Peer to Peer: Collaboration and Sharing over the Internet

Chapter 11 at a Glance

This chapter looks at some of the social implications of peer technologies, and includes comments drawn from the experience and reflection of others.

Peer Community explores the social implications highlighted by p2p and relates some of the current commentary on these matters.

• Technology Acceptance is found to be a crucial factor in determining the success of a technology.

• In the Social Criteria of P2P, we take this analysis further by examining the different assumptions manifested in software as cultural expression.

• The Content Control Wars shows how diverging software cultures have come to be in conflict concerning control of digital content.

• The Legal Challenge outlines the current legislative mess surrounding copyright ...