Peer-to-peer networks are efficient tools for swapping songs, software, and maybe even research material. Unfortunately, they’re also great at spreading spam and spyware. But researchers at Cornell University are hoping to cut spam out of file-trading with a new program called Credence, which lets connected computers "gossip" to determine which files are real and which are junk.
The technology sounds great on paper, but it is unlikely to go over well with recording and movie studios: The antispam filter could root out the floods of fake song and movie files that the entertainment industry releases online to frustrate peer-to-peer pirates.
11 Responses to Taking the Spam Out of File Sharing
drvirago - September 4, 2011 at 12:55 pm
A friendly question: was the possibility of starting earlier ever discussed, so that you could have Labor Day off? We started August 22nd this year, and have Labor Day, as well as Veterans’ Day off — though the latter is on a Friday this year. We, too, have a Fall Break, but it’s only half a week, to balance the half a week that Thanksgiving gets (so thus adds up to the equivalent of a week-long break like Spring Break). On the other hand, we have a really freakin’ long fall semester — 16 weeks!!
tenured_radical - September 4, 2011 at 1:10 pm
Well, see, I missed the faculty meeting, so I don’t know. It’s a good question. But if past experience is any guide, there are probably many options that all seem unpalatable and are discussed in an incoherent way because no one ever discusses what principles a schedule might be guided by and all parties are antagonistic.
drvirago - September 4, 2011 at 1:17 pm
Alas, that sounds like the meetings we have, too, no matter the subject.
Katrina Gulliver - September 4, 2011 at 2:48 pm
I’ve wondered at the odd practice of a winter break only a couple weeks before Thanksgiving too. How would this play out in your state if you were on a quarter system?
goxewu - September 4, 2011 at 8:15 pm
Past experience is the best kind. Present experience is still going on, so it can’t be a guide. And future experience? Well…
susanda - September 5, 2011 at 1:17 am
Another thing that goes into this is the private/public difference. State institutions usually observe the major state holidays, and are required to do so by law. Private institutions can ignore the legal holidays. And note, in CT Good Friday is a state holiday. Discuss.
tenured_radical - September 5, 2011 at 8:15 am
Didn’t know that, Susanda, but it makes sense given the large numbers of Catholics in CT, and their influence in the city political (can we say it?) machines. But again, given that it is a very holy day in the church (and for high church Protestants) — why not, I say. And of course since the vast majority of faculty working at private institutions refuse to teach on Friday…….
physioprof - September 5, 2011 at 3:34 pm
Thatte’s the stupidest fucken thinge I’ve heard today! And I’ve already heard some stupid fucken shitte! BTW, I fail to see what this has to do with being in CT. I just Googled up the holiday schedule for a handful of other private universities in CT, and *all* of them have no classes today.
SWNC - September 6, 2011 at 3:15 pm
If it makes you feel any better, staff (that would be me) at our private college are also expected to work on Labor Day. A lot of staff wound up taking the day off anyway, b/c all of the K-12 schools and most of the daycares here were closed yesterday, so staff and faculty with young kids either had to take a vacation day or scramble to make childcare arrangements. Wheeee!
Marie M - September 12, 2011 at 2:26 pm
Here at a public university in Northeast Ohio, our faculty are unionized. And if someone dared to bring up the idea of holding classes on Labor Day, I’m pretty sure the Center for Working Class Studies faculty would go on strike. Conveniently forgetting that many individuals who are much closer to being called “working class” than the average tenured professor don’t have the luxury of paid holidays
Guest - September 13, 2011 at 8:55 am
I work with schools in a metro area that has the one of the highest concentrations of Arab-Americans in the U.S.; many teachers, staff, and students are also practicing Muslims. I was disgusted to learn that the district scheduled mandatory staff development for days on which Eid was likely to fall (for those not familiar, Eid isn’t attached to calendar dates and one doesn’t know exactly when it will happen until it is announced- but Ramadan is either 29 or 30 days, so it’s kind of one or the other). To put people in the position of having to choose between being ‘professional’ or observing their faith is incredibly disrespectful.
Also pretty gross that faculty would accept working on Labor Day- ch-ch-ch-changes, indeed.