Points Of Interest: Microsoft, Apple, Peer 2 Peer, Download.com, BBC, Amazon, Sony, Problems
In today’s modern society the internet seems to be part of everyone’s day to day routine. People use the internet for numerous things such as Business, Downloading and Commerce amongst other things. An aspect which I feel will grow and expand is the downloading market.
In the downloading market people can download there favourite radio show to the latest updates for a piece of software. However, downloading can be used for illegal activity such as illegal mp3 downloads and pornography.
Let’s examine some of the services available for downloading over the internet:
Microsoft is a major O/S and software development company and is making very good use of the capability to download. Microsoft currently offer a module called “Automatic Updates” which allows users to simply select and download updates for there software. Microsoft also offers you the feature to actively take part in becoming a beta tester. Simply download the latest beta edition of a piece of software in development, try it out and give feedback to Microsoft.
Apple
Apple in recent years has grown and grown through the success of the revolutionary iPod. Apple currently offers the widely available service of downloading mp3 music tracks via its software iTunes. Users can now obtain there favourite tracks from a huge database of music at a click of a button for
£0.79/$0.99. Users can then simply upload their newly downloaded tracks onto their iPod. Apple has broadened its market recently to allow US residence to download Television shows and music videos adapted for the latest iPod video.
However, on 16th September 2006, BBC News reported that “iPod fans 'shunning iTunes store'” . It says a “Jupiter Research” report had found out that on average only 20 tracks on an iPod will be purchased from the iTunes music store. Could this be the decline of Apple’s dominance in the mp3 music market?
Peer 2 Peer file sharing
Peer 2 Peer file sharing has become more the enemy of big record and film industry as many of the products are very much available through various Peer 2 Peer systems such as Bit Torrent. The more common Bit Torrent clients include: Azureus, BitComet and Utorrent. The concept of sharing files is in-fact not illegal to do but the problems come in when it is what you are sharing. If I for instance put this document on a Peer 2 Peer system it would not be illegal. However, if I put the latest movie of say “Spiderman” on the system it would be
illegal. Peer 2 Peer file sharing is also infamous for spreading
viruses.
The software “Kazaa” has been repeatedly documented on how users are receiving viruses through files they are downloading in the Kazaa network.
Numerous court cases and claims of “bundled malware” can be found on Wikipedia.
Wikipedia also has stated the following as possible “Attacks on Peer 2 Peer”
“Poisoning attacks (e.g. providing files whose contents are different from the description)
Polluting attacks (e.g. inserting "bad" chunks/packets into an otherwise valid file on the network)
Defection attacks (users or software that make use of the network without contributing resources to it)”
Download.com is what Wikipedia quotes as being “the world's largest internet download directory website”
Download.com offers users free of charge the chance to download free trials of software, freeware and shareware (complete software available for free). In the last two years starting with 2004, download.com started offering music to replace the service offered by the defunct MP3.com.
In 2005, download.com started also offering users the chance to download video streaming with a variety of content including Movies & TV, Sports, Animation and Music Videos.
At present the BBC seems like one of the nearest competitors in the “downloading media” market behind Apple. As with Apple, BBC offer 
users the chance to download podcasts and missed television and radio shows broadcasted by the BBC. A good example is the BBC 2 website which freely offers shows broadcast for users to stream/download the very next day.
Amazon.com the American electronic commerce company has been running for 11 years. With figures showing it has been making a net income of approximately $359 million (USD) for year 2005, unsurprisingly Amazon has decided to venture out into the downloading industry. On 8th September 2006 BBC News reported that Amazon has launched a digital TV and film download service in the US called Amazon Unbox . It has also been reported that Amazon will sell TV shows for $1.99 (£1.06) per episode and movies for between $3.99 and $14.99.
The record producer Sony last year (December 2005) tried passing a plan where by an users uploading songs from a artist’s CD produced by Sony would be in fact infected by a simply virus created by Sony. The main question that arouse because of this was “Is Sony going to far or is it what people who upload the songs illegal deserve”? The plan was rejected and Sony or any other record producers currently have not planned to perceiver this.
A big problem which many big software development companies are trying to tackle is spyware. Quite often users “download” spyware either “accidently” believing it is something else or a website downloading the spyware to their computer without their knowledge. Often websites offering illegal “cracks” for software target vulnerable computers and install spyware which can often make a computer run very slow.
However, the feature of downloading is only available for users with internet access. This means that the ability to “update” your computer isn’t easily possible without internet access. This can leaves users frustrated and angry because they have to find alternative sources for updating their computer (i.e. receiving files from friends via a storage device).Another problem which again is an issue for all downloading services is speed. Various users from various parts of the world are only able to receive limited speeds. Fortunately, here is the UK users can in-fact receive internet connection of up to 24mb. Internet access for others can be tedious. The main issue other than speeds is the economy and availability. In various countries the cost of Internet access many people cannot afford on an average salary. If there is any internet access even available then the issue rises of speeds. Some people able to receive 56kb and others 24mb.
The morality issue arises into whether downloading is in-fact “wrong”. Many argue that the use of downloading things like mp3 songs is damaging the record industry. The decision to include downloaded mp3 music tracks as well as CD’s in the UK top 40 has also upset critics.