The Other Side of BitTorrent

ByteWoopy wrote to mention a Wired article giving more coverage to the upside of BitTorrent. From the article: "Film and television executives no doubt wish the increasingly popular BitTorrent peer-to-peer file-sharing system never saw the light of day. Thousands of consumers are using the software to download hundreds of movies and hours upon hours of television programming. But one industry's threat is another's opportunity. There's an upside to allowing viewers to transfer copyright material content over BitTorrent. As noted by Japanese entrepreneur Joi Ito, fans of the Japanese anime series Naruto regularly post translated episodes of the show to BitTorrent, which attracts more fans to the series. The relatively obscure program has spawned a global following in online forums, internet relay chat channels and fan sites."

Comments

Has the Industry ever lost a cent to BT?

[Nom du Keyboard]

I wonder to this day if the **AA industry has ever lost a cent to BT. Can they prove that 'x' downloads equates to 'y' lost sales amounting to 'z' dollars?

(I know in their skewed logic x always = y and z > $1e9, but I don't buy it.)

How often have you seen some person out there saying, I saved $$$'s this year by downloading instead of buying records/movies/games/whatever? I wouldn't believe them if I did because if true, they should be in jail instead of on TV.

I mean, the RIAA claims losses from songs you can't even buy any more since they lump every MP3 download into their lost sales numbers.

I may be alone in believing that the record companies and movie companies have yet to lose any money to filesharing since the items would not have been bought otherwise, but there's at least one of me here.