Word of the Day

: May 22, 2019

peer-to-peer

adjective PEER-tuh-PEER

What It Means

: relating to, using, or being a network by which computers operated by individuals can share information and resources directly without relying on a dedicated central server

peer-to-peer in Context

"PayPal announced a new mobile peer-to-peer (P2P) payment platform called PayPal.me, which will allow users to create a personalized PayPal link and send it to peers for fast P2P transfers through PayPal." — Jaime Toplin and John Heggestuen, Business Insider, 1 Sep. 2015

"The figures come from a paper presented at Federal Reserve Bank of New York's fintech conference in March, which found 27 percent of peer-to-peer lending dollars had displaced traditional bank lending." — Steven Harras, The Austin (Texas) American-Statesman, 7 Apr. 2019

Did You Know?

The term peer-to-peer is a relatively recent addition to the English language, being little more than a half-century old. In its earliest known uses from the 1960s, it referred to something that occurs directly between human peers, people who are similar in age, grade, or status. It can still be found in this use in phrases such as "peer-to-peer tutoring." With the emergence of computer networking, peer-to-peer began to be used in reference to a system of computers that are able to communicate directly with one another without the mediation of a centralized server. Since the turn of the 21st century, peer-to-peer lending—the borrowing and lending of money through online services—has become increasingly common. You might also encounter peer-to-peer in the techy abbreviated form P2P, as in "P2P networking."