How to cheat BitTorrent and why nobody does - 19 views

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  #1 owen_davies on 25 Mar 12

   

  Patarin, S., Hales, D. How to cheat BitTorrent and why nobody does (2006) Retrieved from http://cfpm.org/~david/papers/19-eccs06.pdf
  
  This next article that I looked at was How to cheat BitTorrent and why nobody does, written by Simon Patarin and David Hales. The main points behind the article is how easy both Patarin and Hales believe that the sharing of Bit Torrent could be cheated like it is on so many other forms of P2P, but despite this there is a sense of loyalty and in their words "altruistic" mentality that surrounds the Bit Torrent community.
  
  The article believes to stray away from the explanation of why there are communities and collaboration within the Bit Torrent protocol. Believing that the tit-for-tat or TFT structure "can not be the full explanation since it can not account for the pure altruism of seeders, isn't the best strategy in any case and can easily be subverted with a little hacking of the client."
  Instead, looking at Meta-Data and how it could possibly strengthen, and improve how users are able search and find user specific swarms that they can join, that are full of "good guys" who are helping the community of users. If the swarm or tribe that they are apart of isn't performing to a certain level or isn't altruistic enough for them, they can leave and find one that is. It is concluded that this may also have a negative effect on the community and altruism as by allowing good swarms to be differentiated and easily found it means that they will eventually transform into one large swarm that can be abused.
  Overall the article asks the question, why exactly do the social connections that the Bit Torrent protocol creates continue to function? And what exactly is going on?

   

  <div class="cArrow"> </div><div class="cContentInner">Patarin, S., Hales, D. How to cheat BitTorrent and why nobody does (2006) Retrieved from <a href="http://cfpm.org/~david/papers/19-eccs06.pdf" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://cfpm.org/~david/papers/19-eccs06.pdf</a> <br /> <br /> This next article that I looked at was How to cheat BitTorrent and why nobody does, written by Simon Patarin and David Hales. The main points behind the article is how easy both Patarin and Hales believe that the sharing of Bit Torrent could be cheated like it is on so many other forms of P2P, but despite this there is a sense of loyalty and in their words "altruistic" mentality that surrounds the Bit Torrent community. <br /> <br /> The article believes to stray away from the explanation of why there are communities and collaboration within the Bit Torrent protocol. Believing that the tit-for-tat or TFT structure "can not be the full explanation since it can not account for the pure altruism of seeders, isn't the best strategy in any case and can easily be subverted with a little hacking of the client." <br /> Instead, looking at Meta-Data and how it could possibly strengthen, and improve how users are able search and find user specific swarms that they can join, that are full of "good guys" who are helping the community of users. If the swarm or tribe that they are apart of isn't performing to a certain level or isn't altruistic enough for them, they can leave and find one that is. It is concluded that this may also have a negative effect on the community and altruism as by allowing good swarms to be differentiated and easily found it means that they will eventually transform into one large swarm that can be abused. <br /> Overall the article asks the question, why exactly do the social connections that the Bit Torrent protocol creates continue to function? And what exactly is going on?</div>

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  #2 jessica_mann on 11 Apr 12

   

  Personally I use BitTorrent for the following reasons: I find it incredibly simple to use, the program loads quickly and doesn't seem to use much hardware resource and it isn't laced with advertisements or trojans. However, even though I am an avid BitTorrent user, downloading files on a daily basis, I would definitely class myself as a BitTorrent "freeloader." The only time I find myself 'seeding' files is when they automatically seed after I've finished downloading.
  
  This article raised many points that I had never really considered and has caused me to reconsider my selfish BitTorrent behaviour. I haven't ever noticed that my BitTorrent experience has been limited by the fact that I have been so reluctant to seed files, however the article has encouraged me to really utilize the "tit-for-tat" system to ensure that my self-serving attitude is not bringing down others in any tribes I may be part of. Because at the end of the day, if I as forced to choose between giving up some bandwidth to help the BitTorrent community to continue to thrive, or lose the tool all together, I'm sure I'd choose the former. I'm also fully aware that if everyone had the same attitude as me, there would be no one seeding files for download at all.

   

  <div class="cArrow"> </div><div class="cContentInner">Personally I use BitTorrent for the following reasons: I find it incredibly simple to use, the program loads quickly and doesn't seem to use much hardware resource and it isn't laced with advertisements or trojans. However, even though I am an avid BitTorrent user, downloading files on a daily basis, I would definitely class myself as a BitTorrent "freeloader." The only time I find myself 'seeding' files is when they automatically seed after I've finished downloading. <br /> <br /> This article raised many points that I had never really considered and has caused me to reconsider my selfish BitTorrent behaviour. I haven't ever noticed that my BitTorrent experience has been limited by the fact that I have been so reluctant to seed files, however the article has encouraged me to really utilize the "tit-for-tat" system to ensure that my self-serving attitude is not bringing down others in any tribes I may be part of. Because at the end of the day, if I as forced to choose between giving up some bandwidth to help the BitTorrent community to continue to thrive, or lose the tool all together, I'm sure I'd choose the former. I'm also fully aware that if everyone had the same attitude as me, there would be no one seeding files for download at all.</div>

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