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BitTorrent Inc, makers of a technology often used to trade pirated copies of Hollywood movies, is launching a website that will sell downloads of films and TV shows licensed from the studios.
The BitTorrent Entertainment Network was set to launch on Monday with films from Warner Bros, Paramount Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Lionsgate and episodes of TV shows such as 24 and Punk’d.
The service is squarely aimed at young men and boys who regularly use BitTorrent to trade pirated versions of the same films and who more often watch such files on their computer instead of on a big screen TV in the living room.
The San Francisco-based company is betting that at least one-third of the 135 million people who have downloaded the BitTorrent software will be willing to pay for high-quality legitimate content rather than take their chances with pirated fare.
“The vast majority of our audience just loves digital content,” Ashwin Navin, president and co-founder of BitTorrent, told The Associated Press.
“Now we have to program for that audience and create a better experience for that content so the audience converts to the service that makes the studios money.”
The new site will rent movies for a 24-hour viewing period for $US3.99 for new titles and $US2.99 for older films, but the site has decided not to sell films for now because the prices demanded by the studios were too high.
Source:
SMH
Related Links:
BitTorrent Entertainment Network
