I really enjoyed this book, but I'm not sure that "peer-to-peer" necessarily focuses on the issues of security and authenticity upon which most of the book seemed concentrated. Indeed, an early contributor noted that what made Napster so nifty wasn't the peer-to-peer aspect, as the hybrid centralized list of peers and what they had available.
I would suspect that issues of self-publishing and collaboration go beyond the extremes of anonymity and methods of publishing despite potential government (or corporate) oppression that came to color the writings, at least as I read through them. Those things =are= important, but in focusing on those particular edges, we lose sight of the fact that current tools do not provide comfortable affordances to self-publishing, nor do current typical ISP relationships (no fixed IP for putting the home computer online).
Having said all of that, I also begin to wonder at the historical review. It was with a great start that I read Andy Orum's comments at the end where he writes: "When a revenue stream that information providers have counted on for over 2000 years threatens to dry up...." If, as I believe, Mr. Orum is referring to the concept of authorship, or modern concepts of intellectual property, he needs to drop an order of magnitude. Indeed, as Elizabeth Eisenstadt pointed out in her monumental "The Printing Press as an Agent of Change," the concept of authorship as we know it today is one innovation that appeared with "mass" printing.
On the other hand, the idea of control over ideas goes back as far back in human history as there are recorded ideas, such that it is neither notable that some people like to control access to information and others (Prometheus, to cite one early legendary example) work to change that. In that context, peer-to-peer, as it applies to intellectual freedom, is only the latest phase of an ongoing tao-ish part of human social behavior! That doesn't lessen it's importance, but perhaps might be useful in lessening the self-importance of some practitioners :-).
Still, a lovely book and an excellent introduction. It will take me months to think things out and explore the new software that the book introduces.
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