Online file sharing
Definition
“File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digitally stored information, such as computer programs, multi-media (audio, video), documents, or electronic books.” [1] It is carried out through different types of systems and mediums which allow storage and transfers, covering from optical discs, memory cards, Zip disks, file servers, hyperlinked documents to peer-to-peer networking.
This practice is being automatically associated to illegal downloading lately and has been growing since the late 1990s, especially due to the sharing of music files with the mp3 music format, which is said to be the cause for the drop of music purchases.
Models of file sharing
We can find three types of file sharing:
- PEER TO PEER NETWORKS : This kind of file sharing allows people to use a software that lets you share files with other people through the network. ( some of them are : Gnutella, Gnutella2, Enetwork, eMule)
- BIT TORRENT : It is also a peer to peer network that is used to share larger files. The files are “ broken” into smaller ones so that the sharing is faster.
- FILE HOSTING SERVICES : This file sharing is an alternative to peer to peer softwares. They are sometimes used with other tools of internet that have links to files that have been saved.
The repercussion on the Economy
The economic impact due to file sharing, nowadays, is incomputable and very difficult to determine.
For example, the music industry was significantly affected , whose sales dropped considerably.
While many studies have found that file sharing has a negative impact , other studies also concluded that it has positive effects.
So, as usual, it is very difficult to determine the cause and effect relationships among a number of different trends, including an increase of legal online purchases, but at the same time an increase of general illegal file sharing.
Even in countries with strong intellectual property enforcement, such as the US or the EU, there exist huge piracy rates.
Scope and use
Approximately 70 million of people was participating in online file sharing in the US, in 2004. Nearly 70 percent of them were 18 to 29 years and they found illegal file sharing acceptable.
The huge majority of them was not concerned about being punished for illegal downloading. However, there was a strong division as to where they thought the legal burden should be placed.
Half of them insisted in the culpability of P2P companies, who should be held responsible for illegal actions on their networks, while others not to comment on that issue.
Disadvantages and dangers
One of the most important “risks” is the release of personal information when downloading or sharing a file. Also, virus, spyware and “online plagiarism” worry the clients. Therefore, some open source files sharing packages provide the consumers with a programmed anti-virus that scan files. However, this is not enough. Recently, since Obama´s became President, it has been observed a significant increase in the leaking of information. Due to this, it has been determined a case of national security.
As a way to prevent more of this information leaks, the current legislation in USA is being debated and will be changed: from now on, individuals will have to be aware of the risks of sharing files and will have to give the consent before sharing one of these.
File sharing advocates
File sharing is not always illegal, even if they are covered by copyright. Many types of advocates such as freeware or open source promote the use of file sharing as a fee promotional tool. Many industries, in special the music and film industry, claimed that the P2P programs make them lose millions of dollars because these programs don´t consider the intellectual property. In recent years, the Web 2.0 has changed society so significantly that copyright law is consider nowadays irrelevant.
REFERENCES
· File Sharing (2009)Retrieve from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_sharing
CITATIONS
· [1] File Sharing (2009)Retrieve from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_sharing
17/12/2009
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