Popcorn Time launched with a big media splash just last week. Following movie industry complaints that it facilitated piracy, it made an even bigger media splash when it shutdown — not gone, not forgotten.
Our experiment has put us at the doors of endless debates about piracy and copyright, legal threats and the shady machinery that makes us feel in danger for doing what we love. And that’s not a battle we want a place in — Official Popcorn Time “Goodbye”.
Popcorn Time’s exile seems to have ended with the weekend. According to the BBC, the “Netflix for piracy” is back.
“What is clear is that there are people that want to push the boundaries of technology and testing the law out,” said Eddy Leviten, director of communications, Federation Against Copyright Theft (UK). “What we would say is that the law is quite clearly defined as to what is copyright infringement and what isn’t.
People will label Popcorn Time according to their place in the worldwide media distribution system. Nevertheless, Popcorn Time is absolutely and perhaps irrevocably back with the software hosted on GitHub, a global open-source collective with a history of resisting lawsuits.
Popcorn Time, which provides instant access to thousands of movies, etc via BitTorrent, is now being developed and hosted by scores if not hundreds of anonymous volunteers. The kind of people, both adept hackers and ordinary people, that could make it impossible to control let alone effectively shutdown Popcorn Time.
Popcorn Time Is a Moving Target
YTS, a torrenting collective that has been closed only to be reborn in the past, is taking a lead role in the Popcorn Time revival.
“It’s our vision at YTS that we see through projects like these and that just because they create a little stir in the public, it doesn’t mean they are shut down. That stir is exactly what the public needs and it’s already evident that people are becoming more aware of copyright-related issues,” an anonymous YTS developer told TorrentFreak
Just a little stir? In the grand scheme of things, Popcorn Time is likely to be just one place to find and watch illegally copied movies.
That said, YTS later released a statement on their website that attempts to put some distance between the collective and that earlier commitment of support.
“Popcorn Time is a community driven project, not owned nor maintained by a single person or entity,” said YTS.
Will Popcorn Time really become the “Netflix for piracy”? Only time will tell, but it’s certain that there’s no putting this genie back in the bottle…
What’s your take?