Mashable - The Social Media Guide - Latest Comments in Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Eric Waller — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:51:12 -0000

I think that a lot of people are missing that though bandwidth is a finite resource, total transfer is not. Bandwidth is transfer per unit time, kind of like the power of a light bulb, which is energy per unit time.

The fact is that Energy delivery per unit time (Power) is also finite. Brownouts during the summer, because everyone has their AC cranked, are exactly analogous to when your connection slows because your neighbors are running a bunch of torrents.

What Mark Cuban seems to be suggesting is "bandwidth-conservation." To me this is basically the equivalent of Rockefeller-esque Industrialist recommending that we use less energy in the middle of an Industrial Revolution. Conservation may have it's merits, but certainly not yet. ISPs should be focused on one thing -- building infrastructure to fuel the IT revolution.

If bandwidth-conservation were to ever become a real issue (doubtful), the last person I'd want to hear about it from is a dot-com billionaire.

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Ryan Milnes — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 09:49:13 -0000

Marc, were you not an investor in the P2P company RedSwoosh that was sold this year to Akamai?

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

me — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 09:07:03 -0000

roflmao. shut down p2p? roflmao.

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Sam Cornwell — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 03:47:25 -0000

So i think everyone is quick to jump on mark, but i would have to say

1. i have never known anything on p2p networks to be legal, for the most part the p2p is an underground leach that allows the smuggling of illegal audio, video and software.

2. Servers pay for the bandwidth to upload to the user files, If everyone that wasn't useing p2p networks, started to we would all see our much smaller pipe lines at our homes getting clogged and IF... p2p networks were emliminated then our speeds at home would be greater because our consumer lines would not be clogged with data that should be going through a much wider server line.

3. Bandwidth is measured in GB's in the end, you CAN use 10 GB of bandwidth, because those that pay for it don't pay for the speed, but rather pay for the total pass through in a given amount of time. Bandwidth can be both a speed AND when quantified, a measurement of the actual data.

4. Another factor is that videos that are out on p2p networks are poorly encoded and compressed. If video was streamline through a server that could compress and encode all videos to a standard, it would reduce the amount of bandwidth that would have to be used, by reducing the size of the files.

Adobe needs to hurry and get there new flash player out so we can all switch over to the H.264 format.

get off his back..

"in the land of the blind the one eyed man is stoned"

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Felix — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 03:43:24 -0000

It seems to me that broadband is a utility like processing power, not like electricity. We all have capacity to use how we like; if I'm not using all my bandwidth I'm happy to be a P2P node; if I need it I can turn off the software, frankly. Similarly, I should allow my excess processor cycles to go into a distributed comupting effort.
Obviously, there are technical and efficiency problems with existing networks; shared connections mean that broadband isn't really comparable to the processing power of my computer.
But the way broadband is currently sold; I am buying an always on service if I choose to, while the companies selling the broadband are operating on the same model as airlines over selling flights. I choose to use as much as possible the capacity I have been _sold_, and I think the fault lies with network providers (and awful advertising and regulation).

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Ben — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 12:55:25 -0000

Cuban, whatever

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Ben — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 12:54:42 -0000

Mark Rubin 1 - Mashable 0, apparently you just got servered...buZZZZzzzzingggg.

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Al Iguana — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 10:06:17 -0000

its like that Sky Anytime, whereby Sky subscribers can watch movies online... erm... anytime. Thing is, it relies on a p2p model. So it's not a "free service" (as sky advertise), you have to 1) be a subscriber b) pay with your bandwidth. So yeah, companies like that will soon be overloading the network with p2p traffic.

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

soulbleed62 — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 09:16:06 -0000

i love p2p, but when your internet is capped, and uploads and downloads count towards your usage, p2p sure does take its toll.

however, i have a shitty isp and i realise that, so thats the problem, not p2p.

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

Patrick Holmes — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 06:56:49 -0000

After all, the main point is ISPs want to pay less.

I pay them for unlimited bandwidth, so what's wrong with me using what I've paid for? What if I use HTTP? What's wrong if it's P2P? Hey Mr Stupid Mark, are you sure you want to pay for unlimited bandwidth and use limited bandwidth?

P2P is a great technology, with the sharing in mind. It helps downloading from busy servers easier, take loads of servers, files live longer. It's just that servers pay for their limited bandwidth, while I have unlimited bandwidth. P2P increase bandwidth at end user side and significantly reduce server load. It's not much different in total amount of bandwidth used. But it's that ISPs have to pay more for their network.

ISPs oversells all the time, they lie about network speed, they charge me for unlimited and want to limit my bandwidth, they're f*cking bitches dirty.

They simply give higher priority to http traffic and do some simple tricks to show their network speed, which is absolutely stupid under an network administrator's eye.

They blame P2P for the slow speed that instead they have for pay for an upgrade.

Have a nice day, Mr Stupid Mark, aka. the most stupid puppet of ISPs.

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

hts — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 06:44:41 -0000

Oh come on, lets get real :) ! P2P technology is one of the greatest thing to ever hit internet users. It takes off A LOT of load from servers. Bandwidth is still used, obvious, but it is even more obvious that one server, no matter how powerful, can't handle such high speeds and so many requests - however, not so good as can be supported when a certain file is "shared" through P2P. No matter what he (Mark Cuban) really meant, what everyone understood is that P2P is "bad" and should be stopped - and that's not going to happen in the "near" future...

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

The Michel — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 06:42:31 -0000

Normally my comments are more constructive than this.... *ATOMROFL*
this is truly funny !

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

CountRob — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 06:36:55 -0000

^ ^ ^
Wouldn't it be something if this guy won the trolling contest? Mark Cuban has my official nomination.

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

mark cuban — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 06:14:53 -0000

Joost is a perfect example of what is wrong with P2P. It is a for profit corporation that is attempting to develop a tv like product without paying (as best i can tell, correct me if im wrong), for the bandwidth its users are consuming. Call me crazy, but to me thats wrong.

This doesnt mean that Joost isnt a valid application. It is. If they were to put P2P on a CDN and pay for the bandwidth they consume, I would be all for it.

To be clear, Im not against P2P across the board, just in instances where its used as a bandwidth leach.

As far as CDN vs P2P, i would guess that for non pirated bits, that CDNs consume more bandwidth than P2P does. Again, Im fine with this because it requires companies to pay for the bandwidth they use.

And P2P beats downloading from a single source in many cases, but who downloads from a single source these days ? There are untold non P2P options, CDNs and multiple file download hosts that require the distributor to pay for the bandwidth they consume and distribute the bits to end users in an very efficient manner.

The Google option is for file distribution rather than emulating a video distribution option. Google is preferable because they have what is arguably the best network for content distribution in the world and they have made a business decision to subsidize the cost of anyone wants to use it.

And I think its a bad idea because of the confusion it would cause, not because its not a viable business model. I havent done a complete analysis, but from a cursory glance it seems like it could lead to the opportunity for lower pricing alternatives (if ISPs were smart enough to avail themselves of this alternative)

Bottom line is that P2P hasnt solved a single problem for recipients of files. It has solved a cost problem for distribution of content/files/other bits. It has moved the cost of distribution from the source to the destination. I think thats wrong.

obviously , not everyone agrees.

If we want to push for ISPs to optimize our experience and minimize our costs, then lets push for multicast. Lets push for better accounting of usage and more realism in advertising of just want we get for our money and what we dont get.

I can think of 100 different ways to improve the ISP experience.

I can also think of 100 internet sacred cows that need to be challenged. Challenging them in blog posts is a lot more fun

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

CountRob — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 06:07:40 -0000

"The last thing I want slowing my internet service down are P2P freeloaders. Thats right, P2P content distributors are nothing more than freeloaders. The only person/organization that benefits from P2P usage are those that are trying to distribute content and want to distribute it on someone else's bandwidth dime." ~ Marc Cuban

I totally agree with your idea of a Centrally Planned and Controlled People's Internet, Mr. Cuban. I think there should be heavy restrictions on on what people can and can't do with the bandwidth they pay for.

And you are so right about P2P. It's ridiculously inefficient to have each client acting as a server, taking the load off the main site. So much bandwidth wasted!

I was on Ares last night and it brought down my ISP, because I was trying to download 8 songs at the same time. So that's proof right there that P2P is a failed technology.

Also, while I have you here, could you sign my petition to ban electric lightbulbs? They're totally inefficient and they waste electricity. Once we make them illegal, we can go back to using gas lamps.

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

mark cuban — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 06:00:58 -0000

no question its an oversimplification. P2P is o bviously not the only bandwidth hog. However, it is the only "bandwidth leach" that comes to mind.

It is the only manner of bandwidth consumption that commercial operations use in order to avoid paying for bandwidth. A distinction that I point out multiple times

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

LiquidSilver — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 05:30:01 -0000

I thought I'd never say something like this on Mashable but...."I didn't expect someone with low intelligence as Mr.Cuban exists in the tech world." In short, "What a moron!"

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

alienworx — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 05:27:11 -0000

â€œI personally donâ€™t want to see my connections slow down so P2P users can resell bandwidth to someone who isnâ€™t willing to pay for bandwidth in order to distribute their bandwidth consuming files.â€

The word of the day is................ *DING DING DING* Bandwidth!

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

IrfanFaruki — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 05:08:22 -0000

What??? Stop all P2P ? Has he gone crazy? I personally think that P2P will never be stopped. Loads of organization lik RIAA has tried to stop it but not with any luck. P2P is here to stay

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

ochibi — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 04:55:53 -0000

grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Re: Stupid Idea Of The Week: Stop All P2P Traffic

mark cuban — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 04:49:44 -0000

time for you guys to do your homework and maybe you should actually read what i wrote before you go off.

I said Google Video should replace P2P..no. I said it was better for audio and video. Understand the difference ?

And your example on efficiency only applies in the rare cases where 100pct of the seeds are on the same network segment.

and there are far better ways to do file distribution than p2p. Look up multicast. I guess i should have expected your post and done a "Turn Off P2P, replace it with multicast and...." post first. Would that have helped you ?

the redunancy and load balancing of P2P ? I would love to see that paper confirming that. The issue with P2P is that you dont know who your seeds are or when they are available and exactly how much bandwidth will be available. if you did, it wouldnt be a P2P network, it would be a CDN.

Im all for applying P2P principles on a CDN. A CDN has resources thats are clearly definable and for the most part deterministic. Something that an open internet P2P application doesnt have.

More importantly, CDNs pay to host their servers and for the bandwidth they use.

Open Internet P2P is a leach network. Its theft by stealing bandwidth a few bits at a time.

As bad as an idea as it would be, it would be fun to watch ISPs go to a pay per bit model rather than the disingenuous all you can eat model they currently have.

If not a pay per bit, how about an all you can download for free, but pay per bit for upload model ?

Want to see how inefficient a protocol P2P is ? Watch how quickly users would unload their clients when they got a bandwidth bill for their upstream bandwidth use.