BitTorrent is taking on broadcast television with a multichannel livestream platform

BitTorrent’s peer to peer data protocols are most known for file sharing through torrents and Sync, but now the company believes it can tackle a completely different platform: live television.

To be clear, the company isn’t taking on livestreaming platforms like Periscope or Twitch; it’s setting it’s sights on broadcast television. Called BitTorrent Live, the platform will focus on the areas Web streaming hasn’t quite cracked yet, including sports, news and events – all which BitTorrent says hold the majority of television viewership.

Part of the reason large scale streaming video has been problematic is simply an issue of scale: the more viewers a network has, the larger and more expensive its content distribution network has to be. We’re all too familiar with laggy livestreaming.

That’s where P2P comes in: Every viewer becomes part of the distribution network by both receiving and sharing that video at the same time – just like a torrent. Only this time the protocol has been tuned for latency; BitTorrent promises under 10 seconds of latency without the need of an expensive CDN, even at the scale of traditional over-the-air television.

The platform will include 13 free channels to start – including live sports, news, tech and film channels – but will later expand to include subscription, ad supported, and pay-per-view networks. Head on over to the source link below for more details on the current lineup.