P2P

File sharing is when users share and transmit files from one computer to the other over the internet or through an external drive. P2P file sharing is the ability to share such content through other connected computers on the P2P network, usually through a P2P or torrent software. File sharing has become very common, especially through cloud based services such as Dropbox and Google Cloud

Examples of peer to peer file sharing would be programs such as Limewire or Torrent programs such as Bittorent or Utorrent. Although file sharing originally meant uploading and downloading of such files, now streaming has become more common. As shown in Digital Pirates Winning Battle With Studios  Instead of illegally downloading new movies on a torrent, a user is easily able to stream it off of many popular websites. This ultimately hurts everyone involved in the creation and distribution of the content. In the example of a song being illegally downloaded and shared, the band themselves, any song writers, the record label, the record label staff, management, and everyone else involved would all be negatively affected. Online piracy and theft of content is so widespread and easy to do that people do not realize the effects of their actions. With this article talking about how it effects the movie industry and how they are taking a page from the music industry in how it was effected by online piracy, the trend seems to be moving towards giving users more and more ability to stream the movies they want on their own official websites. This way traffic is diverted away from piracy sites and re-directed towards the proper channels.