Law prof Mark Schultz ponders the impact of the decision on BitTorrent, which is now the techology of choice for file-sharing. His conclusion:

In sum, Bram Cohen and the original BitTorrent (as a technology) look pretty safe post-Grokster. BitTorrent's unique history and the existence of the etree community are great protection.

Sites like the now defunct Suprnova, most likely are not. Such sites add a commercial layer on top of BitTorrent (banner ads). The commercial layer is not the problem; the problem is that they drive traffic by linking to infringing torrents. They also promote the presence of infringing torrents via ads and paid search engine placements. In short, they are the sort of bad actors that today’s decision wishes to reach.

An addendum is here.

Link from Declan McCullagh's PoliTech newsletter.

posted by James DeLong @ 11:00 AM | Internet: P2P, Search Engines...

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