ScatterBrain: anonymous peer-to-peer

This is why we need a spam section.

Anyone tried it? ::fears virus:: lol

Originally Posted by ToM

Unlocking and moving to GeneralP2P.

I really appreciate it, ToM. I realized that posting a link as my first post might not be appreciated - and then I read the rules too... ugh. Thanks for the benefit of the doubt, and I hope to take part in many areas of the board (ie: I'm not here just to spam regarding our anon p2p client). Thanks again.

And Scythe... lol. I hear ya, and I was wondering how to get over that first "hump" of people wondering if it's legit, it if works, etc. Man it is hard to get a p2p network off the ground! All I can do is assure you that I wrote the program, and there is no code that would be remotely considered malicious in there. I'll be happy to answer answer any questions I can.

BrainTech,

How does ScatterBrain compare to other secure P2Ps such as Waste, Winny, Freenet and Mute?

What is the size of the file segments?

Must the individual network founders remain online so new users can connect to their posted IP? Are there other network gateways?

Originally Posted by tn

BrainTech,

How does ScatterBrain compare to other secure P2Ps such as Waste, Winny, Freenet and Mute?

What is the size of the file segments?

Must the individual network founders remain online so new users can connect to their posted IP? Are there other network gateways?

ScatterBrain uses similar technology as Freenet, but by not being so ambitious (an entire transparent anonymous network for all web communication), the user experience is enhanced. For instance, you can search for files based on multiple criteria, edit file descriptions, drag and drop files to various categories, etc. Searching itself uses multiple proxies, so it's hard to tell even who is searching for what

The size of the file fragments varies depending on the file size. Fragments range from 64k (for very small files) to 640k (for files more than 80mb, I believe). The premise is that people who are transferring 80 meg+ files will be the ones who have faster connections and can easily handle the larger fragment sizes. I have to say outright that ScatterBrain is unusably slow for those on dialup.

The individual network founder does not have to remain online. ScatterBrain is completely decentralized. There is a ".sn" file which specifies a bunch of potential computers your client can connect to in order to "get on the network". Only ONE of those peers in the .sn file needs to be online. Once connected to a computer on the scatterbrain network, information about peers is shared, and scatterbrain establishes multiple peer connections (as specified by settings, default is max 20 outgoing, 30 incoming).

So, the individual network founder must remain online until some sort of user base is formed (which is the stage all the scatterbrain networks are in right now). Once a network is established, anyone on the network can publish a ".sn" file (basically a list of who might be on the network who your client can "talk to"), and chances are that one of those peers will still be listening.

Much like "supernodes" on Kazaa, you can specify the role you want your client to tend towards on the network. If you have a great connection and a large hard drive, you might want to play a super data node role, offering your computer as a cache for all network data that flows through your client. If you have a fast connection but a small hard drive, you can force your client to be a super search node, where you participate less in storage of data, but searches are routed to you more often.

And yeah - you can turn off proxying data for others. But by doing that, you are reducing your anonymous nature on the network. ScatterBrain with proxying turned off would be like a weird version of bittorrent meets kazaa.

However, with all this file sharing talk, I'd like to stress that Scatterbrain works best for (and was designed to be) a backup tool. It allows for private, noncentralized, distributed storage of data. The fact that Scatterbrain networks begin to slow when there are more than around a thousand users on a single virtual network means that scatterbrain will never be some massive behemoth with everyone sharing everything under the sun. This can be somewhat alleviated by forming smaller virtual scatterbrain networks that focus on specific content.

Anyway, hope this answers some of your Qs. Have a good night

im off 2 give it a try.

Originally Posted by D_MaN

im off 2 give it a try.

Let me know what you think - and your suggestions for improvement. I'm looking to work closely with others to shape this technology into something practical, useful, and fairly easy-to-use. If the suggestions are moderately simple, we can usually implement them in a few hours to a day. Feel free to email me at mailto:BrainTechLLC@yahoo.com - even if you find it hard to use, or encounter errors - let me know, please. Thanks.

Originally Posted by ToM

I honestly don't see what the problem is.

This is related to P2P file-sharing, so why not allow them to post their ideas here? Give them feedback, positive or negative - it's all good.

I don't consider this spam unless someone shows me a reason otherwise.

Edit: There's a BIG difference between a link to a P2P client/site and fanboying. In my opinion this would only become spam if the poster mass posted this message or went on to spam it in off-topic threads, and so on - i.e. fanboying.

Unlocking and moving to GeneralP2P.

It's spam because it's the author telling us to try his own program, that's advertising i.e. spam, IMO it's no different than dick lengthing pill emails, even if the really do make your dick bigger.

This is why I've been calling for a guest spam section, so authors and others can post their wares, sites, etc and leave the rest of the site for discussing, commenting, etc on their programs or sites.

This way they don't come on, register a nick, tell us to goto their site or try their program, etc on the first post and then piss off.
Instead they can just post their site or program, etc in a guest spam section and then piss off

I totally understand where you are coming from, it looks like spam when they do it on their first post though, their program could be full of ad-ware/spyware and they could be trying to make a quick buck. Anyone can claim it has no spyware, ad-ware and 15 million users.

Which is why I keep mentioning a spam/advertisement section like on unitedtrackers.com, that way you don't have to do things on a case by case basis, you free up more time for yourselves. So you can do chattin instead of moddin .

I'm all for new p2p programs, bt sites, the more the better but you have to admit that not all of them are legit and they use sites like this for their own financial gain.

I rather appreciate it when any P2P developer posts on these forums to announce a new product, and is also willing to reply to questions. This is not even close to spamming when it is only posted for the first time.

Does anyone still remember what ES5 was up to about a year ago? They not only started threads plugging their product in every P2P forum on the internet, they also tried to turn nearly every unrelated thread into a pitch for ES5. On top of that, they would pull other stunts like posing as a new user asking a question about Es5 in the forums, only to answer their own questions under another name. They would write sales pitches to post on self-advertising sites like PR Newswire, and then each time start a post on the p2p forums under the guise of it being "news". They would repeatedly pose as consumers and post their own glowing reviews of ES5 on sites like Download.com in an attempt to counter all the truthful reviews of their pathetically buggy program. They would make lots of wild and ridiculous claims, and flame anyone who disagreed with their lies and distortions. They created dozens of different user names to post under. These shills became so pervasive they would try to take over nearly every topic of every forum. Their fanboying became legendary. The goons of ES5 used every trick in the book to get the ES5 name continuously plastered all over every P2P forum. It got so bad that eventually the forum mods were forced to take drastic action, and suspect - if not assume - that everyone talking up ES5 was just a shill.

To me, that is spamming.