While the pros and cons of
P2P
networks on the Web are still being debated, there are
a number of private invite-only P2P networks (aka darknets) out there which enable users
to get quality-approved media and software. They are decentralized, secret and almost
certainly not very legal in their media-sharing activities. Many of them use the Bittorrent service. A reader who goes by the name
The Rub of Clubs
let me in on a few of the secrets…
The Rub says that invite-only P2P networks are more popular than most people realise.
He uses them “to get the kinds of albums, film, and software that are almost impossible
to find anywhere else, including Netflix.” What’s more, these private
networks are being used by some marketing companies to ‘leak’ new music – in order to get new
songs quickly into the hands of influencers. The Rub says this has been an informal practice
for a couple years and is not far separated from mp3 blogs or myspace.
I asked what he meant by “quality-approved” media, a term he used to describe the
types of media that can be obtained in these private networks. He said quality-approved
means there are strict standards of quality. For example, “telesync” films or “cam” films
can’t be posted, but “telecine”, DVD quality, or HDTV quality films can be posted. For
music, usually there is a minimum of 220 bitrate, and often music is posted with lossless
quality. This
Wikipedia list of standards explains more about quality-approved.
Recently The Rub’s friend Ariel made a YouTube video about
private torrent communities:
In it Ariel explains the story of a former Torrent network called WDMA (Where Da
Moviez At?), which apparently had a user base of around 20k…. until it abruptly ended
around August 2005. Copycat sites popped up afterwards, but what happened to the
original? Well, according to Ariel’s story “those in the know won’t tell”.
So what kind of people are using these secret P2P networks? The Rub told me:
“It’s difficult to know how many people use
these networks, their age, their occupations, locations, etc. That’s just the nature of
these networks. I get the impression that many are in college. Almost all male. They seem
fairly intelligent, and tech-savvy, as you can imagine. It’s very difficult to gather
conclusive data about darknets, and I’m sure there are more networks that I don’t know
about. I’ve wondered about the possibility of an “ASmallWorld” type ultra-exclusive
torrent trading network. Intriguing idea, but almost impossible to
verify.”
These private networks thrive on the concept of exclusivity, so there’s little
chance that people not in the know will ever know much about them.
