File sharing software

Napster was an American proprietary peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing application primarily associated with digital audio file distribution. Founded by Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker, the platform launched on June 1, 1999. Audio shared on the service was typically encoded in the MP3 format. As the software became popular, the company encountered legal difficulties over copyright infringement. Napster shut down in 2001 following a series of lawsuits and subsequently filed for bankruptcy in June 2002.

peer-to-peer program for uploading and downloading files via the BitTorrent protocol

Kazaa Media Desktop ( ; once stylized as "KaZaA", but later usually written "Kazaa") was a peer-to-peer file sharing application using the FastTrack protocol licensed by Joltid Ltd. and operated as Kazaa by Sharman Networks. Kazaa was subsequently under license as a legal music subscription service by Atrinsic, Inc., which lasted until August 2012.

eDonkey2000 (nicknamed "ed2k") was a peer-to-peer file sharing application developed by US company MetaMachine (Jed McCaleb and Sam Yagan), using the Multisource File Transfer Protocol. It supported both the eDonkey2000 network and the Overnet network.

Soulseek is a peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing network and application. It is known mostly for the exchange of music.

WinMX (Windows Music Exchange) is a freeware peer-to-peer file sharing program authored in 2000 by Kevin Hearn (president of Frontcode Technologies) in Windsor, Ontario (Canada). According to one study, it was the number one source for online music in 2005 with an estimated 2.1 million users. Frontcode Technologies itself abandoned development of WinMX in September 2005, but developers brought the service back online within a few days by releasing patches. WinMX continues to be used by a community of enthusiasts.

BearShare was a peer-to-peer-file-sharing-application originally created by Free Peers, Inc. for Microsoft Windows and also a rebranded version of iMesh by MusicLab, LLC, tightly integrated with their music subscription service.

Microsoft file synchronization application, replaced by Microsoft OneDrive

SHAREit is a peer-to-peer file sharing, content streaming and gaming platform that supports online and offline sharing of files and contents. It allows users access to short format videos and a wide range of games, making it a multimedia entertainment app for users. It works on various smartphone platforms and Windows, allowing users to share files between devices directly. SHAREit was developed as part of Lenovo at its initial stage but was later spun off and operated under a separate Singapore based technology company Smart Technology Pte. Ltd.

MLDonkey is an open-source, multi-protocol, peer-to-peer file sharing application that runs as a back-end server application on many platforms. It can be controlled through a user interface provided by one of many separate front-ends, including a Web interface, telnet interface and over a dozen native client programs.

peer-to-peer file sharing client

Winny (also known as WinNY) is a Japanese peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing program developed by Isamu Kaneko, a research assistant at the University of Tokyo in 2002. Like Freenet, a user must add an encrypted node list in order to connect to other nodes on the network. Users choose three cluster words which symbolize their interests, and then Winny connects to other nodes which share these cluster words, downloading and storing encrypted data from cache of these neighbors in a distributed data store. If users want a particular file, they set up triggers (keywords), and Winny will download file

iMesh was a media and file sharing client that was available in nine languages. It used a proprietary, centralized, P2P network (IM2Net) operating on ports 80, 443 and 1863. iMesh was owned by American company iMesh, Inc., who maintained development centers around the world. , it was the third most popular music subscription service in the US.

OpenNap was an open-source Napster server, extending the Napster protocol to allow sharing of any media type, and adding the ability to link servers together. It became popular after the original Napster network was shut down in 2001, but was subject to similar pressures and its use soon declined. As of 2024, the WinMX client is the only one still in use.

WebTorrent is a peer-to-peer (P2P) streaming torrent client written in JavaScript that enables BitTorrent functionality directly within web browsers. Created by Feross Aboukhadijeh, the developer behind YouTube Instant, WebTorrent implements the BitTorrent protocol using WebRTC for peer-to-peer data transfer, allowing users to download and stream torrents without requiring traditional torrent client software.

name for a closed-source P2P application

Zapya and Kuai Ya () are peer-to-peer file sharing apps that allow users to transfer files between mobile devices without the need of an Internet connection. DewMobile, Inc. initially conceived Kuai Ya in Silicon Valley, California, USA to target the Chinese market in 2012. However, the demand for the app spread to neighboring countries such as Myanmar and Pakistan. When the international user base had grown to a reasonable size, DewMobile created a separate app known as Zapya to publish on Apple App Store and Google Play Store. While Kuai Ya and Zapya are similar to each other, they include d

Grokster Ltd. was a privately owned software company based in Nevis, West Indies that created the Grokster peer-to-peer file-sharing client in 2001 that used the FastTrack protocol. Grokster Ltd. was rendered extinct in late 2005 by the United States Supreme Court's decision in MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd. The court ruled against Grokster's peer-to-peer file sharing program for computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system, effectively forcing the company to cease operations.

eXeem was a peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing client using the BitTorrent protocol. eXeem was designed to replace the need for centralized trackers (servers which co-ordinate the transfer of metadata across a BitTorrent network). It largely failed to achieve this goal, and the project was canceled and eXeem's network was shut down by the end of 2005.

Nodezilla is a peer-to-peer network software written in C++ (core, aka Network Agent) and Java (GUI), and the GUI part is released under the GNU General Public License. It attempts to provide anonymity.

tool for exchanging contents in an anonymous and secure way over a friend-to-friend (F2F) network

Xunlei Limited () is a Chinese multinational technology company and an online service provider founded in 2003. The subsidiary of Xunlei Limited, Shenzhen Xunlei Networking Technologies, Co., Ltd. () was formerly known as Sandai Technologies (Shenzhen) Inc. and changed its name to Shenzhen Xunlei Networking Technologies, Co., Ltd. in May 2005. Its headquarters are in Nanshan District, Shenzhen.

QTRAX was an Israeli ad-supported digital music service that provides Downloads, Streaming and Radio via Mac and PC (and on Android and iOS from February 2015) that operated from 2008 to 2019. CEO Allan Klepfisz has stated that maintaining compensation for copyright holders while capturing part of the 95 percent marketshare that continues to download music illegally is the ambition behind Qtrax's current model.

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