Earthstation 5

FILE SHARE : P2P FORUMS : FILESHARE : P2P SOFTWARE : FILE SHARING

THE centre of the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank still looks like it has been hit by an earthquake, having been razed to the ground by the Israeli army last year in a bloody attempt to stop suicide bombings. So when an outfit called Earth Station 5 announced itself this year as a new peer-to-peer file-sharing service headquartered in the camp, internet downloaders and journalists paid attention. In the occupied Palestinian territories, says Steve Taylor, a spokesman, Earth Station 5 is safe from the music and film industries' campaign to stop people sharing content for free. When they complain, he told Salon.com, a website, “we tell them to go fuck off”.

For rebellious technophiles, Earth Station 5 seems a tantalising mix. Its management is made up of Jordanians, Palestinians, Russians and Israelis who “love and respect each other”, according to a press release. It thumbs its nose at big media firms and, in July, it pledged to mount an attack on the sex industry by giving ten internet sex channels away for nothing. It also claims to possess advanced technology that shields the identity of downloaders and so protects them from being sued.