Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

The Uncertain Future of BitTorrent

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the standards-are-hard dept.

javipas writes "The people behind the popular BitTorrent tracker are working on a new version of the BitTorrent protocol that could become the successor to the current one, maintained by BitTorrent Inc. The company founded by Bram Cohen — original author of this protocol — now has decided to close the source for several new features in the BitTorrent protocol, and this "gives them too much power and influence". The new file format would be called .p2p, and would maintain backwards compatibility with current .torrent files."

7 of 340 comments (clear)

  1. What the Story Submission Should Have Said by VengefulCynic · · Score: 5, Informative

    The PirateBay team is currently developing on a new torrent protocol that they hope will be the next-generation successor to the current BitTorrent file. They say that they're concerned about continuing to use the current standard since BitTorrent has closed the source and hope to be able to create an open-source successor that maintains backward-compatibility with the current .torrent standard. The new standard, currently named .p2p is still in the development phase, but the initial release is planned for sometime early next year. Among the planned new features are responses to the increasing number of spammers and anti-piracy organizations who currently abuse the BitTorrent protocol. Seriously, would it have been that hard to have waited for a submission that was informative and grammatically correct?

  2. Re:Meanwhile, .FLV yawns, streams another video by dave420 · · Score: 3, Informative

    When you want random-access to a file, streaming doesn't work. That's why BitTorrent is so good. Also, it means you can publish your own content and not have to send it to everyone, just some folks. Once it's out there, if it's popular, other folks can download it from others, saving you thousands in bandwidth costs. FLV is just a video codec - it's being served over HTTP, which is ages-old and not particularly suited for mass-dissemination of data in a bandwidth-effective way, anyway. FLV might be good for low-quality videos, but it sure ain't good for gigs of ISOs, DVD-quality movies, albums, libraries of pictures, etc. It's all about using the right tool for the job, and FLV is great at streaming low-quality videos to users at great expense to the server.

  3. Re:Shooting themself in the foot by Ginger+Unicorn · · Score: 4, Informative

    except cohen bought utorrent and adopted it as the official client. a lot of windows users use utorrent, so that argument doesnt really stand.

    --
    (1.21 gigawatts) / (88 miles per hour) = 30 757 874 newtons
  4. Re:Au contraire contraire by click2005 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Manufacturers do not assume liability if their product is used to perform illegal activities.

    That has never stopped the media companies from going after software that enables copyright infringement.

    --
    I am a free slashdotter. I will not be modded, blogged, DRM'd, patented, podcasted or RFID'd. My life is my own.
  5. Re:Oh well, by deathy_epl+ccs · · Score: 5, Informative

    Hell, I think modern piracy would've taken longer to come to their attention if the dumbshits at Napster hadn't tried to make a business model out of it.

  6. And well before warez, there was pirate radio. by Ellis+D.+Tripp · · Score: 3, Informative

    Which similarly never killed anyone, although some of the more famous stations DID broadcast from ships in international waters...

    --
    Remember "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters"? Help make it a reality again! http://soylentnews.org
  7. Re:Oh well, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    The official client is now based on utorrent, which is written in C++, not Python.