Comcast has agreed to stop throttling BitTorrent traffic. Well, kind of. What Comcast is really promising is to develop a "capacity management technique that is protocol agnostic." In other words, Comcast still reserves the right to limit your downloads, but hopes to develop a method that will do this whether you're using a web browser, FTP client, or BitTorrent software. Gee, that makes us feel better.

Another interesting note is that BitTorrent is both a protocol and the name of a particular company. Comcast has been in discussions with BitTorrent Inc, but we honestly don't know that many folks who actually use BitTorent Inc's software. So while the company has pledged to develop BitTorrent client software optimized for "a new broadband network architecture," the agreement won't matter much unless other popular BitTorrent clients like Azureus and µTorrent also adopt the technology.

In case you're wondering what led to Comcast's change of heart (if that's what it is), we're going to go out on a limb and assume it might have had something to do with an FCC investigation that may or may not have eventually cost the company billions, or even trillions of dollars.

[via GigaOm]

Conferences for free, remote meetings at minimal costs, and personal tv shows for nothing, that's what the future of video is about. We covered Ustream earlier this month, but now is the chance to check it out in a live test.

Ustream is a free online service that allows users to create and watch live streams, as well as chat with other viewers online. It is extremely simple to setup, and only requires a webcam of your choice, preferably with sound, plugged into a computer to get up and running.

If you've been at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco this past week, you might have noticed Jeremiah Owyang, or Robert Scoble, walking around with a webcam on a tripod. They are actually running a live stream covering the event, all running off of the Ustream service. Everything has been running fine with the service. The audio seems to lag a few seconds, and video runs choppy when in larger conference rooms or away from strong signals, other than that the Ustream service looks really good. Scoble informs us that the students at Virginia Tech are actually using Ustream to broadcast events from around the school. Needless to say, it looks like personal content is slowly picking up, so we could see some big developments from Ustream pretty soon.

Jeremiah is using his laptop running his space inside Ustream.tv, with a webcam and an EVDO/3G card for wifi. You can check out what Jeremiah is using for his setup on his blog, and view the live stream there as well.

Pretty soon we'll all be live on the web. If you're aching to stream every moment of your day live to shut-ins internet users, Ustream.tv may have you covered. Recently, and for reasons that are totally inexplicable, Justin.tv has shown that there might be a market for the live streaming experience that is one mans daily life. Watching Justin.tv is just so, two weeks ago; With Ustream, you can be Justin.

Ustream doesn't appear to have reached much of a critical mass, and the available content is pretty thin. However, if you're an obsessed fan and can't get enough Paparazzi coverage, you can watch Liverazzi, full streaming coverage of a Hollywood paparazzi who stalks the stars for fun and profit.

[via Emily Chang]