In an effort to eclipse the overwhelming negative press that the BitTorrent protocol has generated, BitTorrent Inc. has announced a new implementation of the protocol. From an article on Torrentfreak describing the new protocol:
This is where uTP comes in. uTP is a new and improved implementation of the BitTorrent protocol which is designed to be network friendly. The current implementation often causes interference with other applications, which is the main reason why ISPs try to slow it down, or even stop it altogether. uTP aims to solve this problem.
While I somehow think that an unstated reason to disallow bittorrent traffic on ISP is a failure to monetize the traffic, bittorrent is the most efficient way to spread files among peers. This newer protocol aims to reduce congestion, one of the main complaints among ISP’s in relation to bittorrent. This is a great step in the right direction. Imagine how easy it would be to have a boxtop DVR provided by the cable provider and it would take a user’s season passes and steadily download content among peers. Only in this case the peers are the cable network subscribers. It would be an efficient way to spread content out and it would be a lot cheaper for the user than buying box sets of tv series or movies in stores.
