The volume of multimedia content generated by consumers grows exponentially larger every day but the mechanisms for transferring this junk … er, valuable media has hardly improved since the turn of the century.

In this newsletter we’ve mentioned a couple of systems that deal with this problem. Today, however, we have one that has a broader reach in terms of transfer channels than the previous solutions we’ve looked at: The product is a Web application called Pando.

Pando supports the posting of downloadable video, audio and photos to Web sites; the transfer of files and folders via any e-mail or IM; and the downloading of large files using Windows or Mac.

Pando is described as a person-to-person (P2P) transfer system, but it is really a hybrid combining P2P with person to server to person (P2S2P) transfers to achieve a higher level of flexibility and availability of content.

The way Pando works is by the client software (available for Windows and Mac) describing the content to be transferred in a .pando file. Once the content is committed for transfer the recipient is sent the .pando file and the actual copying of the content with encryption by the client-side software to the Pando servers begins.

Once the recipient opens the .pando file, their Pando client begins transferring whatever data has been uploaded to the Pando server as well as data that can be transferred directly from the sender if their PC is online. The result is, theoretically, an improved throughput with secure data.

Pando appears to be making headway in a crowded market. According to Techcrunch by last October the company had “over 1.5 million downloads of their client software, and [was moving] up to 20TB of data per day between users.”

Pando is very well financed by the likes of Intel Capital and has developed an enthusiastic following. The performance of Pando is impressive and with a maximum file size of 50GB, with the highest level of paid account, there will be few situations where the system doesn’t meet the users’ needs.

Pando is available in four pricing tiers ranging from the free Personal license (which includes 1GB maximum transfer and up to 10 recipients) to the Publisher package (50GB transfers and up to 100 recipients) for $500 per year.

Mark Gibbs is a consultant, author, journalist, columnist and blogger.