That's when Groove Networks released its eponymous application. While Napster was turning P2P into a synonym for "copyright violation" in the consumer arena, enterprise P2P applications revealed themselves as solutions looking for a problem.

As I first pointed out in a column last year, P2P doesn't scale well beyond the workgroup because managing resources on a central server is more beneficial for large organizations.

Mind you, that doesn't mean P2P can't be a useful tool for certain purposes. In fact, there's one criterion that, if present, makes a P2P product quite appropriate for a given problem: If you're trying to tie together members of a group where no one is in charge or everyone is a volunteer, then P2P is the way to go.

Because most businesses have a hierarchical structure, server-based applications facilitate collaboration just as well as peer-to-peer applications do, and also offer the advantages of server-based authorization and centralized backup. But when organizations of equal status have to share information (imagine different branches of the armed forces, or a pharmaceutical company working with researchers in hospitals) P2P technologies can help them share intellectual and technical resources.

Hopping off the P2P bandwagon

I've been talking about P2P as if everyone had the same understanding of the term, but it ain't necessarily so. Many products that try to hop on the P2P bandwagon aren't true peer-to-peer applications, in that they require a central server to mediate the peers' communication. Consider Napster, for instance, as well as SETI@home and most instant messaging applications. None of them allows clients to communicate directly with each other. A true P2P application, like the Gnutella file-sharing program, doesn't require a server to guide connected clients.

On the other hand, if you define P2P, as British consulting group Ovum does in Enterprise P2P: Flexibility and ROI as "any application or process that uses a distributed architecture and allows peers to provide and consume resources," you open up the definition to a multitude of sinners.

Given that loose definition, Frost & Sullivan's recent forecast that P2P components of centrally managed products may prove useful could be on the mark. Collaborative P2P environments like Groove can help supplement more traditional client/server collaboration products.

I'm glad developers are still working on P2P applications. Sometimes, as with instant messaging, it's useful to go under the radar of the corporate Information Services department. But I still don't see P2P providing a strategic advantage for most organizations any time soon. There are already client/server products that do what most P2P applications do, and that are more compatible with hierarchical corporate networks.

Do you think P2P will bomb in the enterprise or find a successful niche? TalkBack below, or e-mail us your thoughts. And, don't forget to vote in our P2P Quick Poll.