1.6 Million PCs Track Popular P2P Clients

Hodejo1 writes "'Big announcements' are often backed up by a dubiously small data set or not backed up at all. Big Champagne, PC Pitstop and Digital Music News joined forces to analyze 1,661,688 PCs to track 152 unique P2P clients quarterly from September 2006 to September 2007. The result is a definitive list of the most popular P2P software in use. Topping the list by a healthy margin is LimeWire. 'In September of 2007 LimeWire was found on 17.8% of all the PCs polled that month. With regards to market share — counting only those users with at least one P2P application on their systems — LimeWire held a 36.4% share, meaning one out of three P2P users has LimeWire on their system. These numbers are up slightly from September 2006 when LimeWire held a market share of 34.1%'. Meanwhile, uTorrent has made huge gains during this period soaring into second place and posing a genuine challenge to LimeWire."

Sexist comment

[by Anonymous Coward]

from the article:

"this technology is so easy a grandmother could use it"

As a 48 yo grandmother, and C programmer, I find that offensive.

Re:Sexist comment

[by Anonymous Coward]

You still program in C? Holy crap, you ARE old!

Re:

[_bug_ (112702)]

That's like saying "You still use a manual gearbox? Holy crap, you ARE old!"

Sure, there are easier-to-use alternatives, but the connoisseur is more refined in her choices.

Re:

[s0litaire (1205168)]

Hey"!! I've always used a Manual Gearbox But since I'm in the UK that's not unusual :P

Re:Your Silly comments

[Talkischeap (306364)]

"...don't use IE to look at porn or download illigal stuff/cracks/ etc, and youll genrally be fine."

Yeah, tell that to my wife's 83 year old mother who is constantly getting her laptop infected, and she'll kick you ass all over town.

By the way, what dream world do you live in where you actually believe the foolish statement you made?

And I really think your silly question should have been, "Why am I under the impression that Firefox users think that "their" browser is the best".

I've used Firefox since i

Re:

[sm62704 (957197)]

You got modded "funny".

Damned kids!

Re:

[ILuvRamen (1026668)]

I was over fixing a computer for a 70 year old woman and she has an autocad-like program that connects to her automated sweing machine to stich patterns. I thought that was pretty awesome too lol. But btw, upgrade to C#!

Re:Sexist comment

[rueger (210566)]

Did she mention that there are a whole army of grandmothers out there trading copyrighted sewing machine embroidery patterns by e-mail? Disney has in fact busted a few of them from time to time.

My ex-mother-in law collected 500+ 3 1/2" floppies full of designs before we bought her a CD burner. No-one has enough grandhildren to use that many designs!

Re:

[Snowmit (704081)]

I'm about to get myself thoroughly modded -1 Offtopic but this is the coolest craziest thing I've read all day.

I *love* that there is a secret underground network of grandmothers sharing embroidery patterns on the Internet.

Re:Sexist comment

[everphilski (877346)]

I was 21 when my first son was born, my mom was 42 at the time, and it was her first grandchild.

Like you said, more than enough time to finish college (although I'm still working on the PhD, 4 years later). And, IMO, there's something for having the kids while you are young and still have the energy. Just an observation.

LimeWire?

[towelie-ban (1234530)]

As a recent college grad (read: pirate), I'm amazed by the percentage of people still using crap like LimeWire and eMule. I would've guessed most people have evolved to uTorrent at this point. But, when you need to download a copy of "Achy Breaky Heart", I guess LimeWire is, sadly, your best option.

Re:

[Digi-John (692918)]

The best thing about living on campus is the possibility of having a nice big Direct Connect network, not that *my* school ever had one, oh no, nor did it rank #8 in the MPAA's top pirate schools of 2007...

Re:LimeWire?

[mattpointblank (936343)]

"Pirate schools"?! Do you go to HAAAAARRRRRRRRvard?

Re:

[Omestes (471991)]

What a coincidence, my school didn't do DC++ either, and we didn't have permission from IT to do so as long as it was limited to invitation only. Said non-existent IT staff also didn't promise to give advance warning to the imaginary users of said non-existent DC++ network if the RIAA came whining about imaginary violations.

This non-existent network only got threatened with non-existent death when some imaginary asshole decided kiddy porn was cool. This hypothetical school, though, let the non-existent me

Re:LimeWire?

[sakdoctor (1087155)]

I always thought gnutella was crap, but I totally disagree with your labelling of emule. Emule is fantastic for obscure content, and content that is too old to be seeded on any torrent.

Also TFA mentions the emule network as edonkey, ignoring the distributed kad network which is an opensource triumph, that further helps to locate rare content.

Re:

[MrNaz (730548)]

Thirded.

Furthermore, I can't see any useful comparison between bittorrent and sharing apps like LimeWire and eMule. Torrents are for specific content targets, sharing bandwidth between peers for what people *are getting now*, while traditional P2P apps create what could be described as a communal library of what people *already have*.

The two P2P models are totally incomparable, and other than the fact that they both evoke "It gets used to pirate our hard forged artwork!" cries, they have nothing in common.

Re:

[robot_love (1089921)]

Fourthed. It's like having a library full of all the world's media at your fingertips. Any book. Any song. Any movie. Anything, from anywhen. It's there. A couple of years ago I found old BBC episodes of "The Tripods". Totally camp. Aired in the '80's!!

I didn't download anything, and I never have, however. Because that's wrong and will destroy civilization as we know it.

Re:

[Chris Mattern (191822)]

eMule is not bad; I like it a bunch. Having a searchable database of what's available is nice. It's slow, but that's OK; I'm willing to let it take a few days. For BitTorrent, I use Deluge, which is good if you're only going to be using other people's torrents.

Re:

[Yetihehe (971185)]

And it's the best client for linux (not counting utorrent on wine).

Re:LimeWire?

[cdrudge (68377)]

But, when you need to download a copy of "Achy Breaky Heart", I guess LimeWire is, sadly, your best option.

...if you can't use Google [google.com].

Re:eMule

[zegota (1105649)]

I've never been able to find solutions manuals, reliably, anywhere other than on eMule.

Re:

[SharpFang (651121)]

It's all about networks.
Many (most?) users have clients for all networks.

Bittorrent - you want one particular thing. It may be common or exotic, but you're pretty sure you know what you're looking for. (search - good. scope - very good. browsing - sucks. speed - directly proportional to popularity)

Edonkey - you search uncommon, rare, exotic stuff, or 'all of' certain domain, say a few thousands Stepmania songs.
(search - very good. scope - enormous. browsing - poor. speed - slow)

Direct Connect - you browse f

Re:

[hcmtnbiker (925661)]

To be fair eMule is a very decent client. And the KAD network is one of the best DHTs. The KAD and becoming deprecated ed2k networks are still huge, if you cant find something anywhere else, you can likely find it there.

My qustion is how can more then 1% of people still be using kaZaa? The client isn't very good, the network has gone to shit, not to mention the add support and unwanted software when you install it. Sure there's K-lite and K++ but i think that most people don't use the hacked versions.

Re:

[NMerriam (15122)]

Like others, I'm baffled at your dismissal of the eDonkey/Kad network. There is none better for finding old or slightly obscure material. Torrents are great for brand new material like a TV show the same day it's broadcast, but finding episodes of some 1960s TV show that was never released on DVD is pretty much impossible unless you know of a dedicated repository to that type of material on some network.

Limewire ...

[BoredAtWorkWhatElse (936972)]

Well now we know that 36.40% of the polled PCs are infected with a real ecosystem of viruses.

Re:Limewire ...

[SoupGuru (723634)]

Time to burn the latest AV tools to a boot CD and start making some house calls. Where do we get this list from?

Whatever Happened to Google?

[SeeSp0tRun (1270464)]

For one, these p2p clients tend to be breeding grounds for bad things. Aside from the RIAA and everything going on with the music industry as it is, the clients themselves are (if i am not mistaken) data miners, resource whores, and virus huggers (not to be confused with tree huggers).

Google (for me anyway) has been far more useful:
-inurl:htm -inurl:html intitle:"index of" mp3 "Your Title Here"

There are many more search parameters you could use, but that does the trick.

uTorrent has made huge gains

[by Anonymous Coward]

The huge gains are going to be in RIAA lawsuits. Do your part to keep uTorrent under he radar - install limewire today.

Gnutella? really?

[Hatta (162192)]

I'm amazed anyone is still using the Gnutella network. Have there been any improvements to it recently? Last I used it, probably 5 years ago, it was awfully slow. Both in searching and downloading, even edonkey was faster. Plus, it didn't seem useful for much other than individual mp3s. Again, on edonkey you could still find rars of full albums.

Of course, private trackers that focus on a certain niche of content (full albums, classic games, textbooks, etc) with quality control and ratios to ensure seeding are far and away the best. There's not a P2P app anywhere that can compare with what Oink offered. But torrents seem really underrepresented on this list. Limewire is on 36% of PCs surveyed, but only 28% of PCs surveyed had any bittorrent client at all? What gives?

Re:Gnutella? really?

[Digi-John (692918)]

I still use gnutella because I can *generally* find a specific mp3 within a few minutes. That's what it's good for, an impulse downloading of a reasonably popular song.

Re:

[trybywrench (584843)]

Have there been any improvements to it recently? Last I used it, probably 5 years ago...

my guess would be yes

Re:Gnutella? really?

[explosivejared (1186049)]

I am a high schooler still, and as such am in contact with many high schoolers. Most of the kids that file share simply don't want to bother understanding the simple concepts of a client versus a tracker. The fact that you can't just open a torrent client window and automatically start downloading is a real turn off. It's sort of crazy that kids will go out of their way to find new cgi proxies daily to circumvent filters at school, but don't have the will to do a web search for a torrent and use a client to download them.

There is no real difference in simplicity between limewire and torrent, but there is a major one in perception. Kids see these boxes with "ports" that they have to configure and test, and they just lose all interest interpreting that there is some deep knowledge of computers required. They completely disregard the fact that limewire is less safe and that the community surrounding torrent is much more cooperative and helpful. It's really weird. I can't explain it other than kids are only interested in "cool" stuff that requires no effort, or what they perceive to be no effort.

If you can't parse it already, I'll just go ahead and say that, yes I do have trouble relating to my peers sometimes.

Re:

[Colonel Korn (1258968)]

The same is true of people of any age. I am surprised, though, that Limewire is this popular with any group. It stopped being competitively acceptable in late 2000.

non-representative sample FTL

[poot_rootbeer (188613)]

FTS: "'Big announcements' are often backed up by a dubiously small data set or not backed up at all."

In this case, the data set is very large, but still of dubious relevance.

The data was collected from the 1.6 million computers by an anti-malware software product I've never heard of, using techniques that would get it itself labeled malware by more reputable anti-malware products. A product that rates only 3 out of 5 stars at Download.com. From a company that rolled over when Gator sued them for calling their spyware "spyware".

Unless there is data to support the assumption that the rubes who blindly install and run PC Pitstop software on their Windows boxes are a representative sampling of the computer user community as a whole, I don't see how this announcement contains any meaningful findings at all.

Re:

[Colonel Korn (1258968)]

I agree - virtually no knowledgeable users would have been surveyed by this quasi-spyware. Anything that focuses attention on the bad software and keeps it off of torrents is a good thing, though.

Re:

[danielsfca2 (696792)]

rubes who blindly install and run PC Pitstop software on their Windows boxes are a representative sampling of the computer user community as a whole,

But "rubes" is exactly how i'd generalize the general populace. How is this not an accurate representative sample, then?

Keep in mind that when we speak about the Average Person, we're talking about people with little-to-no understanding of ANYTHING. They just do what they're told and don't ask questions.

About Those Challenges

[Nom du Keyboard (633989)]

Meanwhile, uTorrent has made huge gains during this period soaring into second place and posing a genuine challenge to LimeWire.

I would say more accurately that it poses a major challenge to the RIAA/MPAA then to LimeWire, which is hardly going to suffer from the success of another P2P client/network.

Easy explanation of Limrewire numbers

[OldHorton (198621)]

PCPitstop.com recorded this information by offereing free malware scans. The very first lines at their web site are "Is your PC acting sluggish? Are strange windows inexplicably popping up on your screen?" If you have Limewire installed you probably fit that category dead on. Of course they're going to use their free services to try and remedy it. People with uTorrent don't necessarily have that problem so no point to going there.. besides they already run anti-malware apps they got via torrents anyway.

Those 1.6million PCs are only those that suffered problems that wanted that free scan. It basically just tells me that 17.8% of all PCs with problems had Limewire installed.

The Best News

[Nom du Keyboard (633989)]

The best news is to find out that your own P2P app isn't even listed. That might put you below the litigation radar threshold.

Sorted by Network

[mzs (595629)]

Sept-07:

40.5% Gnutella
28.5% Bittorent
04.6% Ares
04.0% eDonkey
01.5% FastTrack
00.9% Pando

The first rule of Usenet is,

[kEnder242 (262421)]

Dont talk about Usenet...

Maybe the story is an advertisement.

[Futurepower(R) (558542)]

"The Headline is Garbage"

Yes, and maybe the story is an advertisement. It would be much better if Slashdot editors provided a statement with every story that no one at their company took money to post the story.

I looked at the Limewire web site [limewire.com] and saw what I think is an attempt at manipulation of people who don't have enough technical knowledge to evaluate the usefulness of their product.

Anyhow, the Azureus web site [sourceforge.net] says it is "the most popular bittorrent client". Azureus is open source and free,

Wait, there's more!

[Futurepower(R) (558542)]

As they say on late-night infomercials, "There's more!"

From the Limewire web site about "LimeWire Extended PRO" [limewire.com]: "New! Extend your PRO benefits! Get PRO for 1 year for only $34.95! Best Value"

Quotes:

"LimeWire PRO get turbo-charged" The free version is not "turbo-charged"? What is turbo-charged, in the case of a bittorrent client? Instead of blowing air, they blow compressed air?

"Fastest P2P downloads on the planet"

"Downloads from multiple hosts" What? What does that mean? That it's a bitto

Re:

[freemywrld (821105)]

You are comparing apples and oranges. Limewire isn't a bittorrent client. Limewire can be the most widely used P2P client in use, and Azureus can still be the most widely used by those who are downloading torrents.

Re:

[blueg3 (192743)]

LimeWire is certainly the most-often-seen P2P client in police investigations.

Re:

[snoyberg (787126)]

You're new here, aren't you?

And you must be new here.

Re:

[poetmatt (793785)]

I'd guess torrents since they usually have a healthy amounts of reviews on whatever the subject matter is being hosted, therefore you can usually read up and see "OMFG YOU ASS THIS IS A VIRUS" or "nice torrent", especially on piratebay there are pages of comments.

You will of course see RIAA posting like "omg this is bogus" sometimes too. Always a small level of risk.

Re:

[Hatta (162192)]

An open source client is less likely to contain spyware/malware than a proprietary one. First, because the code is open anyone can check to see whether it's doing anything naughty. Second, because they're not developed for profit there's less motivation to steal your info for sale to whoever.

Re:

[UncleTogie (1004853)]

Which one runs the lowest risk of being a trojan, spyware, or otherwise malware? Limewire is popular. That's great. Do I want to install it?

While corelation != causation, QUITE a number of malware-infected PCs through the shop here have Limewire installed...

...anecdotally speaking, o' course...

Re:

[aywwts4 (610966)]

I'm saying the foundation of the poisoning would be that the clients would be purposefully trying to successfully identify themselves as azureus or utorrent. If they identified themselves as 'Crappy Selfish Client .23b' Its already a completely fixed problem. Clients even have filters in them to try and find when a client is trying to fake their identity. But there has to be a way to fake is successfully, without that then yes, there would be no harm done.