
Instant.io – Streaming file transfer over WebTorrent - MrJagil
https://instant.io/#c6642b73cf82dc52b5d538fabfdf9c8e3d9e850f
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Beldur
Does it mean that whenever I click on a link I must be afraid that my computer
will start to participate in a filesharing network?

What if a website uses the technology to spread copyrighted material in the
background without me knowing about it? Maybe the website had a simple XSS
hole that allowed an attacker to do it?

So later I will get a fine for spreading copyrighted material and I don't even
know where it came from?

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Drakim
This isn't actually a new problem though!

After all, what if the JavaScript on a website makes an AJAX request to fetch
illegal content and store it in your HTML5 LocalStorage?

Bam, you are now a criminal in possession of illegal content of some sort.

~~~
Beldur
In Germany at least, downloading is not a big problem as is sharing and
uploading.

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ascagnel_
In the US, copyright is also more about sharing/uploading than downloading (if
I remember right, all of the RIAA lawsuits were for uploading). The bigger
issue is if the exploit has you download something that's illegal to possess
(eg: illegal pornography).

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uptown
Here's a sample rights-free hash link if anyone wants to test the download:

[https://instant.io/#1cee1045f0ceebcc56bc416da566d5006b58e156](https://instant.io/#1cee1045f0ceebcc56bc416da566d5006b58e156)

Photo Source: [https://unsplash.com/nelly](https://unsplash.com/nelly)

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higherpurpose
Am I wrong to assume that "webtorrent" is a "hack" of current technology such
as WebRTC to make torrents work over the web, and that it would be much better
to define a _native_ protocol for torrents/P2P file sharing on the web?

Unfortunately now that the W3C has made the MPAA a member of its board, I
assume it will oppose any and all such protocols with both hands.

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bobajeff
Actually, the W3C is working on a TCP and UDP Socket API which should allow
for any kind of data transfer protocol over the web.

[http://www.w3.org/2012/sysapps/tcp-udp-
sockets/](http://www.w3.org/2012/sysapps/tcp-udp-sockets/)

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shurcooL
Whoa, that is so cool, I can't wait.

I know it's possible in theory to have UDP-like sockets via WebRTC data
channels today, but it's really hard.

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sktrdie
Webtorrent is such a cool project. Kudos to Feross for the hard work.

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MrJagil
Sourced form this comment:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=9568939&goto=item%3Fid...](https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=9568939&goto=item%3Fid%3D9568778)

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towelguy
So if I close my browser I have to start downloading all over?

The reason I like torrents over regular downloads is that I can pause and
resume at any point. In the browser it's not always reliable.

~~~
comex
In theory, there are plenty of ways for browsers to store data locally. I
can't tell if this site does that, because I can't seem to get it to work.

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maljx
I hope I didn't just seed some copyrighted material. Works for me on chrome.
:)

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slackstation
Is it just me or are these pages not doing anything? I'm looking in the App
Cache, Session Storage and I'm not seeing anything. There doesn't seem to be
any activity. The page just sits there.

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feross
WebRTC doesn't have a tab in the web inspector yet. :) Try chrome://webrtc-
internals/

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BrandiATMuhkuh
I believe Wikipedia should use this technology to store images and movies on
the client side. That would save them a lot of data storage money.

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toufka
Poor little snitch - 'Firefox is trying to connect to _.__.__.__ over port
____.'

Nightmare for connection monitoring - just like bittorrent.

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TimJRobinson
I tried this a few days ago in latest chrome and it didn't work for me. Is it
working for anyone else?

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M4v3R
It does work for me on both latest Chrome and latest Firefox on OS X. On the
latter video streaming is not supported though.

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daddykotex
Streaming is not supported on Firefox :(

