What are peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing programs?
P2P file sharing programs are designed to let people easily exchange music, movies, video and other files over the Internet. Some common programs are KaZaa, Gnutella, iMesh and eDonkey. Many of these programs are used to distribute copyrighted materials and thus violate copyright laws. What effect do peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing apps have on bandwidth? The same effect that a herd of elephants have on a small watering hole: They use it all. Every last bit of bandwidth that is available will be sucked up by file sharing applications. Peer-to-peer apps have no shame about what they use when it comes to using bandwidth. How do file sharing apps use so much bandwidth? The size of the files being shared and the act of sharing combine to eat up a network’s limited amount of bandwidth. File sharing apps like KaZaA have two aspects, they act as clients, enabling you to download files from other participating systems, and they convert your computer into a server, allowing other clients to dow
