***NOTE: A BARBELITH WASTE FILE-SHARING NETWORK IS BEING ESTABLISHED. YOU ARE WELCOME (AND ENCOURAGED) TO JOIN THIS NETWORK. SEE BELOW AND PM ME FOR MORE INFORMATION.***
NOTE TO MODS: I was going to put this in music, but the possibilities for it were so much further reaching. I considered putting it in gathering, but not alot of people check there too often (myself included), and I'm not sure this exactly counts as "a gathering" either. So I'm putting it here, where I think it's most likely to be seen by the most amount of people. If you think it belongs elsewhere, kindly move it.
Anyone ever read Pynchon? Me neither. But if you have, or even if you haven't, you may know about W.A.S.T.E. - the secret, underground postal network used by the counter-culture in "The Crying of Lot 49." In addition to being a major theme in a novel I want to read, it's name has been stolen twice and used (for it's hip factor, no doubt) as the title to two things - an online store for the band Radiohead, and a chat/instant messaging/"secure" p2p program brought to by none other than... Justin Frankel, former head of Nullsoft, creator of Gnutella and Winamp, persistant biter of the hand that feeds him (AOL), and God to programmer nerds everywhere.
We are here today to discuss the later - the brilliant program known as WASTE. Now, while WASTE the store has no reason to refer to itself by it's name besides it's post-modern indie-rocker coolness, WASTE the program has a direct connection to it's literary origins. WASTE the program is very similar to W.A.S.T.E. the secret underground postal network, in that it allows anyone to send a message or a file to any trusted party through a secure and invisible connection independent of any central network.
What does this mean to you? Well, it means that so long as you trust who you are trading files with, you can swap files with anyone without worrying about being caught by the RIAA, or getting viruses, or incomplete files, or any of the other bogus things involved with traditional p2p networks. The only catch is that because there's no central network, there's no way to search for what file you want... instead, you have to seek out another waste user (by means independent of the program, no less) who has the file you're looking for. This also involves a risk, as you must trust the person you are swapping with, as you must provide them with your IP address. It's not that big of a risk (your IP address goes out to the webmaster of every website you visit), but some people are uncomfortable with it (and understandibly so, with all the file-swaping-hating craziness going on).
So, knowing that Barbelith is a very trusting community, I thought I'd open try a little experiment - are there any lithers who would like to try swapping files. Everyone, please post some files you'd like to have and some files you can share with others. When you see that someone has a file you want, and you have a file they might want, PM them inviting them to connect at a certain time. When all arangements have been made, you can PM them your WASTE-key (I'll get into the technical stuff in a minute) and have fun!
Hopefully this will grow into a longliving and helpful thread.
There is plenty of technical stuff involved in getting the program set-up and in running order, but as long as your a little bit techno-savie, this tutorial should be enough to get you through it. Basically, if you want to join or create a network with someone else, you have to exchange keys, you'll see what I mean when you try it yourself.
WARNING: I do not condone copyright violation... any illegal filesharing is done at your own risk.
(do whatever you want, I don't care. but hey, I gotta cover my own ass)
P.S. you might want to find a friend to test this out with before you go posting on the barb about what new jay-z song you just need to have and that you have three led zeppelin albums to offer for it, thinking that you know what your doing, but in fact only wasting everyone's time. if you don't have any friends, PM me, and I can probably find the time to help you out.
P.P.S. when you first start the program, it'll say "network down." don't get pissed off at me for making you set up some complicated program, and then it doesn't even work - it's supposed to do that... WASTE isn't made up of a central network, it's made up of lots of tiny ones - ones that you create. so until you connect with someone else, it's going to tell you that the network is down, which it is, being that you haven't established one yet. |
