BitTorrent Has 100 Million Users

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Accordingto a press release, more than 20 million people are now accessing the filesharing service via theBitTorrent mainline and the µTorrent service. More than 400,000 clients aredownloaded now every day.

“This is an exciting day for ourteam. Our vision is to build a complete technology ecosystem comprised ofsoftware, content and devices, designed to connect modern content creators witha massive digital audience,” said Eric Klinker, CEO at BitTorrent. “Thismilestone highlights the size of our user base and the power of our software.”

Foundedin 2004, BitTorrent maintains the BitTorrent protocol, which is considered tobe most popular file sharing technology for large files in use today. The protocolhas consistently been named as one of the major consumers of Internet bandwidthwith estimates ranging from about 30% to 60%. Several carriers are said to haveestablished bandwidth throttling technology that especially targets BitTorrentand slows down file sharing processes.

Overthe past five years, BitTorrent users have been targeted by movie and musicindustry organizations for copyright violations. In 2010 alone, 20,000 userswere sued by the the U.S. Copyright Group, while the Recording IndustryAssociation of America is estimated to have sued a total of more than 30,000BitTorrent users.   

Douglas Perry
12 Comments Comment from the forums
  • burnley14
    I haven't been able to find a good source for music torrents lately, all my previous sites seem to keep getting shut down. Any suggestions for music torrents would be appreciated :)
    Reply
  • fstrthnu
    The Pirate Bay is still going strong, and they show no sign of slowing down even with the court rulings.
    Reply
  • 2real
    i hear itunes or zune marketplace are pretty popular
    Reply
  • kronos_cornelius
    I don't use bitorrent, but I think the technolgy has a lot of potential with doing legal business.

    If they provide private sharing were you can just share the files with yourself or a small group of people, this technology could challenge the emerging cloud market.

    Let me explain. Even though I like Google, I know I'll have to pay them 15 to $30 dollars a month to have access to... say a couple of terabytes on the cloud. With bit torrent in contrast, I can host cloud application on my desktop at home, and access them any where from the Internet... no monthly fee !(other than the Internet access) For that reason alone I think many savy users may be inclined to use bitTorrent as a cloud replacing tool. It would also be attractive to small business not waiting to let an outside company have possession of their data.
    Reply
  • Bittorrent protocol is very smart. Hashed pieces, DHT, centralized peer list(trackers), automatic piece check, .torrent file and now uTP.

    It's a advance in P2P(a P2P without spam and viruses) and too in download management(impossible to download a corrupted file).
    Reply
  • ctmk
    ddragoonssBittorrent protocol is very smart. Hashed pieces, DHT, centralized peer list(trackers), automatic piece check, .torrent file and now uTP.It's a advance in P2P(a P2P without spam and viruses) and too in download management(impossible to download a corrupted file).
    well, diferent case for a bad client of bad HDD (e.g. firmware issue).
    Reply
  • Travis Beane
    BitTorrent is a wonderful tool. If I had the options, I'd even download my Steam games through it.
    Jamendo.com is nice in that all its downloads are via torrents, not dedicated servers.
    kronos_corneliusI don't use bitorrent, but I think the technolgy has a lot of potential with doing legal business. If they provide private sharing were you can just share the files with yourself or a small group of people, this technology could challenge the emerging cloud market.Let me explain. Even though I like Google, I know I'll have to pay them 15 to $30 dollars a month to have access to... say a couple of terabytes on the cloud. With bit torrent in contrast, I can host cloud application on my desktop at home, and access them any where from the Internet... no monthly fee !(other than the Internet access) For that reason alone I think many savy users may be inclined to use bitTorrent as a cloud replacing tool. It would also be attractive to small business not waiting to let an outside company have possession of their data.As long as the data is enrypted, I see no problem. I personally have no issue with a cloud drive (maybe make it appear as a virtual drive in Windows?), and the only thing stopping me is low speed on my uplink connection.
    ArticleThe protocol has consistently been named as one of the major consumers of Internet bandwidth with estimates ranging from about 30% to 60%. Several carriers are said to have established bandwidth throttling technology that especially targets BitTorrent and slows down file sharing processes.Lemme see... In the last 90 days, I've uploaded 474GB and downloaded 486GB. I can certainly believe the bandwidth claim.
    Around 3 months ago I also reformatted my main drive, and my Steam folder is 457GB.
    I also have Netflix, and I'm sure that uses quite a bit of bandwidth (between me and 2 other people).
    My bandwidth cap is 100GB/month... I love my lazy ISP. ^_^
    Reply
  • shiny_red_cobra
    100 million people can't be wrong!
    Reply
  • henydiah
    i love torrent! working
    Reply
  • rpmrush
    kickasstorrents is my mininova replacement. The pirate bay is still kicking depending on which day u check it. I've been warned by my ISP 3 times now for DLing copyright material. Time Warner and the MPAA never tell me which file/s they r concerned about. Probably all..lol..but they usual single out one particular movie. I finally picked up an HD tv (ya super late adopter) and pulled 1TB in the first month I had it. I'm lucky I have no cap. It's coming tho.
    Reply