BitTorrent.com Launches Video Store
Written by Ernesto on February 24, 2007BitTorrent Inc has released the final details of their long awaited video store. The store itself will go live this Monday, and will offer movie rentals at $2.99 – $3.99, and “download to own” TV shows and music videos for $1.99. The “BitTorrent Entertainment Network” will start off with 5000+ titles in their collection, including movies such as Superman Returns and An Inconvenient Truth, and the popular TV show 24.
BitTorrent will sell content from Warner Bros, 20th Century Fox, MTV Networks, Paramount Pictures, Lions Gate, Palm Pictures, and their latest partner MGM. All videos will be high quality, and encoded with the best possible codecs according to BitTorrent Inc. CEO Bram Cohen, and the downloads are expected to be much faster than most competitive services.
Ironically, pirated copies of some of the titles in their store can also be downloaded illegally through the BitTorrent.com search engine, that indexes BitTorrent trackers like The Pirate Bay.
Marc Brandon, Vice President Anti-Piracy Internet Operations at Warner Bros., one of the content partners of BitTorrent Inc, told TorrentFreak that it is virtually impossible to make sure pirated copies don’t slip through, but that both Warner and BitTorrent Inc are trying hard to remove these unauthorized DVDrips. And indeed, over the past month more and more illegal DVDrips disappeared from the search results.
The BitTorrent store will use Windows DRM to infect protect the movies and TV shows. This means that Mac & Linux users wont be able to use the service. Bram Cohen said before that the DRM issue is causing an awful lot of headaches, but that most of their content partners are insisting on DRM, at least for now.
BitTorrent Inc president and co-founder, Ashwin Navin is not a fan of DRM either, and is a bit more outspoken about it. He said that DRM is “a time bomb waiting to happen,” and that it will inspire people to pirate content.
Personally, I think Navin’s right, piracy wont be defeated that easily, and online video stores like the “BitTorrent Entertainment Network” will only be successful if they offer a product that is at least equal to its pirated equivalent. At this time, only DRM-free content that’s “download to own” (versus rentals/subscriptions) seems to have a chance at competing with piracy.
Previously: BitFox Adds BitTorrent Support to Firefox
Next: TorrentPod Episode 26
18 Responses
Is there a press release or any other sources?
Is this LEGAL! As in the companies who make the stuff will get paid for their work? I ask because I truly want to have it yelled in my face.
IT SOUNDS LEGAL, but is it? Anyone, please confirm it!
Nice Typo about the DRm.
;D
[quote comment="54355"]Is there a press release or any other sources?[/quote]
Here’s another story
[quote comment="54363"]Is this LEGAL! As in the companies who make the stuff will get paid for their work? I ask because I truly want to have it yelled in my face.
IT SOUNDS LEGAL, but is it? Anyone, please confirm it![/quote]
It is legal!
thanks!
I would love to stick around here on earth to see how well this goes:)
NO LINUX VERSION?
IM SORRY, ARE YOU FROM THE PAST???
They’re going about this all wrong… Here’s my suggestion…
Build a new encoder, open source, that allows you to “encrypt” the AVI where you can not forward through it, only pause and rewind. They include ads, which would sponsor the download. How would this be different from the current free TV model? You choose what you want to see, when you want to. If others want to copy the content, let them… Give it out for free, because there’s a paid advert in it. I’m sure the Torrent networks can provide some indication as to how popular a show is.. They do it for ancient television already. All we’re doing is changing the medium from mega hertz to mega bytes…
Offer a paid service as well, where I can do anything with the file, with no ads.
I would gladly sign up for a paid service, with no DRM or ads included. My Linux based MythTV would be so happy with it!!
I would be interested without DRM. But I already have music on my PC that I purchased but can’t play anymore because I switched players. Never again.
Embedded ads would be fine also, but no DRM!
why do you have to pay for shows on broadcast like 24. They are paid for by the advertisers everybody has already got thesubscribe to them. But once you subscribe you should be able to download and watch it how you want. Isn’t it like recording it on your vcr.ir money. Shows on on Showtime are different since you have to
why do you have to pay for shows on broadcast like 24. They are paid for by the advertisers everybody has already got their money. Shows on Showtime are different because you have to subscribe to them. But once you subscribe you should be able to download and watch it how you want. Isn’t it like recording it on your vcr.
[quote comment="54623"]Why would you pay to download movies over BT when you can get them for free from sites like http://www.flixflux.co.uk – probably before they’re even out on the official BT site??[/quote]
Because some people care about their downloads being legal?
They would be better off straming the videos like Netflix does with its movie service and offering a subscription model than a fee per rental model .
video
music
cd-dvd label
[quote comment="54355"]Is there a press release or any other sources?[/quote]
[quote comment="54367"][quote comment="54355"]Is there a press release or any other sources?[/quote]
Here’s another story
[quote comment="54363"]Is this LEGAL! As in the companies who make the stuff will get paid for their work? I ask because I truly want to have it yelled in my face.
IT SOUNDS LEGAL, but is it? Anyone, please confirm it![/quote]
It is legal![/quote]
[quote comment="83960"]video
music
cd-dvd label[/quote]
I Think Ä°t is very good information…
Webmaster
Thats mota fuka shit
I wanna pirat stuff for FREE
culture has to be free!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What the hell? Are you serious? What gives you the right to watch for free what people paid millions to make? Sheesh.
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