“Danger danger Will Robinson!!!”
“Golly Dr. Smith!”
welcome to nu’s p2p-zone mr smith
depending on your choice of networks it's usually not too hard to find a clean version for it, like fasttrack, gnutella etc. some are adfree to begin with, like soulseek and winmx and some are probably best avoided altogether.
my views on firewalls are pretty straightforward. i feel they don't mesh all that well with p2p's. the majority of help querries are about getting p2p's to work with them and i recommend an inexpensive 2nd pc just for peer-to-peer, running w/out a firewall, but with a good anti-virus/trojan remover to check the contents before burning to disc.
btw, for your browser there are several that come with real working pop-up stoppers and anti-hijack features that are all but immune from takeover even on the worst offending sites. opera is the one i use and it's much faster the i.e. as well. there are several other good ones too.
you might also consider joining a smaller, more private network like waste. you can be comfortable running it day and night without worrying if you're going to receive something unpleasant in the mail. of course it all depends on who else is in the group, but that's the point. unlike a normal p2p - as good as they are - with an invitation only network you can choose your peers.
- js.