[p2p-hackers] P2P In 15 Lines of Code

[Hal Finney]

Ian Clarke writes:
> "The program creates a small-world network, which might be used by a  
> group of friends or business associates to share files."
>
> I am wondering whether this is really a small-world network in the  
> Kleinberg sense  
> (http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/kleinberg00smallworld.html), in which case  
> it would be impressive and should be very scalable.

I think you're right, Ed Felten used the wrong phrase in describing this.
Small-world networks have a fractal-like connection topology and scale
very well.  The term goes back at least to 1998.

What Felten made was a network of the kind which is designed to be used
by a small circle of friends, not part of a larger network.  WASTE is
probably the best known example of this kind of network.

I'm not sure what the right name is for these.  Sometimes they are
called darknets but I think that term may be more generic, for any kind
of network which is designed to resist surveillance.

Hal Finney