P2P as a news tool

P2PNet: Inspired by a recording of the INDUCE hearing made by singer-songwriter Tom Barger, a coalition of American Net activists and technology firms wants to use p2p to make US congressional hearings visible - highly visible - in the cold, hard light of day.

"The US Congress offers webcasts of their hearings but these often evaporate into the ether unless citizens take the initiative to make live recordings," says Click to Vote founder John Parres, who's spearheading the launch of the non-partisan P2PCongress.org.

"The P2P Congress website helps coordinate those efforts and enables visitors to find audio and video copies of hearings via P2P networks," he states. "The P2P Congress website helps coordinate those efforts and enables visitors to find audio and video copies of hearings via P2P networks."

Supporting the project are Barger, Click to Vote, DeviantArt.com, Dmusic.com, Downhill Battle, the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation), FreeCulture.org, Gnutella.com, Grokster, Intent Media Works, Mashboxx, Morpheus, Stanford law professor Lawrence Lessig, Limewire, New Yorkers For Fair Use, Off The Peer, Public Knowledge, Savethe.org, TopP2P and TrustyFiles.

It's prohibitively expensive for individuals such as Barger to make videos available on their own, says the site, but, "P2P technology makes it possible for citizens to collectively solve this problem.

Cross-posted to Darknet.com.