I don't like the idea of points systems.

There are a lot of things in gnutella that could be improved to make it easier to get downloads. There are a lot of files out there, they are just hard to find, then hard to download.

BEFORE you even consider this plan you would have to have in place easily recoverable downloads (ie hashes and has-searches), otherwise all these people getting their downloads broken (how frustrating!) by people with higher points will then need to find the same file again, which usually you don't, you find one similar, but the same song for example, then download from scratch usually.

Anyway, the point I would like to make is I think once you have hashes and hash-searching widely implemented then you would be less often frustrated and cursing at 'freeloaders'.

Now, there are some other incorrect assumptions/assertuions I would like to clear up in the posts above.

Modems, just like cable modems, have a dedicated upload bandwidth. The bandwidth IS NOT SHARED between upload and download, so whether you share or not should not be an issue for a modem user.

I share like hell on my modem. I also browse like hell at the same time. Most users probably use less bandwidth than me browsing, and I share at the same time and download too, two songs at a time.

So give up this fantasy that modem users have a hard time getting any value or putting back any value to gnutella. The biggest limit of modem users is the time factor. But if you have time to download, you have time to upload.

Please, modem users, share. That is all we need to say, not "if you don't share you'll get a smack!" Then they WILL join fast-track, or better yet audio-galaxy.

Nos