Hot Videos: March 2007

Thursday, March 29, 2007

Killer NIC K1 and Custom BitTorrent Client Tested

"The new Killer NIC K1 is the successor to the much debated original Killer NIC card that offers the same features at a lower price: this time for about $170 or so. Not cheap, that's for sure. But in this review at PC Perspective, not only is the new card tested under the drastically updated Vista networking stack with improved results, but the free BitTorrent client that runs on the Killer NIC is reviewed as well; with it you should be able to download torrents without affecting online gaming performance. Enough to warrant a $175 network card?"

What Of Joost, BitTorrent If NBC/News Corp. JV Succeeds

YOUTUBE ISN'T THE ONLY VIDEO site likely to be affected by the coming NBC Universal/News Corp. joint venture. Smaller digital video players are expected to feel the deal's waves.

Joost--a start-up from the founders of Kazaa and Skype--just announced plans to offer ad-supported versions of a host of Viacom programs. Similarly, BitTorrent Vice President and General Manager of Consumer Services Eric Patterson said at OMMA Hollywood this past week that the company plans to start offering ad-supported TV programs by the end of the year.

"When the big players agree to play together, there's automatically less need for the smaller guys," said David Clark, a managing director with investment banking firm Jordan, Edmiston Group, Inc. "There's room for other players, but they obviously don't have as much to offer."

BitTorrent, a peer-to-peer Web company, has drawn 135 million people worldwide who have downloaded files using the service--one-third of all P2P traffic online.

Last month, BitTorrent launched BitTorrent Entertainment Network, a new service that has compiled the rights to more than 3,000 movies, 1,000 games and 1,000 music videos from 34 participating content providers. The network has deals with Paramount Pictures, Lionsgate, Warner Bros. and MGM.

Like iTunes Music Stores, the BitTorrent business is a pay Internet service, where users can rent movies for $4 each, and download-to-own TV shows and music videos for $2 each. BitTorrent also plans to add a digital-rights-management-free music download service in the near future.

Both Kazaa and BitTorrent have had a history of unauthorized digital-content distribution. Now the founders of both companies are setting themselves up to provide above-board digital-entertainment services.

If NBC and News Corp. do find success with their new venture--and that's still a huge if--it could threaten the continued adoption of peer-to-peer distribution, which relies on the collective computing power of its users to thrive.

"To the extent that this creates an efficient use of one set of servers powered by NBC and News Corp., the deal could take some of the air out of peer-to-peer," said Forrester Research analyst Josh Bernoff.

But with the future of digital video distribution still highly uncertain, everyone is hedging their bets, Bernoff added.

Case in point: The broadband services company Roo Group, in which News Corp. holds a minority stake, recently agreed to buy legal P2P service provider Wurld Media's assets for up to $10 million in cash and stock.

News Corp. earlier this year agreed to purchase a 5% stake in the company, with tentative plans to purchase another 5% in the near term. The deal gave Roo's existing clients--including News Corp., Verizon and The Street.com--access to a burgeoning pay-to-play market.

Indeed, a recent report by Adams Media Research projected significant increases in consumer spending on downloaded movies, music and TV shows. The report projected that pay-to-play spending will top $4 billion in 2011, far exceeding revenues derived from video advertising.

While details are still scarce, News Corp. and NBC have made it clear that advertising will not be the only source of revenue coming from the new venture. Selling their own and others' movies and TV shows is also part of the plan.

Could Bittorrent Inc. Be the Next Big IPO?

Some are contemplating if BitTorrent Inc could be the next big dot-com IPO since Google's mad run caused a fever on on Wall St back in 2004 but, does the current and future state of the video download service look good enough to make it a successful bet?.

It's been a while since Google went public back in 2004 to much fanfare on Wall St and press the world over, and stock-market investors have been looking for the next big "dot-com thing" ever since.

We have all watched Google's profits, market capitalization, and profits soar to stratospheric heights, and many have wondered what company will be the one to follow in such big footsteps.

Now I don't think anybody's foolhardy enough to predict that BitTorrent Inc. will have anywhere near the success or impact that Google has but, the POTENTIAL for a huge impact on the nature and model of video content distribution as we know it is definitely within the realm of possibilities.

"When downloading a movie, it should be faster than a pizza delivery. That's a safe rule of thumb with us," said Ashwin Navin, the president, COO and co-founder of BitTorrent.

It currently has content distribution agreements with Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures, News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox, Lionsgate, Palm Pictures and Kadokawa Pictures USA, and as everybody will tell you, "content is King." With iTunes offerings limited to that of Disney, ABC, and Lionsgate, BitTorrent Inc. is head and shoulders above the competition.

Plus, they have an "anti-Google" situation on their side where Viacom, NBC, News Corp., and just about every other major media company whose content winds up on YouTube looking for a viable online video site alternative. Tired of not getting what they feel is their proper cut of ad-revenue from Google, which is a fair assessment considering since they did all the work to create and produce in the first place, BitTorrent Inc. just could be the next YouTube in that it would be more than happy to distribute or stream their content under terms far more favorable to the media companies than Google would ever dream of offering. This alone may be why BitTorrent really could be the next darling of Wall St.

As far as their video download service is concerned, its current state is probably its biggest weakness. Riddled with DRM and playback problems, this and the fact that its pretty hard if not impossible to convince people that it's better to pay for what they currently can get for free, makes the future of this portion of their business look less than bright. But, its rumored ad-supported Net TV service, possibly in conjunction with YouTube-disgruntled media companies as I mentioned could perhaps more than make up for this shortcoming.

Ashwin Navin, president, COO and co-founder of BitTorrent Inc., has also mentioned recently that they are going to release a corporate version of their BitTorrent Entertainment Network called BitTorrent DNA, sometime in the 2nd quarter of this year. Some companies are apparently already testing it but, he declined to name who they are.

Navin's also hopeful that BitTorrent Inc. will be able to create a lucrative new revenue stream by licensing its BitTorrent protocol technology to companies who wish to both cut down on the costs of maintaining central servers as well as be able to to deliver files faster and more cheaply than typical downloads.

It might just be that BitTorrent Inc's status as a distribution platform more so than as a content destination may be what sets it apart to be successful in a such a highly competitive and crowded playing field.

Musicians Demand the Internet Stay Neutral

"124 bands — including R.E.M., Sarah McLachlan, and Pearl Jam — and 24 music labels are sending a clear message to keep Net traffic neutral. The Rock the Net campaign wants all traffic to be equal instead of allowing providers to charge a fee for certain pages to load faster than others. These musicians are the latest to join the Save the Internet campaign, which has the chair of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet in its camp. Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., spoke at the campaign's kickoff. I think it's obvious that musicians (especially independents and small labels) will find themselves with the short end of the stick if they are asked to pay a fee to have their music streamed as fast as larger bands or even corporations."

File sharing Bit Torrent client ported to RISC OS

A BitTorrent client has been successfully ported to RISC OS by Theo Markettos using the GCCSDK. The peer-to-peer file sharing program can fetch and upload large files from the Internet, from Linux distribution CDs to videos of films and TV shows - allowing users to download and enjoy episodes of their favourite shows, such as Lost, pictured.

To use the BitTorrent network, users must first search for and download a .torrent file which the client will use to fetch a particular file from other BT users. The file is gradually downloaded in bits from other clients until it is complete. At the same time, you will be expected to share files with other BT users.

Theo's RISC OS port of the enhanced ctorrent client runs from the command line, and can download files as well as share them with other bit torrent users. For example, to download a GNU/Linux Ubuntu ISO, run in a taskwindow:

*wget http://releases.ubuntu.com/6.10/ ubuntu-6.10-desktop-i386.iso.torrent
*ctorrent ubuntu-6.10-desktop-i386.iso.torrent

Theo told us: "You can successfully fetch a file from a torrent, and letting other people leech it works too. Somebody is doing so right now. I haven't tested creating torrent files, as I'm not sure I have anything I want to upload to the world."

He ported the software, written in C++, after RISC OS Open staffers discussed using peer-to-peer file sharing networks to spread the load of distributing the RISC OS 5 source code.

Theo said: "I decided to port ctorrent partly because lots of Linux distributions and similar projects are supplying files by torrent these days, and it's only polite to download by a method that costs them less bandwidth.

"But it's also as a result of a discussion on the RISC OS Open forums a month or two ago where I suggested peer-to-peer as a means of distributing big source tarballs like the RISC OS sources."

A binary build for punters to run is expected to be made available via the GCCSDK Autobuilder shortly. GCCSDK users can read Theo's post below to port the software by hand using the Autobuilder.

Girls Gone Wild on BitTorrent

Mantra Films, makers of Girls Gone Wild, plans to offer its girls-baring-all franchise of videos on BitTorrent’s recently launched legal movie download service, company executives told Red Herring.

The move will come soon after the Los Angeles-based company’s international expansion, which was announced Wednesday. GGW set up shop in the United Kingdom about a month ago to test the audience appetite for girlie videos on that side of the pond.

“We will launch our videos on BitTorrent’s video-on-demand service in about two weeks,” COO Scott Barbour said.

The company also plans to expand to France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Australia, New Zealand, Portugal, the Philippines, Finland, Greece, and Turkey. Plans include local web sites, podcasts, and cell phone videos, which GGW has been testing with Vodafone in the U.K.

Mantra has capitalized on home video and new media technology to establish a beachhead in the market for entertainment for young men, while attracting college-age women to live events in which it encourages them to expose themselves before the cameras. The privately held company has emerged as a competitor to videos from Playboy Enterprises and lad magazines such as Dennis Publishing’s Maxim, Blender, and Stuff.

Is BitTorrent usage really all about FREE content?

There's nothing like a good P2P comic strip to start the week off right, and this one comes from Greg Dean over at RealLife.

We've seen a number of BitTorrent related comics appear over the last year or so, perhaps due in large part to the way that BitTorrent Inc. has taken P2P mainstream, and also because of the way that BitTorrent has become the P2P file-sharing program of choice for the discerning pirate at large.

Greg Dean over at RealLife has just posted a new comic strip for the day that points out some of the inequities of BitTorrent usage.

The two characters in the strip download a BBC TV show off of BitTorrent and note that they really do so only because it's FREE CONTENT and not out of some enlightened notions of availability or limited TV network distribution.

Everybody loves free content, and perhaps that's what a large part of BitTorrent and P2P file-sharing programs really are all about.

Bulgarian ISP Speaks Out On Bittorrent Crackdown

The Bulgarian government has been cracking down on BitTorrent tracker sites as of late, and the people of that country are none to happy.

Just this last Sunday, as a matter of fact, Hundreds of people filled the streets of Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria, to protest against the closure of the country's BitTorrent tracker sites

I had a chance to talk with a guy over at the Bulgarian ISP Linkos Ltd who was able to shed some light on the situation and how he his company has been affected by the crackdown.

He writes:

We are a Bulgarian internet provider – Linkos Ltd. and used to support the p2p torrent site Zamunda.net.

On March 12th, 2007 GDBOP (General Office for Fighting Organized Crime) and the Metropolitan Investigation Office held an action in our offices. It was directed against the Zamunda.net site which we had already sold to a Syrian citizen a week earlier.

When the state bodies raided in our offices, we were announced that if the above mentioned site wasn't closed down, all our company's machinery and equipment would be seized, including the communication one (the document they presented allowed that).

After seeing that the site wouldn't stop its activity and they convinced themselves it wasn't on Bulgarian territory the same officials embarked on confiscating the equipment. It meant the immediate discontinuance of the whole business of Linkos Ltd. and its bankruptcy. In order to prevent our company from being affected, the new owner of the site agreed on suspending the access to main sections indefinitely.

After the suspension of the site one of our administrators was arrested with the explanation he had been administrating and supporting the servers on witch Zamunda.net was presently hosted. An accusation has been brought against him.

The above mentioned government officials indulged into sending a police order to the internet providers in the country obliging them to filter the access of Bulgarian internet users to torrent sites including arenabg.com. With this action of theirs the officials from GDBOP and the Metropolitan Investigation Office prohibited users the free access to information which is guaranteed by the Constitution of the Republic of Bulgaria and violated the European regulations. A few days later the order was cancelled and some obscure and indistinct reasons for that were pointed out.

The action against the torrent sites in Bulgaria has been ordered by an offshore company registered on the Islands of Virginia named Amotera Ltd. which states presenting the rights of the big major companies for Bulgaria.

Now he meant to say "The Virgin Islands" I'm sure but, it does bring up an interesting question of how exactly copyright holders, presumably originating from interests in the United States, are able to bring about a crackdown in countries beyond their shores.

We have seen it happen again and again in countries like Singapore, Russia, Malaysia, and just about every other country in between. There never seems to be any discussion between the country and its people, and rather simply the country and a group represnting copyright holders like the MPAA and RIAA.

It's more than just a little disturbing to see that companies can bypass all the natural orders of a country's popular will FROM FOREIGN SHORES and see their interests carried out in a decisive and expedited manner.

It also shows that the will of coporate interests has no bounds, and is not limited by georgraphical or popular interests. The will of the people be dammed, its profits first and foremost, and it's sad to see another governemnt surrender its sovereignty to a foreign corporation.

Thursday, March 29, 2007

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

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