In a deal aimed at reducing illegal Internet traffic in pirated films, Hollywood reached an agreement Tuesday with the creator of the popular file-sharing software BitTorrent.
The agreement requires 30-year-old software designer Bram Cohen to prevent his Web site, bittorrent.com, from locating pirated versions of popular movies, effectively frustrating people who search for illegal copies of films.
Hollywood, BitTorrent Reach Agreement – Yahoo! News
Cohen will remove links to pirated films from the bittorrent.com search engine. While this will certainly slow traffic in pirated films, it will hardly stop it. Although BitTorrent has enough legit use to stop it from shut down like Napster or Grokster, it certainly lacks the resources to wage a lenghty legal battle against the MPAA. I hope that Cohen’s decision here leads to a wider adoption of BitTorrent as a way to deliver properly licensed films.
Update: Seems Variety also thinks this move may signal the beginning of a better relationship between BitTorrent and the film inudustry.
technorati tags: bittorrent, mpaa