Read this in hope: File-sharing to bypass censorship
By the year 2010, file-sharers could be swapping news rather than music, eliminating censorship of any kind. This is the view of the man who helped kickstart the concept of peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing, Cambridge University’s Professor Ross Anderson. In his vision, people around the world would post stories via anonymous P2P services like those used to swap songs. They would cover issues currently ignored by the major news services, said Prof Anderson.
Professor Ross Anderson is clearly hopelessly optimistic if he really thinks that underground and alternative news will filter through to the masses, and child pornography will be eradicated by the application of P2P systems – but that’s the worst possible reason to discourage him from trying. Analyst Bill Thomas thinks Prof. Anderson’s ideas are naive.
Given the choice, I’ll back the one that gets criticised for not being cynical enough every time.
