Peer-to-peer (P2P) and swarmcasting
The way content is conveyed along the network infrastructure is also changing. Peer-to-peer computing (or P2P) is not new - it is a practice that reaches right back to the early internet P2P is direct communication or collaboration (mostly file sharing) between computers, where none is simply client or server, but where all machines are equals (peers). What makes P2P unique is not two nodes talking to each other as equals, but the type and (virtual) location of the nodes. Ordinary PCs, previously little more than web-page viewers, become active participants in the internet, despite their lack of fixed IP addresses.
The Cambridge company CacheLogic36 shows that file sharing is currently the dominant generator of data traffic on the net, with volumes ranging between two and 10 times those of normal web traffic, depending on the time of day.
Skype37 also uses P2P technology, as does the video-conferencing web application Festoon38, which enables you to hold whole audio conferences online for free. Skype (like other VoIP applications) allows you to make telephone calls for free to other users online: it is free to use, making its money out of selling allied services - in this respect it is a Web 2.0 business.