Late last year, Ares abandoned the Gnutella protocol to begin experimentation with its own network. Network hopping is nothing new in the P2P world, as popular networks such as WinMX, Shareaza and FileNavigator have witnessed varying levels of success by implementing their own protocols.

The reasons for various clients switching networks have remained fairly constant. Typically, the client resides on a dying network. In order for the program to survive, it needs either piggy-back another network, or develop its own community.

In WinMX's and FileNavigator's case, both were originally OpenNap clients. However, the RIAA made short work of this open source Napster alternative, leaving these clients with virtually no network to connect to. In both situations, these clients have found success by initiating their own communities.

Similarly to OpenNap, Gnutella is facing a crisis not seen since the days after Napster fell. As of 7AM EST, Gnutella's population was only 53,000, the lowest is been since late 2000. There are many reason for the declining population, including a severe internal division with the current Gnutella2 conflict and the abundance of alternative P2P networks that significantly outperform this veteran network.

So it comes as little surprise that we see Ares slowly but surely developing into a success story. At the same time we took in the Gnutella stats, Aeres had over 2,000 users. Although this may seem small, even the largest networks started with only a handful of users. With an already impressive userbase assisting in the transition, a well-performing decentralized network, and a wide variety of files, Ares stands to become an important community in the P2P world.

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P2P Clients :: Ares Galaxy

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