Greg
http://atlanta.cs.nchu.edu.tw/www/PAPER213.html
As demand for bandwidth on the Internet continues to rocket, it becomes increasingly important
to expand the existing infrastructure and to fairly allocate scarce network resources to improve
user welfare. This paper introduces a paradigm for accessing information on the Internet
whereby previously unused resources, those of the users themselves, play a central role in
allowing users to bypass network congestion under ``flash-crowd'' conditions, where a large
number of users from many networks retrieve the same set of files from a server over a short
period of time. Simulations demonstrate the feasibility of this approach: a user obtains speedy
access to files on servers under flash-crowd conditions in exchange for holding the file for a
short period of time, within which, she serves at most two other users.