Twister: the development of a peer-to-peer microblogging platform. Issue 1 (2nd January 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Freitas, Miguel
• Is Part Of: International journal of parallel, emergent and distributed systems. Volume 31:Issue 1(2016)
• Page Start: 20
• Page End: 33
• Publication Date: 2016-01-02
• Subjects: peer-to-peer -- microblogging -- BitTorrent -- Bitcoin -- DHT; Parallel computers -- Periodicals; Electronic data processing -- Distributed processing -- Periodicals; Computer algorithms -- Periodicals; 004.35
• DOI: 10.1080/17445760.2015.1053808
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1744-5760

Abstract

Abstract : This paper proposes a new microblogging architecture based on peer-to-peer networks overlays. The proposed platform comprises three mostly independent overlay networks. The first provides distributed user registration and authentication and is based on the Bitcoin protocol. The second one is a Distributed Hash Table (DHT) overlay network providing key/value storage for user resources and tracker location for the third network. The last network is a collection of possibly disjoint 'swarms' of followers, based on the BitTorrent protocol, which can be used for efficient near-instant notification delivery to many users. By leveraging existing and proven technologies, twister provides a new microblogging platform offering security, scalability and privacy features. A built-in mechanism provides incentive for entities that contribute processing time to run the user registration network, rewarding such entities with the privilege of sending a single unsolicited ('promoted') message to the entire network. The number of unsolicited messages per day is defined in order to not upset users. Security and scalability assumptions have been confirmed in a real-world deployment.