What is the maidsafe-dht project ?
Basically it's a c++ implementation (lots of boost etc. easily adapted for API to other languages such as java, python, php etc.) which allows p2p or distributed system to be developed.
maidsafe-dht is a kademlia DHT implementation, with built in cryptographic libraries (courtesy of another open source project, cryptopp), a network layer (courtesy of another open source project udt) all wrapped in a nice clean API for people to connect with.
This allows a distributed hash table implementation of a network where you can easily store and find data of practically any type. The network has another API / modular approach and can allow udp, tcp etc. communications as well and importantly has built in NAT traversal methods such as UPnP and nat-pnp as well as a hole punching system very similar to ICE, but without the need for servers as all channels are made available via the dht itself.
This is a very valuable system and will allow p2p development to be carried out without huge up front costs for many people an businesses getting involved in p2p network.
Why give it away ?
The more appropriate question would be why do we think we can build test and maintain this part of the system better than hundreds or thousands of contributors and developers. The truth is we cannot and need to increase reliability, innovation in this area and frankly test it in many situations on many platforms (pc's mobile phones etc.).
It is like a car manufacturer giving away technical specs for a chassis, the car manufacturer may not sell or make money from the chassis, but does with what goes on the chassis. It makes sense all manufacturers use the same chassis for the same reason and they all work together to improve on it and allow small builders and individuals access to to the latest design advances and innovations in that arena.
So basically it simply makes a lot of sense and at no commercial cost.
Does that not encourage competition ?
Yes, and it should, the best products will succeed regardless. Competition is always a good thing and secrecy and not allowing access to information is perhaps not a great business model these days (thank goodness).
This is the first gift to the world maidsafe has made and already it is finding use in some companies, we expect a lot more soon and we know perpetual data will be a better product for it.
Will perpetual data ever be open source ?
In a word, yes and so it should. After launch we will identify revenue streams for maidsafe to continue to innovate. The focus of these revenue streams will be that which allow us to open source the product, although we may have to protect patents whilst doing so for a while (we hope not too long as if we stifle any innovation we will not be doing the right thing, and that's not acceptable for this project. We realise patents and open source in many ways is oil and water, but we also realise that there is always a correct answer to most problems or ssues such as this.
What revenue streams will exist in PD ?
We do not really know at this point, we may introduce a flat rate advertising model (which may be very different from traditional advertising), disk space selling, brokering disc sales between customers and many more. we do not want to pin any hopes on any particular stream just yet.
Can I help ?
Yes, sign up for the release (use anonymous mail if you can,we do not collect such data and we really do not want to know our customers, that way we cannot affect or harm your privacy).
We would love to hear comments and suggestions of how maidsafe should make revenues from such a network and do so as fairly as possible. This has to be done in a way that keeps everyone happy and satisfied we are doing something that is for the benefit of our vision of privacy, security and freedom for all.
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