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BSA Reacts to 'New' BitTorrent

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the usual-response dept.

An anonymous reader writes "It seems the Business Software Alliance isn't afraid of the new, tracker-less BitTorrent beta. While it concedes it will have to 'regroup', Tarun Sawney, BSA Asia anti-piracy director, said BitTorrent files could still be identified. 'BSA has traditionally sought the assistance of those hosting the actual pirated files. With or without the tracker sites, someone still hosts the infringing files.'"

8 of 326 comments (clear)

  1. Shared responsibility by arikb · · Score: 5, Interesting
    The question is, can they prove someone has the infringing file, if they only transmit PART of the file?

    What bittorrent is about is being able to send very small but verifiably authentic parts of the file - but is that enough for them to prove the person has the infringing content?

    My guess is that this is going to be made into law in the US in the near future - that if they get a single BitTorrent packet from you that belongs to an infringing file, it's enough to convict you of a crime and haul your behind in jail.

    -- Arik

    1. Re:Shared responsibility by syntap · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Let's say you get four friends and you each photocopy a fifth of the new Harry Potter book when it comes out, then stand outside and each sell your part for a dollar, in effect letting one person collect a fifth from each of you and get the whole book for $5 instead of the $12 or whatever the retail price will be.

      Is it your contention that by making only a part of a work available that you and your friends aren't infringing on a copyright? A "small but verifiably authentic" part of a file is content infringement just as much as a significant portion of a book would be.

  2. Arrrgh! by ale3ns · · Score: 5, Funny

    Shiver me timbers!We can just bury the torrent files and make a map!BSA's having the Davies now! Arrrgh!

  3. Re:Trackerless BitTorrent will never work by Alioth · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This whole trackerless bullshit (new BT beta as well as "new" distributed tracking in Azureus, was created for ONE purpose only - to distribute ILLEGAL content.


    No, that's not true. There are plenty of reasons for having a trackerless torrent system - it allows people who don't have access to a server that can provide a tracker (such as bloggers, or those with GeoCities sites) to host large files without waxing their bandwidth limits. Bloggers can now easily publish their home videos, for example. There are substantial non-infringing uses for trackerless torrents.

    --
    Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
  4. Blaiming Technology is fruitless. by jellomizer · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Sure you can blame BitTorrent for piracy problems you can probably even go and make it illegal to use in most countries. But it wont stop the piracy. They will make an other program that does it differently. Technology moves a lot faster then the legal system. If they really want to cut down on piracy they should figure out why people pirate materials.

    Things like Price. $100 and up is a lot of money for the average home user. Money that can be used for car payments, paying Rent/Mortgage. And paying $100 on a product you don't even know you really want or will use for only a couple of months can be a big waist. $25-$85 is the normal sweet spot for what people are willing to pay for most software.

    Things like convenience. Going to the store and finding the product that you need now. Or going online and filling out all your personal information and getting placed on the stupid mailing lists and then paying for the product. Or go and get a pirated version with no questions asked.

    Finally no real good reason to buy. When you buy the programs at the store you no longer get useful documentations like the good old day you just get the media and sales stuff on other programs the company makes or install directions in 1000 languages. I wish every program came with a manual the explains all the features in it, and a real paper manual not a PDF or html documentation where it is more difficult to flip to some page and find a cool feature.

    Stop blaiming people who make the tools that make our lives easier the companies to think about making our lives easer,

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  5. Re:Fry the BSA members in the Electric Chair by shani · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Most people either download music, and/or see nothing wrong with it. The "extreme" that you mention is the norm.

    It is not possible for every activity to result in somebody getting paid. Neither is this a reasonable goal.

    There were no "content producers" for most of human history, yet people made music, works of art, and so on. It will be different, neither better nor worse, if the world returns to a state where people are not paid for making digital recordings.

  6. Re:Two dilemmas by !the!bad!fish! · · Score: 5, Funny

    I haven't even got 4 friends, you insensitive clod.

    --
    Kids today are tyrants. They contradict their parent, gobble their food, and tyrannize their teachers. - Socrates 400 BC
  7. I smell fear by springMute · · Score: 5, Informative

    What are these guys smoking? The concept of the trackerless torrents wasn't created because of the need for protection of tracker servers, but for the ease of distribution... this is not about making it harder to identify trackers. The whole torrent system isn't about circumventing identification or about being completelly anonymous, and the BT author has mentioned this several times.