The Ferrari and the Vespa. Both are in the class of "motorized vehicles," but I think we'd all agree they're at opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to the classification. Kind of like "Commercial P2P" vs. "filesharing" technology (or "non-commercial P2P").
Over the last few months, we've seen a major surge in awareness of P2P technology as a legitimate technology for content distribution. Much of this can be attributed to CDN market leader Akamai's endorsement and purchase of RedSwoosh (see my previous blog post "Akamai Follows VeriSign's Lead"), but I believe it is also due to a growing awareness of the difference between what we call Commercial P2P vs. the technology generally utilized by filesharing networks (predominantly for illegal downloads of copyrighted material).
One of the reasons this topic is important is because I believe we are going to see quite a bit of P2P technology utilized by major media players in 2008 (following the lead of BBC, Sky and Channel4 in the UK). As they do so, it's critical that these companies consider the positives and negatives of using proven vs. unproven platforms. I'm not pointing this out to be altruistic - Kontiki is the most widely deployed, commercially successful P2P platform on the market - and we hope a smart buying community will result in lots of new customers for VeriSign/Kontiki.
For depth on this topic, read below the jump, and I'd also suggest reading our white paper on the subject.
In short, Commercial P2P is secure, reliable and sophisticated software and network technology that delivers a consistently high quality user experience while protecting the rights of content owners, creators and distributors. For examples of Commercial P2P in action, see the BBC iPlayer, which utilizes VeriSign's Kontiki P2P platform.
The technology utilized by filesharing networks tends to lack many of these qualities. As you evaluate P2P technology - as a customer or an end user - here are a few characteristics I'd look for in a commercial-grade P2P provider. I will also shamelessly highlight the benefits of the Kontiki platform in these areas (that's what you get - VeriSign pays for the blog :)). Here they are, not necessarily in order of importance.
1) Consistently high quality user experience. Does the platform deliver a consistently high quality user experience, and has the technology provider proven it can deliver such service to millions of users over an extended period of time? It's one thing for an end user to have a poor experience watching video from a filsharing network - they don't have a trusted affinity for the brand, they know the file was downloaded illegally, and they don't have high expectations for the experience. A poor user experience with a major media company is another thing altogether. The end user expects a high quality experience - and the media company should expect to deliver on a consistent basis. This includes relatively short download times, a high quality (DVD, HD) viewing experience, a well-designed EPG or user interface, and a quality level of end user support when required. Deliver a poor user experience and the consumer won't blame P2P - they'll blame your brand.
2) Respect the PC. If end users are consistently downloading clients that don't "respect the PC" - take a backseat to other programs, distribute and download when appropriate, consume a small footprint on the machine, etc. - P2P providers and their customers will find themselves in a very uncomfortable spot as more consumers use their applications. I give a lot of credit to Mike Homer and the founding team at Kontiki for realizing this way back in 2000/2001 and designing the Kontiki platform to work in a very intelligent fashion on the end user's pc. The fact that Kontiki has been deployed by some of the world's largest corporations for enterprise rich media delivery to millions of end users - including GM, Schwab, E&Y, Wachovia, Textron, Coca Cola and others - tells you something about its ability to work within a very tough corporate security and networking environment. Trust me, these guys do a thorough evaluation of the technology before they buy - and they don't like anything that disrupts the end user's ability to work, their corporate firewall or IT policies.
3) Respect the network. In general, the technology utilized for file sharing has very little intelligence with respect to network topology, and it drives ISPs and carriers nuts - making up an estimated 50-90% of traffic. The peers on these networks employ very little sophistication, peering essentially at random and pulling files from all over the globe. I don't have time or space to go into all the detail here (read the white paper), but a Commercial P2P application like Kontiki is topoligically-aware - and is often referred to as "ISP-friendly." You may say "well, that's the ISP's problem." It's a bigger issue than that, and recent actions by ISP's to "traffic shape" filesharing technology like BitTorrent signal a battlefront you may want to understand closely before proceeding with a non-Commercial P2P application (or one with less than 5 years of experience, for that matter). We're proud to say we think we have the most "ISP-friendly" P2P platform on the market, and have had several major carriers tell us so.
4) Security. This is an area of real differentiation for Commercial P2P, and certainly one that we emphasize as a strength of the Kontiki platform (given VeriSign's strong brand in security). With the US Congress and others evaluating the risks posed by filesharing networks, we think this is an area of real concern. There are two angles here - security around the content (digital rights), and security for the user. Both are big topics well covered in our white paper, but I'll add a few basic comments here. From a content perspective, as a content distributor I want to be ABSOLUTELY sure that my content is being distributed to the right consumers, under the right conditions, and with the right protections around my content. I won't go into the technical details, but suffice it to say I would ask your potential P2P vendor if they can demonstrate years of experience and millions of files downloaded under rights-managed, secure conditions. From a user perspective, I want to know that the files I download are clean - no viruses or malware - and that only trusted sources are distributing content to my machine. Again, ask your P2P provider for evidence of experience here - supporting millions of end users.
5) End user support. This isn't so much a technical issue as it is an operational one, and it's really important. It's only after supporting millions of users that a vendor learns the "ins and outs" of a relatively complex technology like P2P and the different issues that arise at scale. Make sure your vendor/partner has supported customers at scale well beyond your wildest projections (yes, assume you'll be successful). This ties into point #1 above, as it contributes to the users' overall impressions of the brand (in a big way) and the service.
There are lots of other items I could add in this post, but for now I'll stick to these 5. If every P2P buyer does a thorough evaluation based on these 5 items - and the technology components underlying them - we'll all benefit.
