I guess it all started back in the summer of 1999 with the Napster network. As an mp3 webmaster, I remember getting an email one day about a beta version of a new "filesharing" program. I tried it out and found it was only semi-useful as it was not in broad use and had not reached a critical mass of users. But soon, ad hoc music-sharing communities were in broad use - like many things it moved at "Internet speed" - both in it's rise and fall. They tried to go 'legit' but only in the wake of iTunes (at the end of 2003) have they been able to.
Soon they were gone and a number of (superior) systems could be found filling the void that was left. kazaanet (Morpheus, KaZaA), Gnutella (bearshare) and others (WinMX) offered "faster, better and more" - not just music, but whatever you wanted to share. Multi-user parallel downloading of identical files exploits the asymmetric broadband connections (cable and ADSL) available to most users giving speed and reliability. The newest network is an open-source driven system called eDonkey, it has the ability to label files as 'fakes', it does segmented dowmloading and you can create links to specific versions of a file to put on a webpage. There are a number of clients available - I put a few at the end of my list below. It is likely the next 'big thing'.
Here are the top remaining P2P networks. Be careful! You can get almost anything from them, including viruses, trojans and subpoenas from the RIAA. Whatever you do, don't download software (WaReZ) from these networks - seriously - it's a monumentally bad idea.
| KaZaA | The number one network, and the most visible to the RIAA. Free adware version or $30. |
| Kazaa lite K++ | Free Kazaa network client with 'addons' like hiding from the RIAA, hiding from network admins, hiding your file list while still sharing files and more. |
| BearShare | Self-proclaimed best Gnutella client. Probably true. |
| WinMX | A little harder to use, but offers advanced featues similar to KaZaA in a lightweight, free package. |
| Overnet | The de-centralized client from the creators of the eDonkey2000 network. |
| eMule | An open-ource eDonkey network client with many advanced features. |
| eMule plus | Another open-source eDonkey client. This one is 'spiffy-looking' and is the one I use (for testing purposes only ;-). |
