more on When Muni-WiFi Becomes Vehicle For Muni-Censorship

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Dylan Northrup <docx () io com>
Date: August 26, 2006 8:18:40 AM EDT
To: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Cc: ip () v2 listbox com
Subject: Re: [IP] more on When Muni-WiFi Becomes Vehicle For Muni- 
Censorship

A long time ago, (26.08.06), in a galaxy far, far away, David Farber  
wrote:

:=Begin forwarded message:
:=
:=From: Brett Glass <brett () lariat net>
:=Date: August 26, 2006 12:00:31 AM EDT
:=To: dave () farber net, ip () v2 listbox com
:=Subject: Re: [IP] When Muni-WiFi Becomes Vehicle For Muni-Censorship
:=
:= From the "techdirt" article:
:=
:=> Broadband Reports points out a press release which says the  
Culver City,
:=> California, <http://www.broadbandreports.com/shownews/77538>will  
install
:=> filters on its muni-Wifi network -- which covers all of one  
square mile --
:=> to weed out porn and P2P traffic.
:=
:=An ISP's viewpoint:
:=
:=While blocking porn is nearly impossible to do well and legally  
questionable
:=under the First Amendment, blocking or at least mitigating P2P is  
an essential
:=responsibility of any ISP -- public or private. Not only is the  
vast majority
:=of P2P illegal (the amount of legal activity being so small as to be
:=negligible), but it is, quite simply, network abuse. Due to the  
bandwidth
:=hogging behavior which is built -- by design -- into P2P software, a
:=relatively small number of P2Pers can render the network unusable  
for its
:=intended purposes. Any responsible network provider simply MUST  
mitigate P2P,
:=both to prevent theft of intellectual property and to ensure the  
quality of
:=service for legitimate users.

And for those users who use P2P applications for legitimate use?  The  
Linux
hacker who downloads the latest SuSe ISO via BitTorrent so he can get it
much quicker than if he were to do a straight ftp or http download?  The
millions of World of Warcraft players who update their clients every  
patch
via the built-in torrent client?  Game demo downloads available from
publisher sites or from Gamespy, also available via a torrent download?

Having worked at an ISP previously, I understand this isn't purely a  
matter
of throwing the baby out with the flood of bathwater and that there's a
point where your network capacity has to be taken into account.   
However,
assuming you aren't actively scanning the bits your customers are
downloading to inspect what they're downloading, how do you determine  
if the
network use is legitimate or if they're stealing intellectual property?
Also, what is the impact on future emerging technologies of this kind of
reaction by network providers?

If I remember correctly P2P was originally designed to distribute the
network load amongst many different nodes instead of concentrating the
traffic on a few nodes.  Perhaps it is an artifact of many ISPs being
configured primarily for users primarily downloading information  
(instead of
downloading and uploading that occurs with P2P) that is also  
contributing to
the problem.

--
Dylan Northrup - docx () io com - http://www.io.com/~docx/
"Harder to work, harder to strive, hard to be glad to be alive, but it's
 really worth it if you give it a try." -- Cowboy Mouth, 'Easy'


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