Quote:
Originally Posted by dreams
Geesh... Way too complicated for a non-techie...
Although, I do understand just a bit better now. Thank you.  |
Explained in a non-techie language:
Your get an A4 paper from a "peer-to-peer" system. Now your friends wants a copy of this A4 paper so he gets one also, but now from you and the source YOU got it from. When a third person wants a copy of this A4 paper, he/she can get it from three sources: you, your friend and the source YOU got it from. because the third person now uses three sources to obtain it from, it is much faster than what it took you to get it from just one place.
In addition to this, your friend and the third person doesn't get it in one piece from one source. instead, he gets it piece by piece from all three sources and then the software "glues" the pieces to form one document that you can use.
This is really nice as torrents are much faster than direct HTTP downloads. For example, you can download a Linux distro into your computer much faster than by doing direct HTTP download.
the bad side is, that with torrents or better with peer-to-peer, its a whole lot easier to distribute illegal material such as pirated movies and MP3s.
peer-to-peer is much like a virus. Once someone creates the initial link to a file, it can be very hard to get rid of it because the bits and pieces of that file are now spread all around the universe.