Study Shows BitTorrent’s Contribution to Film Exposure

Movie Lovers Worldwide United by BitTorrent

Sniper - not a Hollywood flick but a Chinese hit

P2P Research Group summoned at the 75th IETF Meetings in Stockholm recently revealed a new study (PDF) according to which downloading movies via BitTorrent has become such a spread habit that it occurs in 165 countries out of 192 recognized by the UN, NewTeeVee reports.

The research proves that foreign films can reach in popularity the Hollywood productions and it gives the example of a Cantonese movie which enjoyed even wider distribution worldwide via BitTorrent than a movie with approximately the same number of downloads but release by the major American studios.

Despite the established fact that subtitled movies often are preferred by a far smaller audience when distributed via more traditional channels, it seems that when it comes to BitTorrent people are more open and interested in exploring other cultures and expanding their intellectual basket – this including the effort of reading subtitles.

The study was conducted by Bell Labs’ Gurbani and P2P veteran Stas Khirman who analyzed two popular BitTorrent swarms two months ago, monitoring all those who were sharing two flicks using the Swedish BitTorrent tracker, The Pirate Bay.

You can check out this link for downloading Sniper.