Grouper.com

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TaranT
Joined: Wed May 16, 2001 11:20 pm
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Grouper.com

Post by TaranT » Thu Nov 24, 2005 3:55 am

I have not participated in this at all so I can't offer any comment. Looks interesting.

Grouper - Share your files privately...
Grouper was born out of the ongoing frustration of trying to share media with our friends. We had all amassed 1,000s of files on our computers (photos, video clips, music, animated shorts, shareware, etc), yet when it came to sharing, the technology sucked. Emails would get blocked because files were too big. Burning discs for our friends took hours and costs too much over time. Uploading lots of files to sites was painful and they would restrict how these files could be used by friends. We knew there had to be a better way to share with people we know, discover what our friends like and experience it all together.

Grouper is our answer. We made Grouper easy enough for the less inclined, yet robust enough for you, since all of us have friends that span the tech gamut. Start sharing your files, lending your music and connecting about it.
From the PC Magazine review:
It's a peer-to-peer app. But not the kind you're thinking of. Grouper isn't like Kazaa or Morpheus, a way of sharing files...with millions of strangers across the Internet. It's a way of sharing private files with people you know—your friends, family, and colleagues. Rather than tapping into one, enormous, worldwide peer-to-peer network, it sets up small, private P2P networks, including only the people you tell it to include. With no more than a few clicks of the mouse, you and up to 29 buddies can instantly share most any file from machine to machine,...

To protect your private data, Grouper uses 256-bit AES and SSL encryption to hide all browsing, file-sharing, and chatting from anyone outside the group. Plus, an "Activity" window notifies you each time someone accesses your shared folder. You'll know if they stream a song. You'll know if they download a file. You'll even know if they simply browse your folder.

Though most files can be transferred with ease, you can't actually download a recognized MP3 or WMA file from a remote machine. For legal reasons, the company doesn't want you trading copyrighted material. (Remember the original Napster and its fate? So do Grouper's founders, who started the Spinner online audio service that AOL acquired.) But you can stream MP3 and WMA files from machine to machine (via a built-in audio player). And though the company frowns on such practices, you can work around the download restriction by giving a digital song a different file extension, or slipping it into a zip file.

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DeinReich
Joined: Sun Mar 27, 2005 10:40 am
Location: College
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Post by DeinReich » Thu Nov 24, 2005 8:52 am

Erm... I dont think that there is any use for that site here.
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Kai Stromler
Joined: Fri Jul 12, 2002 9:35 am
Location: back in the USSA
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Post by Kai Stromler » Thu Nov 24, 2005 9:07 am

SOAD2k8 wrote:Erm... I dont think that there is any use for that site here.
Except for the obvious one of greatly lowering the barriers to MEP coordination. You want to do a MEP, but you don't have sufficient webspace to host the common files and aren't crazy about setting up a FTP site on your comp to take tracks and betas, whether for technical or other reasons. So you set up a temporary Grouper network for all participants, and now you all have secure access to everyone else's project components. You can all see what everyone's working on, provide source if you've got something that someone else wants to use, but that won't apply to your track. A single studio or group of otherwise unaffiliated friends could also use this kind of network on a more permanent basis to share betas around and bring videos that other people in the group might be interested in to everyone's attention.

These are just the first two that I could think of; the idea is similar to the share server that I used to run in college to let other people sample the music and anime that I was currently high on, and that others used for collab projects, except that the app allows/forces you to define your own network based on exterior social stuctures. There are definitely other applications of possible AMV use that I just haven't thought of yet.

--K
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rubyeye
Joined: Wed Sep 05, 2001 1:45 pm
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Post by rubyeye » Thu Nov 24, 2005 9:20 am

Interesting...it might be something to use for beta testing of videos for a selection of "friends" to preview before posting your final copy on the org.

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Keeper of Hellfire
Joined: Sun Jan 09, 2005 6:13 am
Location: Germany
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Post by Keeper of Hellfire » Thu Nov 24, 2005 10:04 am

The bad is - it runs (at the moment) only on Win2K and WinXP, and it installs WMP9, if you don't have it. And the availability of the files depends on if the group members have their comps running.

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DeinReich
Joined: Sun Mar 27, 2005 10:40 am
Location: College
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Post by DeinReich » Thu Nov 24, 2005 11:28 am

Kai Stromler wrote:
SOAD2k8 wrote:Erm... I dont think that there is any use for that site here.
Except for the obvious one of greatly lowering the barriers to MEP coordination. You want to do a MEP, but you don't have sufficient webspace to host the common files and aren't crazy about setting up a FTP site on your comp to take tracks and betas, whether for technical or other reasons. So you set up a temporary Grouper network for all participants, and now you all have secure access to everyone else's project components. You can all see what everyone's working on, provide source if you've got something that someone else wants to use, but that won't apply to your track. A single studio or group of otherwise unaffiliated friends could also use this kind of network on a more permanent basis to share betas around and bring videos that other people in the group might be interested in to everyone's attention.

These are just the first two that I could think of; the idea is similar to the share server that I used to run in college to let other people sample the music and anime that I was currently high on, and that others used for collab projects, except that the app allows/forces you to define your own network based on exterior social stuctures. There are definitely other applications of possible AMV use that I just haven't thought of yet.

--K
hmm never really thought about it that way.
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TaranT
Joined: Wed May 16, 2001 11:20 pm
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Post by TaranT » Thu Nov 24, 2005 1:45 pm

Grouper seems like a cross between Kazaa and Livejournal. They're testing the fair-use doctrine that it's permissible to share media with friends, family, etc. And they're drawing the line at 30 for some reason although in practice the number of members will be smaller than that. It'll be interesting to see if the lawyers go after them and whether they would even have a case.

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mokulen22
Joined: Mon Jul 26, 2004 10:48 pm
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Post by mokulen22 » Thu Nov 24, 2005 2:31 pm

Sounds interesting, thanks for bring it to our attention, TaranT. :P

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BasharOfTheAges
Just zis guy, you know?
Joined: Tue Sep 14, 2004 11:32 pm
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Post by BasharOfTheAges » Fri Nov 25, 2005 9:51 am

TaranT wrote:Grouper seems like a cross between Kazaa and Livejournal. They're testing the fair-use doctrine that it's permissible to share media with friends, family, etc. And they're drawing the line at 30 for some reason although in practice the number of members will be smaller than that. It'll be interesting to see if the lawyers go after them and whether they would even have a case.
Without the burden of proof that they're sharing copyrighted material? I think they'd be limited to stings and such -- which would be fuled primarily by the bright few that would randomly give out invites to groups without actually knowing anything about the person.
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