In desperate times, when you were looking for a torrent download and don't know where to get from, you could previously just Google it. Google had agreed on to fight piracy and to keep up with that it has started removing piracy related terms from its Auto-Complete.
This means that if you want to search for those torrents, you need to know precisely what you are looking for. This does not cut down completely and does not eliminate search results completely. If a new movie is released, searching for the movie does not automatically show up the links to the torrents now.
So if you are searching for BitTorrent, RapidShare, uTorrent or any other site that hosts torrents, they are not going to auto-complete from now on. These sites do give access to illegal torrents, but also host legal torrents or user generated content. There is no way to distinguish that and blanket block on some sites is not the right solution for this problem.
This means you don't "accidentally" download illegal torrents now, instead explicitly choose to download it. If and when P2P cases are going to get stronger, you can be made liable for these explicit choices then. This move may reduce some instances of download, but people who are going to download will continue doing this. There are way too may sites and ways to get this content.
Author: Vinod
Source: ArsTechnica
This means that if you want to search for those torrents, you need to know precisely what you are looking for. This does not cut down completely and does not eliminate search results completely. If a new movie is released, searching for the movie does not automatically show up the links to the torrents now.
So if you are searching for BitTorrent, RapidShare, uTorrent or any other site that hosts torrents, they are not going to auto-complete from now on. These sites do give access to illegal torrents, but also host legal torrents or user generated content. There is no way to distinguish that and blanket block on some sites is not the right solution for this problem.
This means you don't "accidentally" download illegal torrents now, instead explicitly choose to download it. If and when P2P cases are going to get stronger, you can be made liable for these explicit choices then. This move may reduce some instances of download, but people who are going to download will continue doing this. There are way too may sites and ways to get this content.
Author: Vinod
Source: ArsTechnica
It's almost comical how many things they continue to do to try to cut down on instances of piracy. But really, isn't it like trying to stop an avalanche by standing in front of it and waving your arms?
ReplyDeletePeople are going to find pretty much whatever they want, regardless of whether Google auto-completes it. The thing is, there are so many LEGAL torrents out there too! (as you mentioned). I recently downloaded the full director's (Darren Aronofsky) audio commentary for the movie "The Fountain" - big thumbs up! Anyway, my point is, I think that the majority of people, when searching for a torrent, usually know what they are looking for. What's a little more typing? :)