Seth Godin writes:
BitTorrent is what p2p file sharing was supposed to be. It’s a system that is totally decentralized. The more it gets used, the better it works.
Once lots of people start using it (and I imagine it will be built into browsers quite soon) the effect is this:
Person A starts downloading a file by pointing to a “torrent” file on the web. This is not the data itself, just information ABOUT the file. It points to places where seeds (copies) of the file are available for downloading. The more seeds, the faster that person A can get going. It’s all automatic… the software does the work, not you.
Person B starts downloading, but now they’re getting the file from the original seeds and from A, too.
Person C continues the linked process, with all the seeds, plus A & B.As a result, it’s possible to download, say, an hour’s worth of Apple Computer ads in high quality format in just a few minutes as opposed to in a day or two.
He adds in a second post:
When everyone can watch high resolution DVD quality video on their screen without breaking your server, what will you do about that?
Is Volvo ready with a thirty minute test drive I can watch when I’m ready to buy a new car?
Is Toshiba ready with a how-to manual for their new music server? A fifteen minute well-made video that actually explains what I should do to hook it up?
How about publishers? Are they ready to do a video news release with complete interviews with all their important authors?
This, folks, is the real 500 channel universe. It will probably turn out to be more boring than Seinfeld, but way more specific. A billion infomercials, all the time.
The winners will be people who have the guts to make the interesting ones.
