WebGC: browser-based gossiping

Abstract

The advent of browser-to-browser communication technologies like WebRTC has renewed interest in the peer-to-peer communication model. However, the available WebRTC code base still lacks important components at the basis of several peer-to-peer solutions. We tackle this problem by proposing WebGC, a library for gossip-based communication between web browsers. Due to their inherent scalability, gossip-based, or epidemic protocols constitute a key component of a large number of decentralized applications. WebGC thus represents an important step towards their wider spread.