Movie studios, BitTorrent sign anti-piracy pact

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Hollywood's major movie studios and internet technology provider BitTorrent Inc have signed a pact to help stem piracy of films on the web, but the move was deemed by both as an "early experiment".

Under the deal announced on Tuesday, BitTorrent founder Bram Cohen agreed to remove links on his website that direct users to illegal copies of films that can be downloaded.

But because the BitTorrent software already is widely used to pirate movies, television shows and music, the agreement was seen more as a symbol of change in the industry than a deal that would have a major, immediate impact on curbing piracy.

"We are glad that Bram Cohen and his company are working with us to limit access to infringing files on the BitTorrent.com website," said Dan Glickman, chief executive of the Motion Picture Association of America, which represents Hollywood's major studios and signed the deal with BitTorrent.

"They are leading the way for other companies by their example," Glickman added.

The BitTorrent software allows large data files that contain movies, TV shows or music to be broken into small pieces, shared among a wide group of users, quickly distributed via the internet and reassembled at the downloading computer.

Using BitTorrent software to copy and redistribute unlicensed content infringes artists' copyrights. Late last month, a court in Hong Kong convicted a man of trying to illegally distribute movies with the software.

The agreement to work with the industry was seen as a step ahead because Cohen, a major player in peer-to-peer software development, has agreed to work with Hollywood studios as opposed to working against them.