Cohen: Microsoft's attempts are simply "vaporware". Photograph: Kevin P Casey/AP
BitTorrent creator Bram Cohen, a man who is not usually short of a word or two, has spoken on his LiveJournal about Microsoft's Torrent-esque Avalanche protocol (reported here at the weekend).
Guess what? He's not a fan:
First of all, I'd like to clarify that Avalanche is vaporware. It isn't a product which you can use or test with, it's a bunch of proposed algorithms. There isn't even a fleshed out network protocol. The 'experiments' they've done are simulations.
He fisks the project fairly strongly, giving it several pieces of his mind and an angry waggle of the finger for good measure.
As you've probably figured out by now, I think that paper is complete garbage. Unfortunately it's actually one of the better academic papers on BitTorrent, because it makes some attempt, however feeble, to do an apples to apples comparison. I'd comment on academic papers more, but generally they're so bad that evaluating them does little more than go over epistemological problems with their methodology, and is honestly a waste of time.
Whether or not Cohen's position on Avalanche is correct, it's only a matter of time before somebody builds a BitTorrent-style system that does the job better. That's the way of the world. BitTorrent itself remains an inspirational idea, but still relatively difficult to implement - and why shouldn't it be, it's not a mass market consumer product.
I imagine there are technology wonks at hosts of companies all trying to replicate the BitTorrent effect - the real question is who's going to get there first?
