File-swap software poses threat to Hollywood

The estimable Dawn C. Chmielewski takes an extended look at BitTorrent in a San Jose Mercury News article today headlined, "File-swap software poses threat to Hollywood." Naturally, there's no evidence presented that file-sharing software like BitTorrent does anything of the sort, and no one is quoted questioning Hollywood's assertions.

The article does, however, serve as a nice primer on using BitTorrent. Excerpts:

BitTorrent can transfer a feature-length film in about two hours -- a fraction of the 12 hours it typically takes with file-sharing services like Kazaa. What's more, the speed of the download actually increases with the number of people sharing a particular file.

``One of the scary things about BitTorrent is how effective it is at redistributing content,'' said Andrew Parker, chief technical officer at CacheLogic, a British firm that monitors Internet traffic.

Funny he said "scary" rather than "dazzling" or "spectacular."

Movies aren't the only large files that can be found on BitTorrent distribution Web sites like www.torrentreactor.net or www.suprnova.org. For instance, on Monday, Torrentreactor offered copies of the Doom 3 video game and Apple's OS X operating system for Macintosh computers as well as dozens of other software titles. ...

BitTorrent is not nearly as easy to use as Kazaa and other popular file-sharing programs. It lacks a built-in search feature, like that found on those services. So anyone seeking to download a copy of the new video game ``The Sims 2'' has to hunt for it by entering the name of the game and the word ``torrent'' on Google or another Internet search engine. The search result points the way to Web sites that distributes pirated video games, movies and software.

Once a download is completed, the network disconnects and disappears without a trace.