The Exeem technology could find itself in some of the same difficulties faced by other file-swapping networks.
Much of BitTorrent's popularity has come both because of the speed of downloads and the assurance that files were real instead of the decoys or damaged content often found on other file-swapping networks. Indeed, a recent academic study attributed much of BitTorrent's strength to the influence of moderators at the SuprNova Web site, who hand-checked files to ensure they were genuine.
"One of the big advantages of BitTorrent/SuprNova is the high level of integrity of both the content and the meta-data (information such as movie name or file size)," Johan Pouwelse, a Delft University of Technology researcher, wrote in a recent paper. "A decentralised scheme such as in Kazaa has no availability problems but lacks integrity, since Kazaa is plagued with many fake files."
Exeem includes tools to write comments or rate files, which Sloncek said would help eliminate fake files. However, Kazaa has included similar tools, and some researchers have found that up to 70 percent of versions of popular songs are actually fakes.
The software is being launched without any participation from Bram Cohen, the original BitTorrent creator. He dismisses the project as simply the latest in a long line of Kazaa clones that has little to do with his own software, even if it uses some of his technology.
"Exeem has nothing to do with BitTorrent," said Cohen, who is continuing to improve his own technology in hopes of seeing it adopted by big online businesses. "It's just yet another warez tool."
In his interview, Sloncek said Exeem would be free, but ad-supported. A public version will likely be available "very soon", he said.
