I used the the metasearch engine dogpile.com because it uses multiple search engines that are quite popular (Google, Yahoo! Search, and Bing). Using this metasearch search site is useful because many search results that say come up on Yahoo! Search may not come up on Google or Bing.
My search term was "pros for peer to peer file sharing" Interestingly enough, one of the top search results sent me to results for ask.com, which was a sponsored result for Google.
One of the better results I got in the search was a link to this site which had arguments for for and against peer to peer file sharing. Even though it is an obscure .com site, it does have useful information and arguments about what's good and bad about P2P file sharing. It has a link for almost every point that is made for that particular argument. Reference sources are clearly marked and there is a works cited at the bottom of the page. One of the knocks against this site is that it's unclear as to when this particular article was published. Sure, you can go through all the dates of laws and acts passed to get a rough estimate, but it isn't clearly stated and it is likely around 3-4 years old. There isn't any mentioning of how the site is funded and there isn't even an author credited for writing it. This site is more of an outline than an actual article, which can definitely be helpful considering how many links are sited. But this isn't what I would call "academic" at all, and I will look for a more reliable link.
Many of the results for this search are links to specific P2P file sharing sites or sites that compare and contrast different P2P systems. I don't think the metasearch is to blame, but rather that my search terms were too general and since it is a metasearch engine it finds even more unrelated links than a normal search engine.
Apparently found exclusively on Bing, this link to an academic article entitled "A Measurement Study of Peer-to-Peer File Sharing Systems" is far more impressive than the link above. While it doesn't directly relate to the search terms, it is a study done at the University of Washington about the characteristics of those who use P2P file sharing. It goes into many specifics about the bandwidths of the users, how often to users file share, how often hosts connect and disconnect, and it looks at how these and other characteristics relate. The authors are clearly posted at the begging of the study along with where there funding comes from (U of Wash.) and the purpose of the article is stated in the abstract, which is right below the title, authors, and funding. This paper is much more reliable then the link above this one because it is from a credited and well known university, rather then an unknown author with an unknown motive. Again, despite not exactly being relevant to my search terms, it is relevant to our project as it discusses the characteristics of those who file share.
I think that the graphs and statistics included in your second link would be useful to our presentation, as they directly correlate to the processes of P2P file sharing - how, what, where, etc. We would have to remember to give them credit, but this site looks perfect for statistical information.
ReplyDeleteand I think the first site, even if it is a non reliable source, would be a good way to structure and organize our thoughts. It gives topics we can expound on and go more in depth...
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