November 25, 2015.
  26. ^ Filby, Michael (2011). "Regulating File Sharing: Open Regulations for an Open Internet". Journal of International Commercial Law and Technology. 6: 207. from the original on January 17, 2023. Retrieved December 28, 2021.
  27. ^ Filby, Michael (January 1, 2008). "Together in electric dreams: cyber socialism, utopia and the creative commons". International Journal of Private Law. 1 (1–2): 94–109. doi:10.1504/IJPL.2008.019435. ISSN 1753-6235. from the original on January 17, 2023. Retrieved December 28, 2021.
  28. ^ Glenn, David (July 17, 2008). "Dispute Over the Economics of File Sharing Intensifies". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Washington, D. C. from the original on April 15, 2021. Retrieved November 5, 2020.
  29. ^ Hart, Terry. More Evidence for Copyright Protection February 5, 2012, at the Wayback Machine, copyhype.com, February 1, 2012. "The literature review looked at a 23rd study but did not classify it here since the author presented a mixed conclusion: the overall effect of unauthorized downloads is insignificant, but for unknown artists, there is a 'strongly negative' effect on recorded music sales."
  30. ^ AJ Sokolov, Daniel . Wissenschaftler: Studien über Tauschbörsen unbrauchbar June 3, 2013, at the Wayback Machine, c't magazine, June 11, 2010.
  31. ^ a b Levine, Robert. Free Ride: How the Internet Is Destroying the Culture Business and How the Culture Business Can Fight Back, Bodley Head, February 2011, ISBN 1847921485.
  32. ^ Oberholzer, Felix; Koleman Strumpf. "The Effect of File Sharing on Record Sales: An Empirical Analysis" (PDF). (PDF) from the original on June 13, 2008. Retrieved June 13, 2008.
  33. ^ Liebowitz, Stan J. (September 2007). "How Reliable is the Oberholzer-Gee and Strumpf Paper on File-Sharing?". SSRN 1014399. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  34. ^ Liebowitz, Stan J. "The Key Instrument in the Oberholzer-Gee/Strumpf File-Sharing Paper is Defective" (PDF). (PDF) from the original on August 27, 2010. Retrieved June 13, 2008.
  35. ^ Peoples, Glenn. Researchers Change Tune, Now Say P2P Has Negative Impact December 9, 2010, at the Wayback Machine Billboard. June 22, 2010.
  36. ^ Oberholzer & Strumpf. "File Sharing and Copyright" NBER Innovation Policy & the Economy, Vol. 10, No. 1, 2010. "Artists receive a significant portion of their remuneration not in monetary form – many of them enjoy fame, admiration, social status, and free beer in bars – suggesting a reduction in monetary incentives might possibly have a reduced impact on the quantity and quality of artistic production."
  37. ^ Peoples, Glenn. Analysis: Are Musicians Losing the Incentive to Create? November 3, 2010, at the Wayback Machine Billboard. July 26, 2010.
  38. ^ Friedlander, Joshua P. & Lamy, Jonathan. Illegal Downloading = Fewer Musicians January 21, 2012, at the Wayback Machine ifpi.org, July 19, 2010.
  39. ^ The Impact of Music Downloads and P2P File-Sharing on the Purchase of Music: A Study for Industry Canada September 14, 2008, at the Wayback Machine, Birgitte Andersen and Marion Frenz
  40. ^ Peoples, Glenn. A New Look at an Old Survey Finds P2P Hurts Music Purchases February 6, 2012, at the Wayback Machine, Billboard. February 2, 2012.
  41. ^ Barker, George R. Evidence of the Effect of Free Music Downloads on the Purchase of Music CDs February 5, 2012, at the Wayback Machine Social Science Research Network. January 23, 2012.
  42. ^ "Estimating displacement rates of copyrighted content in the EU" (PDF). (PDF) from the original on January 20, 2018. Retrieved February 3, 2018.
  43. ^ Bhattacharjee, Sudip., Gopal, Ram D., Lertwachara, Kaveepan. Marsden, James R. & Telang, Rahul. The Effect of Digital Sharing Technologies on Music Markets: A Survival Analysis of Albums on Ranking Charts February 14, 2012, at the Wayback Machine Management Science 2007.
  44. ^ Hammond. Robert G. "Profit Leak? Pre-Release File Sharing and the Music Industry May 23, 2012, at the Wayback Machine" May 2012. File sharing benefits mainstream albums such as pop music but not albums in niche genres such as indie music. ... Further, the finding that file sharing redistributes sales toward established/popular artists is inconsistent with claims made by proponents of file sharing that file-sharing democratizes music consumption."
  45. ^ Peoples, Glenn. Business Matters: Pre-release File Sharing Helps Album Sales, Says a Study. So Why Not Replicate This Legally? May 25, 2012, at the Wayback Machine Billboard. May 22, 2012.
  46. ^ Global Internet Phenomena Report - Spring 2011 January 13, 2012, at the Wayback Machine Sandvine Global Internet Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. May 12, 2011
  47. ^ Secure Federal File Sharing Act : Report (to Accompany H.r. 4098) (Including Cost Estimate of the Congressional Budget Office). United States. March 11, 2010. from the original on September 20, 2018. Retrieved February 15, 2018.
  48. ^ Larrier, Travis (March 4, 2013). "Bilal Is the Future (And the Present ... And the Past)". The Shadow League. from the original on July 20, 2020. Retrieved July 20, 2020.

Further reading

  • Levine, Robert. Free Ride: How the Internet Is Destroying the Culture Business and How the Culture Business Can Fight Back, Bodley Head, February 2011.
  • Ghosemajumder, Shuman. Advanced Peer-Based Technology Business Models. MIT Sloan School of Management, 2002
  • Silverthorne, Sean. Music Downloads: Pirates- or Customers? June 30, 2006, at the Wayback Machine. Harvard Business School Working Knowledge, 2004.
  • Ralf Steinmetz, Klaus Wehrle (Eds). . ISBN 3-540-29192-X, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Volume 3485, September 2005
  • Stephanos Androutsellis-Theotokis and Diomidis Spinellis. A survey of peer-to-peer content distribution technologies. ACM Computing Surveys, 36(4):335–371, December 2004. doi:10.1145/1041680.1041681.
  • Stefan Saroiu, P. Krishna Gummadi, and Steven D. Gribble. A Measurement Study of Peer-to-Peer File Sharing Systems. Technical Report # UW-CSE-01-06-02. Department of Computer Science & Engineering. The University of Washington. Seattle, WA, USA.

External links

  •   Media related to File sharing at Wikimedia Commons

January 19, 2023
file, sharing, practice, distributing, providing, access, digital, media, such, computer, programs, multimedia, audio, images, video, documents, electronic, books, common, methods, storage, transmission, dispersion, include, removable, media, centralized, serv. File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digital media such as computer programs multimedia audio images and video documents or electronic books Common methods of storage transmission and dispersion include removable media centralized servers on computer networks Internet based hyperlinked documents and the use of distributed peer to peer networking File sharing technologies such as BitTorrent are integral to modern media piracy as well as the sharing of scientific data and other free content Contents 1 History 1 1 Techniques used for video sharing 2 Types 2 1 Peer to peer file sharing 2 2 File sync and sharing services 3 Academic file sharing 4 Public opinion of file sharing 5 Economic impact 5 1 Market dominance 5 2 Availability 6 Copyright issues 7 See also 8 References 9 Further reading 10 External linksHistory EditFor a chronological guide see Timeline of file sharing Files were first exchanged on removable media Computers were able to access remote files using filesystem mounting bulletin board systems 1978 Usenet 1979 and FTP servers 1970 s Internet Relay Chat 1988 and Hotline 1997 enabled users to communicate remotely through chat and to exchange files The mp3 encoding which was standardized in 1991 and substantially reduced the size of audio files grew to widespread use in the late 1990s In 1998 MP3 com and Audiogalaxy were established the Digital Millennium Copyright Act was unanimously passed and the first mp3 player devices were launched 1 In June 1999 Napster was released as an unstructured centralized peer to peer system 2 requiring a central server for indexing and peer discovery It is generally credited as being the first peer to peer file sharing system In December 1999 Napster was sued by several recording companies and lost in A amp M Records Inc v Napster Inc 3 In the case of Napster it has been ruled that an online service provider could not use the transitory network transmission safe harbor in the DMCA if they had control of the network with a server 4 Gnutella eDonkey2000 and Freenet were released in 2000 as MP3 com and Napster were facing litigation Gnutella released in March was the first decentralized file sharing network In the Gnutella network all connecting software was considered equal and therefore the network had no central point of failure In July Freenet was released and became the first anonymity network In September the eDonkey2000 client and server software was released citation needed In March 2001 Kazaa was released Its FastTrack network was distributed though unlike Gnutella it assigned more traffic to supernodes to increase routing efficiency The network was proprietary and encrypted and the Kazaa team made substantial efforts to keep other clients such as Morpheus off of the FastTrack network citation needed In October 2001 the MPAA and the RIAA filed a lawsuit against the developers of Kazaa Morpheus and Grokster 5 6 that would lead to the US Supreme Court s MGM Studios Inc v Grokster Ltd decision in 2005 Shortly after its loss in court Napster was shut down to comply with a court order This drove users to other P2P applications and file sharing continued its growth 7 The Audiogalaxy Satellite client grew in popularity and the LimeWire client and BitTorrent protocol were released Until its decline in 2004 Kazaa was the most popular file sharing program despite bundled malware and legal battles in the Netherlands Australia and the United States In 2002 a Tokyo district court ruling shut down File Rogue and the Recording Industry Association of America RIAA filed a lawsuit that effectively shut down Audiogalaxy Demonstrators protesting The Pirate Bay raid in 2006 From 2002 through 2003 a number of BitTorrent services were established including Suprnova org isoHunt TorrentSpy and The Pirate Bay In September 2003 the RIAA began filing lawsuits against users of P2P file sharing networks such as Kazaa 8 As a result of such lawsuits many universities added file sharing regulations in their school administrative codes though some students managed to circumvent them during after school hours Also in 2003 the MPAA started to take action against BitTorrent sites leading to the shutdown of Torrentse and Sharelive in July 2003 9 With the shutdown of eDonkey in 2005 eMule became the dominant client of the eDonkey network In 2006 police raids took down the Razorback2 eDonkey server and temporarily took down The Pirate Bay citation needed The File Sharing Act was launched by Chairman Towns in 2009 this act prohibited the use of applications that allowed individuals to share federal information amongst one another On the other hand only specific file sharing applications were made available to federal computers the United States Congress House In 2009 the Pirate Bay trial ended in a guilty verdict for the primary founders of the tracker The decision was appealed leading to a second guilty verdict in November 2010 In October 2010 Limewire was forced to shut down following a court order in Arista Records LLC v Lime Group LLC but the Gnutella network remains active through open source clients like FrostWire and gtk gnutella Furthermore multi protocol file sharing software such as MLDonkey and Shareaza adapted to support all the major file sharing protocols so users no longer had to install and configure multiple file sharing programs citation needed On January 19 2012 the United States Department of Justice shut down the popular domain of Megaupload established 2005 The file sharing site has claimed to have over 50 000 000 people a day 10 Kim Dotcom formerly Kim Schmitz was arrested with three associates in New Zealand on January 20 2012 and is awaiting extradition 11 12 The case involving the downfall of the world s largest and most popular file sharing site was not well received with hacker group Anonymous bringing down several sites associated with the take down 10 In the following days other file sharing sites began to cease services Filesonic blocked public downloads on January 22 with Fileserve following suit on January 23 citation needed In 2021 a European Citizens Initiative Freedom to Share 13 started collecting signatures in order to get the European Commission to discuss and eventually make rules on this subject which is controversial 14 Techniques used for video sharing Edit From the early 2000s until the mid 2010s online video streaming was usually based on the Adobe Flash Player After more and more vulnerabilities in Adobe s flash became known YouTube switched to HTML5 based video playback in January 2015 15 Types EditPeer to peer file sharing Edit Peer to peer file sharing is based on the peer to peer P2P application architecture Shared files on the computers of other users are indexed on directory servers P2P technology was used by popular services like Napster and LimeWire The most popular protocol for P2P sharing is BitTorrent File sync and sharing services Edit Screenshot of an open source file sharing software Shareaza Cloud based file syncing and sharing services implement automated file transfers by updating files from a dedicated sharing directory on each user s networked devices Files placed in this folder also are typically accessible through a website and mobile app and can be easily shared with other users for viewing or collaboration Such services have become popular via consumer oriented file hosting services such as Dropbox and Google Drive With the rising need of sharing big files online easily new open access sharing platforms have appeared adding even more services to their core business cloud storage multi device synchronization online collaboration such as ShareFile Tresorit WeTransfer or Hightail rsync is a more traditional program released in 1996 which synchronizes files on a direct machine to machine basis Data synchronization in general can use other approaches to share files such as distributed file systems version control or mirrors Academic file sharing EditIn addition to file sharing for the purposes of entertainment academic file sharing has become a topic of increasing concern 16 17 18 as it is deemed to be a violation of academic integrity at many schools 16 17 19 Academic file sharing by companies such as Chegg and Course Hero has become a point of particular controversy in recent years 20 This has led some institutions to provide explicit guidance to students and faculty regarding academic integrity expectations relating to academic file sharing 21 22 Public opinion of file sharing EditIn 2004 there were an estimated 70 million people participating in online file sharing 23 According to a CBS News poll in 2009 58 of Americans who follow the file sharing issue considered it acceptable if a person owns the music CD and shares it with a limited number of friends and acquaintances with 18 to 29 year olds this percentage reached as much as 70 24 In his survey of file sharing culture Caraway 2012 noted that 74 4 of participants believed musicians should accept file sharing as a means for promotion and distribution 25 This file sharing culture was termed as cyber socialism whose legalisation was not the expected cyber utopia clarification needed 26 27 Economic impact EditAccording to David Glenn writing in The Chronicle of Higher Education A majority of economic studies have concluded that file sharing hurts sales 28 A literature review by Professor Peter Tschmuck found 22 independent studies on the effects of music file sharing Of these 22 studies 14 roughly two thirds conclude that unauthorized downloads have a negative or even highly negative impact on recorded music sales Three of the studies found no significant impact while the remaining five found a positive impact 29 30 A study by economists Felix Oberholzer Gee and Koleman Strumpf in 2004 concluded that music file sharing s effect on sales was statistically indistinguishable from zero 31 32 This research was disputed by other economists most notably Stan Liebowitz who said Oberholzer Gee and Strumpf had made multiple assumptions about the music industry that are just not correct 31 33 34 In June 2010 Billboard reported that Oberholzer Gee and Strumpf had changed their minds now finding no more than 20 of the recent decline in sales is due to sharing 35 However citing Nielsen SoundScan as their source the co authors maintained that illegal downloading had not deterred people from being original In many creative industries monetary incentives play a reduced role in motivating authors to remain creative Data on the supply of new works are consistent with the argument that file sharing did not discourage authors and publishers Since the advent of file sharing the production of music books and movies has increased sharply 36 Glenn Peoples of Billboard disputed the underlying data saying SoundScan s number for new releases in any given year represents new commercial titles not necessarily new creative works 37 The RIAA likewise responded that new releases and new creative works are two separate things T his figure includes re releases new compilations of existing songs and new digital only versions of catalog albums SoundScan has also steadily increased the number of retailers especially non traditional retailers in their sample over the years better capturing the number of new releases brought to market What Oberholzer and Strumpf found was better ability to track new album releases not greater incentive to create them 38 A 2006 study prepared by Birgitte Andersen and Marion Frenz published by Industry Canada was unable to discover any direct relationship between P2P file sharing and CD purchases in Canada 39 The results of this survey were similarly criticized by academics and a subsequent revaluation of the same data by Dr George R Barker of the Australian National University reached the opposite conclusion 40 In total 75 of P2P downloaders responded that if P2P were not available they would have purchased either through paid sites only 9 CDs only 17 or through CDs and pay sites 49 Only 25 of people say they would not have bought the music if it were not available on P2P for free Barker thus concludes This clearly suggests P2P network availability is reducing music demand of 75 of music downloaders which is quite contrary to Andersen and Frenz s much published claim 41 According to the 2017 paper Estimating displacement rates of copyrighted content in the EU by the European Commission illegal usage increases game sales stating The overall conclusion is that for games illegal online transactions induce more legal transactions 42 Market dominance Edit A paper in the journal Management Science found that file sharing decreased the chance of survival for low ranked albums on music charts and increased exposure to albums that were ranked high on the music charts allowing popular and well known artists to remain on the music charts more often This hurt new and less known artists while promoting the work of already popular artists and celebrities 43 A more recent study that examined pre release file sharing of music albums using BitTorrent software also discovered positive impacts for established and popular artists but not newer and smaller artists According to Robert G Hammond of North Carolina State University an album that leaked one month early would see a modest increase in sales This increase in sales is small relative to other factors that have been found to affect album sales File sharing proponents commonly argue that file sharing democratizes music consumption by levelling the playing field for new small artists relative to established popular artists by allowing artists to have their work heard by a wider audience lessening the advantage held by established popular artists in terms of promotional and other support My results suggest that the opposite is happening which is consistent with evidence on file sharing behaviour 44 Billboard cautioned that this research looked only at the pre release period and not continuous file sharing following a release date The problem in believing piracy helps sales is deciding where to draw the line between legal and illegal Implicit in the study is the fact that both buyers and sellers are required in order for pre release file sharing to have a positive impact on album sales Without iTunes Amazon and Best Buy file sharers would be just file sharers rather than purchasers If you carry out the file sharing should be legal argument to its logical conclusion today s retailers will be tomorrow s file sharing services that integrate with their respective cloud storage services 45 Availability Edit Many argue that file sharing has forced the owners of entertainment content to make it more widely available legally through fees or advertising on demand on the internet In a 2011 report by Sandvine showed that Netflix traffic had come to surpass that of BitTorrent 46 Copyright issues EditMain article Legal aspects of file sharing File sharing raises copyright issues and has led to many lawsuits In the United States some of these lawsuits have even reached the Supreme Court For example in MGM v Grokster the Supreme Court ruled that the creators of P2P networks can be held liable if their software is marketed as a tool for copyright infringement On the other hand not all file sharing is illegal Content in the public domain can be freely shared Even works covered by copyright can be shared under certain circumstances For example some artists publishers and record labels grant the public a license for unlimited distribution of certain works sometimes with conditions and they advocate free content and file sharing as a promotional tool 47 See also Edit Internet portalComparison of file sharing applications File hosting service File sharing news sites Graduated response Love for Sale Bilal album an unreleased but infamously pirated album by Bilal 48 Missionary Church of Kopimism Open Music Model Publius publishing system Torrent poisoning Trade group efforts against file sharing WarezReferences Edit Adner Ron March 5 2012 From Walkman to iPod What Music Tech Teaches Us About Innovation The Atlantic Archived from the original on September 21 2022 Retrieved October 12 2021 Elser Amy March 25 2005 Reliable distributed systems technologies Web services and applications Kenneth P Birman Google Books ISBN 9780387215099 Archived from the original on September 5 2017 Retrieved January 20 2012 via Google Books Menta Richard December 9 1999 RIAA Sues Music Startup Napster for 20 Billion MP3 Newswire Archived from the original on June 1 2013 EFF What Peer to Peer Developers Need to Know about Copyright Law W2 eff org Archived from the original on January 15 2012 Retrieved January 20 2012 Woody Todd February 1 2003 The Race to Kill Kazaa Wired Menta Richard October 3 2001 RIAA and MPAA sue Morpheus Grokster and KaZaa MP3 Newswire Archived from the original on July 31 2020 Retrieved October 16 2019 Menta Richard July 20 2001 Napster Clones Crush Napster Take 6 out of the Top 10 Downloads on CNet MP3 Newswire Archived from the original on March 28 2012 Dean Katie September 8 2003 RIAA Legal Landslide Begins Wired Archived from the original on March 8 2021 Retrieved November 1 2019 Rottgers Janko July 26 2003 Bittorrent Webseiten unter Druck Bittorrent websites under pressure in German heise online Archived from the original on October 16 2019 Retrieved October 16 2019 a b Mufson Steven January 20 2012 Department of Justice site hacked after Megaupload shutdown Anonymous claims credit Washington Post Washingtonpost com Archived from the original on January 23 2012 Retrieved January 30 2012 Schneider Joe January 24 2012 Megaupload s Dotcom in Custody as New Zealand Awaits Extradition Request Bloomberg Bloomberg com Archived from the original on January 27 2012 Retrieved January 30 2012 Leask Anna January 23 2012 Dotcom in custody ahead of bail decision The New Zealand Herald Archived from the original on March 13 2018 Retrieved March 13 2018 Free sharing of protected works while compensating creators Ernesto Van der Sar December 17 2020 Freedom to Share Launches EU Citizens Initiative to Legalize File Sharing TorrentFreak Archived from the original on February 18 2021 Retrieved February 22 2021 McCormick Rich January 27 2015 YouTube drops Flash for HTML5 video as default The Verge Archived from the original on April 2 2019 Retrieved February 5 2020 a b Rogerson A M 2014 June Detecting the work of essay mills and file swapping sites some clues they leave behind Paper presented at the 6th International Integrity and Plagiarism Conference Newcastle on Tyne United Kingdom a b Rogerson A M amp Basanta G 2016 Peer to peer file sharing and academic integrity in the Internet age In T Bretag Ed Handbook of Academic Integrity pp 273 285 Singapore Springer Eaton S E 2020 Academic Integrity During COVID 19 Reflections from the University of Calgary International Studies in Educational Administration 48 1 80 85 Retrieved from https prism ucalgary ca handle 1880 112293 Butler J 2020 April 15 Arts amp Sciences investigates Physics 192 academic integrity breach Student Life Retrieved from https www studlife com news 2020 04 15 arts sciences investigates physics 192 academic integrity breach McKenzie L 2018 May 14 Learning tool or cheating aid Inside Higher Ed Retrieved from https www insidehighered com news 2018 05 14 professors warned about popular learning tool used students cheat Sheridan College n d Information for faculty Note sharing sites Retrieved from https sheridancollege libguides com ld php content id 34999338 Sheridan College 2020 Copyright Services Guide Note Sharing Websites Retrieved from https sheridancollege libguides com copyright notesharingsites Delgado Ray March 17 2004 Law professors examine ethical controversies of peer to peer file sharing Stanford Report Stanford University Archived from the original on June 25 2008 Retrieved January 20 2012 Poll Young Say File Sharing OK CBS News February 11 2009 Archived from the original on November 30 2011 Retrieved January 20 2012 Caraway Brett Robert 2012 Survey of File Sharing Culture International Journal of Communication USC Annenberg Press Creative Commons license by nc nd Archived from the original on March 4 2016 Retrieved November 25 2015 Filby Michael 2011 Regulating File Sharing Open Regulations for an Open Internet Journal of International Commercial Law and Technology 6 207 Archived from the original on January 17 2023 Retrieved December 28 2021 Filby Michael January 1 2008 Together in electric dreams cyber socialism utopia and the creative commons International Journal of Private Law 1 1 2 94 109 doi 10 1504 IJPL 2008 019435 ISSN 1753 6235 Archived from the original on January 17 2023 Retrieved December 28 2021 Glenn David July 17 2008 Dispute Over the Economics of File Sharing Intensifies The Chronicle of Higher Education Washington D C Archived from the original on April 15 2021 Retrieved November 5 2020 Hart Terry More Evidence for Copyright Protection Archived February 5 2012 at the Wayback Machine copyhype com February 1 2012 The literature review looked at a 23rd study but did not classify it here since the author presented a mixed conclusion the overall effect of unauthorized downloads is insignificant but for unknown artists there is a strongly negative effect on recorded music sales AJ Sokolov Daniel Wissenschaftler Studien uber Tauschborsen unbrauchbar Archived June 3 2013 at the Wayback Machine c t magazine June 11 2010 a b Levine Robert Free Ride How the Internet Is Destroying the Culture Business and How the Culture Business Can Fight Back Bodley Head February 2011 ISBN 1847921485 Oberholzer Felix Koleman Strumpf The Effect of File Sharing on Record Sales An Empirical Analysis PDF Archived PDF from the original on June 13 2008 Retrieved June 13 2008 Liebowitz Stan J September 2007 How Reliable is the Oberholzer Gee and Strumpf Paper on File Sharing SSRN 1014399 a href Template Cite journal html title Template Cite journal cite journal a Cite journal requires journal help Liebowitz Stan J The Key Instrument in the Oberholzer Gee Strumpf File Sharing Paper is Defective PDF Archived PDF from the original on August 27 2010 Retrieved June 13 2008 Peoples Glenn Researchers Change Tune Now Say P2P Has Negative Impact Archived December 9 2010 at the Wayback Machine Billboard June 22 2010 Oberholzer amp Strumpf File Sharing and Copyright NBER Innovation Policy amp the Economy Vol 10 No 1 2010 Artists receive a significant portion of their remuneration not in monetary form many of them enjoy fame admiration social status and free beer in bars suggesting a reduction in monetary incentives might possibly have a reduced impact on the quantity and quality of artistic production Peoples Glenn Analysis Are Musicians Losing the Incentive to Create Archived November 3 2010 at the Wayback Machine Billboard July 26 2010 Friedlander Joshua P amp Lamy Jonathan Illegal Downloading Fewer Musicians Archived January 21 2012 at the Wayback Machine ifpi org July 19 2010 The Impact of Music Downloads and P2P File Sharing on the Purchase of Music A Study for Industry Canada Archived September 14 2008 at the Wayback Machine Birgitte Andersen and Marion Frenz Peoples Glenn A New Look at an Old Survey Finds P2P Hurts Music Purchases Archived February 6 2012 at the Wayback Machine Billboard February 2 2012 Barker George R Evidence of the Effect of Free Music Downloads on the Purchase of Music CDs Archived February 5 2012 at the Wayback Machine Social Science Research Network January 23 2012 Estimating displacement rates of copyrighted content in the EU PDF Archived PDF from the original on January 20 2018 Retrieved February 3 2018 Bhattacharjee Sudip Gopal Ram D Lertwachara Kaveepan Marsden James R amp Telang Rahul The Effect of Digital Sharing Technologies on Music Markets A Survival Analysis of Albums on Ranking Charts Archived February 14 2012 at the Wayback Machine Management Science 2007 Hammond Robert G Profit Leak Pre Release File Sharing and the Music Industry Archived May 23 2012 at the Wayback Machine May 2012 File sharing benefits mainstream albums such as pop music but not albums in niche genres such as indie music Further the finding that file sharing redistributes sales toward established popular artists is inconsistent with claims made by proponents of file sharing that file sharing democratizes music consumption Peoples Glenn Business Matters Pre release File Sharing Helps Album Sales Says a Study So Why Not Replicate This Legally Archived May 25 2012 at the Wayback Machine Billboard May 22 2012 Global Internet Phenomena Report Spring 2011 Archived January 13 2012 at the Wayback Machine Sandvine Global Internet Waterloo Ontario Canada May 12 2011 Secure Federal File Sharing Act Report to Accompany H r 4098 Including Cost Estimate of the Congressional Budget Office United States March 11 2010 Archived from the original on September 20 2018 Retrieved February 15 2018 Larrier Travis March 4 2013 Bilal Is the Future And the Present And the Past The Shadow League Archived from the original on July 20 2020 Retrieved July 20 2020 Further reading EditLevine Robert Free Ride How the Internet Is Destroying the Culture Business and How the Culture Business Can Fight Back Bodley Head February 2011 Ghosemajumder Shuman Advanced Peer Based Technology Business Models MIT Sloan School of Management 2002 Silverthorne Sean Music Downloads Pirates or Customers Archived June 30 2006 at the Wayback Machine Harvard Business School Working Knowledge 2004 Ralf Steinmetz Klaus Wehrle Eds Peer to Peer Systems and Applications ISBN 3 540 29192 X Lecture Notes in Computer Science Volume 3485 September 2005 Stephanos Androutsellis Theotokis and Diomidis Spinellis A survey of peer to peer content distribution technologies ACM Computing Surveys 36 4 335 371 December 2004 doi 10 1145 1041680 1041681 Stefan Saroiu P Krishna Gummadi and Steven D Gribble A Measurement Study of Peer to Peer File Sharing Systems Technical Report UW CSE 01 06 02 Department of Computer Science amp Engineering The University of Washington Seattle WA USA External links Edit Media related to File sharing at Wikimedia Commons Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title File sharing amp oldid 1134241005, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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