A quick note - the decentralized system that is being proposed is NOT peer to peer. At the top, at the aggregator, it functions just the same as the centralized solution: One database, searchable and acessable by all - ie napster.
The difference is how the metada gets to the central DB. Either it is aggregated from nodes, or required to be centrally submitted to bypass the technical hurdles of aggregation. I am under the impression that feasability or technical-hard-ness of building the metadata collection functionality to be decentralized rather than requiring it to be centrally submitted does not nearly outweigh the problems with admining, maintaining, and hosting the central solution. When i get home i will be rifling through some books for quotes to support my claim that Reed's Law and End-to-End principals support the decentraralized design over the centralized design. -Zack On Fri, 1 Aug 2003, CMR wrote: > > > "Granted, the feasibility of an in place, functional and reliable > > > distributed system may well prove the best argument for the > > > centralized option in the end." > > > > Hi CMR, > > > > I'm sorry -- i'm still having trouble figuring out this statement. > > Did you mean that the *infeasibility* of a distributed system is > > an argument for a centralized option? Or did you mean that the > > feasibility of a centralized system is an argument for a centralized > > option? Or that the feasibility of a distributed system is an argument > > for a distributed system? > > apologies; "feasibility" was implied as "feasibility, or lack there of" > > Therefore the daunting prospect of actually designing and implementing a > distributed media system that realizes our goals may, in the end, be the > best argument against it; and thus for the centralized. I say "may be" > because there may in fact exist opensource code that we could leverage > effectively for this task; I'm just ignorant of what's available and of the > respective pros/cons.. > > Cheers > CMR > > <--enter gratuitous quotation that implies my profundity here--> >
