First of all, let me share with you that my grandmother passed away this morning, at a beautiful age of 85 years. Luckily I had the chance to say goodbye to her yesterday....she will be greatly missed by me and all of my family!
But let's go on with our daily business, here are the questions for week six.
What is P2P…..and what isn’t?
C. Shirky
Question:
What are P2P-networks according to Shirky?
Shirky has a highly technical approach towards what P2P actually is. P2P networks are based on a system that connects multiple PC’s with another within the internet, in a way that bypasses large fixed servers. Whereas websites and servers are very stable and have fixed positions within cyberspace (often structured within DNS systems: giving these fixed positions alphabetical names), P2P networks do not have these structured beacons and work around it. Most usage of the internet is from normal people and is highly unpredictable in, for instance in their off- and online time. It requires a different approach to connect them, but when connected it provides an almost unlimited supply of resources. Ownership is also a large and defining part of P2P networks, if the network software for communication between specific persons and computers runs on a personal computer it is P2P, if it runs on a (corporate) server, it is not. P2P networks are thus networks that connect multiple dynamic users with each other without a server explicitly supplying software or resources.
The P2P report
E. Rutherford
Question:
In this article written for the corporate world,
The benefits of P2P are three fold and can are based on the three main functions that are the most popular forms of P2P, also outside the corporate sphere. First of all technical companies can use the left-over resources of all users for computing jobs in terms of HD space, but especially left over CPU-power. This however is, as mentioned a highly specialised use of P2P only for companies dealing with specific products or research. More important are the so called instant-messaging and affinity community’s functions. The first is an evolved form of chat, and is very useful for short conversation, fast request of some information or even whole meetings. Because a person can set himself online or offline as he wishes, and contact is fast, efficient and direct. Affinity communities can swap files and other (personal) data without putting it on a central server; this again means an easy and direct way of dealing with files and information by searching, rather than requesting and/or manually searching and collecting it. Some dangers however make companies rather reluctant to really start using it. According to Rutherford the main problem is security, by allowing P2P communication of classified information, it becomes harder to control access and it might be easier for unauthorised persons to view these files and meetings, it also needs more advanced computers and larger bandwidth, because P2P computing needs this to function correctly.
A Plague of viruses
J. Boase and B. Wellman
Question:
Boase and Wellman mention a term for a mix between densely mixed and ramified neworks, as the predominant mode in society, what they call glocalized networks. They do not, however, extend to large extend on this phenomenon. How does a glocalized network work, when looking at the two extremes Boase and Wellman introduce?
Indeed we can try to look at how a glocalized network might work when we look at a combination of densely knit and ramified networks. Boase and Wellman argue that both of these networks have significant (dis)advantages in terms of viral spreading and by elaborating more on that we can see more clearly what a glocalized network looks like. First of all the densely knit networks consists of a few members, that have intense and a lot of contact with each other. Based on this there is a lot of trust within the group and knowledge about the other participants. In terms of the functioning of a virus (whether computer, biological or marketing wise) this means that within this group the virus is most likely to catch on and infect every participant. Because the high trust and closeness these people have, it is likely for them to be exposed to numerous ‘viral attacks’ and are very likely to activate it one of those times. This means that in a relative short period a virus has infected most of the participants. The densely knit network thus has the potential for a qualitative spreading of the virus. To thrive however, a virus needs to continually expend its range of ‘infections’, this because a virus is as much a process as the eventual product. In a densely knit sphere a virus would thus soon die out. Ramified networks, however, consist of loosely tied connections, and within it there is much possibility to focus on a large amount of targets. This means a spread based on very quantitative measures. However the ties within these networks aren’t necessarily very strong and so it is possible for a virus to spread itself, but the amounts of activation will be significantly less than within a densely knit group. The extremes of Boase and Wellman thus show a divide along the cliché of Quantity versus Quality. Glocalized networks have the possibility to employ the qualitative aspects of the dense groups with the quantitative spread of ramified ones. People do not have only a dense or a ramified sphere in which they operate; they can even have more then two dense groups. When a person has two dense groups he can transport one virus from the one to the other. Boase and Wellman call these persons ‘brokers’. As we can now see, the broker is the cause of the spread of one densely infected sphere to another. Secondly a strong and infected dense group has the potential to distribute a virus in a ramified sphere, with a larger amount of activations. Because a group usually has more authority and is more likely to projects an image of trust. For instance a virus distributed from the offices of a bona fide business to its clientele will make potentially more victims.