Most downloaded program on the Web?

CNN.com ^ | Friday, May 23, 2003 | Reuters

[Radix]

LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) --Sharman Networks said its Kazaa file-sharing software was on track to set a record Friday as it becomes the most-popular free program on the Web with over 230 million downloads.

By hitting that total, Shaman said Kazaa would surpass the popular ICQ instant messaging program, owned by CNN's parent company AOL Time Warner.

[Radix]

Kazaa: 230 million downloads and counting

[lelio]

How does Kazaa make money? Their bandwidth costs for those 240M (!!) downloads has to cost a fortune.

[Normal4me]

They get kick backs from the spyware that's included in Kazaa. Get Kazaa lite instead.

[SamAdams76]

I would think they make their money from all the pop-up ads that blitz every Kazaa user (except those few who use Kazaa lite).

[Rebelbase]

"Get Kazaa lite instead"

Thats what my teenage technical advisor recommended to me also.

[tubebender]

Thats what my teenage technical advisor recommended to me also.

LOL...I'm having a nervous breakdown this weekend because my 14 year old grandson is out of town...

[Normal4me]

Gee, you guys are lucky. I had to learn all this stuff on my own! :^D

[Khurkris]

May I also recommend www.grokster.com , I use it and it seems to be a good program.

[pcx99]

Kazaa itself uses next to zero bandwidth. It's kind of hard to explain but services like these use the bandwidth of the participants. That is when you log on to Kazaa (and I recommend you check out kazaa lite -- google it -- if you'd like to avoid spyware) anyway when you log in you're given a list of other people who are also logged in, after you get the list you don't deal with kazaa at all anymore, you're only dealing with the other people who are logged in.

When you say you want a copy of shakespear's macbeth (yes, peer to peer networks aren't always about pirating copyrighted material) your program searches all the other people who are logged on, finds those who have copies of the file you want and then asks them to send it directly to you.

This is a great system especially for broadband users. Say if found 5 copies of macbeth but they're all on systems owned by modem users while you're on superfast cable. Well you'll have 5 people sending you macbeth and even though each of them is uploading slowly, together they're enough to send the file to you relatively quickly.

The original peer-to-peer network was napster which used to have you send a list of all your file names to their master server. That made for fast and accurate search results but because it was so centralized it made it very easy for the RIAA to sue them and shut them down.

Kazaa, Grokster, Morpheus, Limewire, and others rose from napster's ashes and now acoount for FAR FAR more traffic than napster EVER did. Had the RIAA worked with napster it was likely Napster would have successfully become legitimate the way apple music has, instead by destroying napster, there are now dozens of services each worse than napster ever was and each so decentralized that even if the RIAA does sue kazaa and totally drives it from business the network will still exist.

[ozaukeemom]

Yup, love my Kazaa lite!

[Radix]

You made a great post and it was very informative.

I do not use any of the services, but I like that they exist. Heck, I do not have my puter speakers turned on and the CD player in my vehicle has never been used by me.

The RIAA is doomed and they are helpless to prevent their demise. It serves them right. They have been part of the Qabbal that has given Capitalism a bad name. They suck, and now they die.

[Quick1]

I don't think KaZaa supplies all of those downloads, alot of them come from CNet.com, I'm sure.

Also, I'll throw in my support of Kazaa Lite. Great program.

BitTorrent is also a great new program, and helped distribute thousands of copies of RedHat 9 on the first weekend, without overloading a ton of FTP servers. I've found that it provides a great way of getting that episode of Enterprise or Scrubs that I missed the night before.

[Quick1]

I have to agree with you on the RIAA. If they can't change their business model to keep up with technology, they should not be kept alive by government protection.

Stuff like the DMCA should be ended as well. Does Mickey Mouse need to be copyrighted for an infinite amount of time?

[SevenofNine]

Rack ittttt

I love Kazza Lite


You know what I don't care if record companies like it I look at music files LIKE Baseball card

I trade my Frank Sinatra file to your Metallica LOL!

[newyorkronin]

I think we can still enjoy the music and movies of leftist celebrities without putting out money into their pocketbooks by using kazaa to just download their products.

Yes, it's theft, but they've stole our country, culture and innocence of our children from us already. Consider the billions of lost revenue from file-sharing a penalty fine for spreading rap and porn.

[Kay Soze]

Heard some really good tunes on the radio.

I bough the CD and guess what?

Instead of
"She really hates me"

My kids heard

"She F***ing hates me" !!!!

Quite a differnce from the radio version.

Piss on the record labels. I hope they REALLY REALLY REALLY suffer.

[tmg]

I downloaded Kazaa before I knew about all the spyware issues. Can anyone post some directions on how to uninstall the kazaa so that I can be sure I got rid of all the spyware files? I'm somewhat computer illiterate, so a "kazaa for dummies" type description would be peachy.

You aren't going to convince me that kazaa is destroying the music industry. If those people would stop and think for a moment, they'd learn how to use programs like kazaa to their advantage. I've heard some music compliments of kazaa that I never would have heard otherwise, and as a result went out and bought the cd.

[js1138]

I wonder how many times winzip has been downloaded. And how many times the self-extractor has been downloaded embedded in a file.

[Paul C. Jesup]

How does Kazaa make money?

From spyware that can take control of your computer away from you thanks to the Kazaa EULA.

This is one of the reasons I do not use it. Nor will I use the hacked version of Kazaa, Kazaa Lite.

There are better P2P programs out there.

[E Rocc]

I downloaded Kazaa before I knew about all the spyware issues. Can anyone post some directions on how to uninstall the kazaa so that I can be sure I got rid of all the spyware files?

Uninstalling Kazaa probably won't get rid of all the spyware, but Lavasoft Ad-Aware will.

-Eric