Bitzi was a website, operating from 2001 to 2013, where volunteers shared reports about any kind of digital file, with identifying metadata, commentary, and other ratings. Information contributed and rated by volunteers was compiled into the ''Bitpedia'' data set and reference work, described by Bitzi as a "digital media encyclopedia". The Bitpedia was published through the Bitzi website and web services under an open content license ( Creative Commons Attribution - Share Alike 2.0). Bitzi's standards and services have been adopted by a number of popular

peer-to-peer file sharing Peer-to-peer file sharing is the distribution and sharing of digital media using peer-to-peer (P2P) networking technology. P2P file sharing allows users to access media files such as books, music, movies, and games using a P2P software program th ...

systems. Bitzi was sponsored by a

metadata publishing Metadata publishing is the process of making metadata data elements available to external users, both people and machines using a formal review process and a commitment to change control processes. Metadata publishing is the foundation upon which a ...

company of the same name based in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

History

Founded by Gordon Mohr with

Mike Linksvayer Mike Linksvayer is an intellectual freedom and commons proponent, known as a technology entrepreneur, developer and activist from co-founding Bitzi and leadership of Creative Commons. He is GitHub's Policy Director. Biography Linksvayer holds ...

the Bitzi service launched in 2001. The Bitzi website shut down on 31 December 2013.

Technology

At Bitzi, files are identified by applying a strong

hash function A hash function is any function that can be used to map data of arbitrary size to fixed-size values. The values returned by a hash function are called ''hash values'', ''hash codes'', ''digests'', or simply ''hashes''. The values are usually ...

to their contents, which gives a distinct "

fingerprint A fingerprint is an impression left by the friction ridges of a human finger. The recovery of partial fingerprints from a crime scene is an important method of forensic science. Moisture and grease on a finger result in fingerprints on surfac ...

" for each

file File or filing may refer to: Mechanical tools and processes * File (tool), a tool used to ''remove'' fine amounts of material from a workpiece **Filing (metalworking), a material removal process in manufacturing ** Nail file, a tool used to gent ...

. Bitzi calls the combination of standard hash functions used by its system "bitprints." An open source downloadable tool, the ''Bitcollider'', calculates file hashes and extracts intrinsic metadata from common media file types to assist user contributions. Bitzi cross-references multiple Uniform Resource Identifiers (URIs) for files, primarily URIs used by peer-to-peer file-sharing networks and/or clients: * sha1:/ magnet: (

Gnutella Gnutella is a peer-to-peer network protocol. Founded in 2000, it was the first decentralized peer-to-peer network of its kind, leading to other, later networks adopting the model. In June 2005, Gnutella's population was 1.81 million compute ...

) * kzhash: (

Grokster 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 St ...

) * tree:tiger: (

DC++ DC++ is a free and open-source, peer-to-peer file-sharing client that can be used for connecting to the Direct Connect network or to the ADC protocol. It is developed primarily by Jacek Sieka, nicknamed arnetheduck. History and background DC+ ...

Shareaza Shareaza is a peer-to-peer file sharing client running under Microsoft Windows which supports the gnutella, Gnutella2 (G2), eDonkey, BitTorrent, FTP, HTTP and HTTPS network protocols and handles magnet links, ed2k links, and the now deprecat ...

). * ed2k: (

eDonkey2000 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. This client supports both the eDonkey2000 network and the ...

eMule eMule is a free peer-to-peer file sharing application for Microsoft Windows. Started in May 2002 as an alternative to eDonkey2000, eMule now connects to both the eDonkey network and the Kad network. The distinguishing features of eMule are ...

OverNet 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. This client supports both the eDonkey2000 network and the ...

) Other file-specific metadata is also collected, such as file size, alternate filenames,

audio Audio most commonly refers to sound, as it is transmitted in signal form. It may also refer to: Sound * Audio signal, an electrical representation of sound *Audio frequency, a frequency in the audio spectrum * Digital audio, representation of sou ...

video encoding In information theory, data compression, source coding, or bit-rate reduction is the process of encoding information using fewer bits than the original representation. Any particular compression is either lossy or lossless. Lossless compression ...

details, user ratings, and free-form comments or descriptions. Users can displace flawed information with new contributions. Data about specific files can also be programmatically retrieved via a

REST Rest or REST may refer to: Relief from activity * Sleep ** Bed rest * Kneeling * Lying (position) * Sitting * Squatting position Structural support * Structural support ** Rest (cue sports) ** Armrest ** Headrest ** Footrest Arts and enter ...

-style XML Web Services.

Relationship to peer-to-peer networks

Bitzi originated several popular standards in the peer-to-peer file sharing sphere, including the

Magnet URI scheme Magnet is a URI scheme that defines the format of magnet links, a de facto standard for identifying files (URN) by their content, via cryptographic hash value rather than by their location. Although magnet links can be used in a number of cont ...

and Tiger tree hashes. Many peer-to-peer file sharing programs, including

LimeWire LimeWire was a free peer-to-peer file sharing client for Windows, MacOS, Linux and Solaris. Created by Mark Gorton in 2000, it was most prominently a tool used for the download and distribution of pirated materials, particularly pirated mus ...

Frostwire FrostWire is a free and open-source BitTorrent client first released in September 2004, as a fork of LimeWire. It was initially very similar to LimeWire in appearance and functionality, but over time developers added more features, including sup ...

, older

Bearshare 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. History The pr ...

versions, and older

versions, offer an option to look up local files or network search results at Bitzi for more information about their contents or quality. As peer-to-peer file sharing networks are often plagued by mislabeled or corrupt files, Bitzi can sometimes provide additional confidence that a file is as expected, before a user begins a long download. In such a role, Bitzi serves to ameliorate some common attacks on peer-to-peer networks.

References

{{reflist

External links

* Th
bitzi.com
website * List o
applications using Bitzi

Bitcollider
project at SourceForge Knowledge markets