Music/video file swapping gets supercharged on Internet 2

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[Thanks to Darcy Quesnel for this pointer. Some excerpts from the original
article - BSA]

http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5202107.html
http://www.i2hub.com/

File-swapping gets supercharged on student network
               
A new file-trading network has sprung up on Internet2, the university
network that offers researchers and students a way to communicate at blazing
speeds while avoiding the ordinary Internet's data traffic jams. 

Dubbed i2hub, the network has drawn thousands of students from universities
around the country to trade files and chat at speeds that far exceed what
even ordinarily swift campus networks can provide. It has drawn rave reviews
on student Web sites and from users but has already sparked concern among
other Internet2 denizens. 

The students involved say they're simply looking to use unused Internet2
bandwidth, which can be less expensive for their colleges than ordinary
commercial Net connections. But some also see it as a way around limitations
that many universities have begun to impose on widely used file-swapping
applications such as Kazaa. 

"Some universities put a restriction on commodity Internet line speeds but
don't put any restriction on Internet2," said "Ttol," one of the students
managing the project. He declined to give his real name. "The experience of
transfers over Internet2 is much faster than on the commodity Internet." 

The i2hub network is based on a piece of open-source software called Direct
Connect, which connects users and allows them to search each other's hard
drives, using technology similar to the original Napster. Unlike most recent
file-swapping networks, it routes search requests through a central server,
which can be operated on an ordinary PC in a dorm room. 

This version of Direct Connect links only students at universities with
access to Internet2. While this keeps all traffic on the fast network, it's
probably not the first time that Internet2 has seen file-swapping
incursions. Some schools automatically route students' data traffic over
Internet2, if the destination is another participating university. Thus,
some students even using older tools such as Kazaa might already be using
the fast academic network without knowing it. 

Ttol said that about 2,000 people appeared to be online Thursday afternoon,
having logged in at different times. Students at about 100 universities are
involved, he said. 




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