torrent

Presenting: ?BitTorrent

If you use torrents frequently, then you'll remember December 7, 2006, as a day that will live on in infamy, a day that teh Interwebs broke in half--just a little. That was the day that BitTorrent, Bram Cohen's torrent progenitor, announced it had bought ?Torrent, the free-but-closed-source torrent client that showcased innovative features in a surprisingly lightweight app.

Now, two years since their last upgrade, BitTorrent has released its first version that combines ?Torrent code with its own open-source base, and ?Torrent has also come out with a minor-point upgrade. Confused? Read on.

Comcast capping bandwidth usage at about 90GB/month?

The battle for net neutrality might be in its infancy, and already we're seeing casualties. There have been murmurs that Comcast has been capping bandwidth usage on its all-you-can eat high-speed subscribers that have simply used more of their connection than Comcast is comfortable with, along with evidence the ISP has been monkeying with people's BitTorrent usage. Last week GameDaily BIZ got in touch with Charlie Douglas, a spokesperson for Comcast Corporation who confirmed that the company was indeed capping monthly downloads of its "excessive" users.

The actual ballpark figure Douglas gave GameDaily BIZ was "… Read more

TV Torrents: When 'piracy' is easier than legal purchase

NBC's recent withdraw from the iTunes store leaves the millions of users of Apple iPods without a legitimate way to purchase and watch NBC's content. Could this be the push that brings easy-to-use 'piracy' to the masses? This article discusses the issues, and then provides step-by-step instructions to setup a computer to automatically download any of hundreds of TV shows as soon as they are broadcast and put online.

With Apple's recent lovers's spat with NBC making the headlines, it seems like a good opportunity to examine the state of the online TV downloads, be they … Read more

Is Comcast's BitTorrent filtering violating the law?

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. I'm a cybersecurity Ph.D. student and take classes in the Indiana University law school, but this in no way makes me a legal expert. CaveatlLector.

Within the last few weeks, there have been a number of reports by Comcast customers claiming that their BitTorrent downloads and uploads have been capped--or worse, blocked. TorrentFreak recently reported that Comcast, a major U.S. cable company, is using an application from Sandvine to throttle such connections.

Many ISPs routinely filter the traffic on their networks. Many forbid customers from running e-mail servers or Web servers, … Read more

A bit of community

Torrent Swapper mashes a perfectly reasonable BitTorrent client with the idea of a burgeoning community. The result?

Nobody's quite sure yet.

Comcast denies monkeying with BitTorrent traffic

Comcast on Tuesday denied rumors that the company is filtering BitTorrent traffic running over its network.

BitTorrent is a peer-to-peer file sharing protocol used to distribute large data files such as video. The protocol has been used widely throughout the Internet to distribute pirated movies. And sites that use the protocol have been targeted by the movie industry to stop the illegal distribution of copyrighted video.

Broadband providers have also not been big fans of BitTorrent because the use of the peer-to-peer protocol can clog networks with huge files. The blog TorrentFreak claims that several Internet Service Providers have been &… Read more

BitLet: Get BitTorrent without the client

BitLet is a handy service for downloading BitTorrent files without the client. Just copy and paste the URL of the torrent you'd like to get, and BitLet will fire up a Java-based downloader that lets you choose where on your machine you'd like to save the file. The whole experience requires no software besides your browser and the latest version of Java.

If you feel like sharing something to friends using BitTorrent, you can use BitLet to generate a link that will start up using the service. This means whoever gets it will be able to download the … Read more

Video: New York's magical 'Harry Potter' bash

Yeah, yeah, I know. Harry Potter this, Harry Potter that, OMG-does-Harry-die, OMG-OMG-it's-on-BitTorrent... We're so ready to move on to the next cultural obsession from across the pond. Regardless, here's some video from Friday night of some of the people who showed up at the official New York book launch event hosted by Scholastic, the publisher that handles Harry Potter in the States.

The wizardly confab was held in New York City's shopper-friendly SoHo neighborhood, on a stretch of Mercer St. between Prince St. and Spring St. Conveniently, not only is Mercer St. right around the corner … Read more

BitTorrent: First Look video

BitTorrent is the original torrent-downloading application, but it's been five years since it kicked file-sharing into high gear. In this First Look video, we'll show you how it works. See if it has kept up with the times, or if it's living life in the slow lane.

Azureus: First Look

From XML torrent options to IP filters, firewall tests to UPnP plug-ins, Azureus leads the way in making the torrent experience as customizable as possible. It's got enough flexibility to appeal to advanced users, but does it make it too hard for beginners to get in on the torrent action?

Watch this First Look at Azureus video to find out, and let us know your favorite torrent client in the comments below.