notwithstanding my somewhat optimistic previous post - there are developments which should be (and obviously are) of real concern to the p2p community - if the bill currently being presented in the US to legalise attacks by RIAA on the computers of p2p users becomes law - and - microsoft gets their new palladium chip into all new computers (disallowing almost all mp3 type file sharing) - then - you have a genuinely vicious hardware and software attack on the gnutella network - it could even work

this would be an example of 'vulgar' capitalism at its most crass and greedy as well as representing an appaling attack on the very civil liberties that capitalism has made possible (if indeed not essential)

the real danger is that too few will realise just what is being planned untill its too late and like napster,- LW, shareaza, morpheus, bearshare etc just become fond memories of a short lived period when consumers had some power to influence immensely popwerful companies that basically couldn't care less about the people providing their 'income stream'