VentureBeat

Updated

Sharing of movies and hordes of photos doesn’t work too well by email, or even by uploading to the Web, which relies on a central server.

That’s why San Francisco’s BitTorrent has done so well, by becoming a so-called “peer-to-peer” protocol for publishers to use in transmitting large files. It works by relying on various computers that are hooked up to the Internet — and Om Malik has just published a good piece about the latest start-ups to take on BitTorrent.

Among them are New York’s Pando, which raised $4 million a year and a half ago from two New York investors. It is aiming to simplify the technology offered by BitTorrent, which it says normal people don’t understand how to use. Pando’s application seems beguilingly simple. You just drag and drop files into a “package,” and send it in an email. The recipient gets the email, and clicks on a link (which is really a directory showing where to find the package of files), and just downloads everything.

And there’s Perenety of Sunnyvale, which is not relying on email. Rather, it is wants to connect PC’s directly, updating your computer whenever your friend ads new content on their end. From Om’s description, it seems a bit quirky, but the site is not public yet, so too early to tell. No word on any funding, either. (Update: A reader forwards a link, showing Vincent Worms, of Partech, is on the board, and thus there’s a 99 percent chance he has invested.)

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