A trio of former America Online heavyweights has created a new peer-to-peer network they hope will bring a combine of file sharing, instant messaging, and multimedia streaming to people without the headaches now associated with the controversial technology. That’s because it’s designed and built to be used only between people who know each other, as opposed to the random swaps made notorious by KaZaA, Grokster, Morpheus, and other P2P networks.
"Our technology turns the computer into a private server that allows you to share files securely in a small, invite-only group," Grouper co-founder Josh Felser told eWEEK.com, adding that each group is part of an encrypted network allowing single-click access to search and download materials.
Felser, who made millions selling Spinner.com to AOL five years ago, created Grouper with two former AOL colleagues, his Spinner.com co-founder David Samuel, and former AOL Entertainment director Mike Sitrin. Now in beta test mode, the network is built to limit private networks to 30 members and limit music swapping to streams within small groups, enabling private performances as classified by American copyright law, Felser said.
“Grouper was born out of the ongoing frustration of trying to share media with our friends,” Felser, Samuel, and Sitrin said on the network’s Web site. “We had all amassed 1,000s of files on our computers (photos, video clips, music, animated shorts, shareware, etc), yet when it came to sharing, the technology sucked. Emails would get blocked because files were too big. Burning discs for our friends took hours and costs too much over time. Uploading lots of files to sites was painful and they would restrict how these files could be used by friends. We knew there had to be a better way to share with people we know, discover what our friends like and experience it all together.”
You can try Grouper for free during its beta testing period, but Felser, Samuel, and Sitrin envision the network graduating in due course to a workplace collaboration tool with remote accessibility as well for small to medium size businesses.
“We all have hundreds of files on our PCs that we want to share with our friends and family. Grouper was designed to enrich online and real-world relationships by making it dead easy to share personal media, connect about what is being shared and discover what your friends like,” Felser said. “Broadband access, file sharing, digital cameras and large, inexpensive hard drives have finally reached the masses. With the convergence of these technologies, we felt the time was right for a truly consumer-friendly, personal media sharing application. ”
