LimeWire just announced that it’s been forced to disable its Facebook integration. The feature, which was introduced with the launch of LimeWire 5.2 at the end of July, enabled users to privately share files with their contacts after logging in with their Facebook credentials. The social networking site allegedly demanded a number of changes before eventually notifying LimeWire that it would disable the feature due to “policy violations.”

LimeWire’s VP of product management, Jason Herskowitz, called the dispute “unfortunate,” adding that the two companies have a common goal: to help their users to connect and share. Herskowitz also said that LimeWire will continue to offer private file-sharing functionality for users of Google Talk and other Jabber-based services. And he apparently couldn’t resist taking a stab at Facebook by noting that his company is looking forward to working with “a number of other open platforms and social networks.”

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TVU Networks this week introduced PVR-like functionality for its P2P TV platform, letting subscribers record 300 or so live TV channels from around the world, including Cartoon Network, BBC World News and Telemundo. Users can record shows in real time or schedule them for later. Due to the nature of the service, however, there’s no TiVo-like programming guide available; Mountain View, Calif.-based TVU essentially picks up signals from its broadcast partners and redistributes them with the help of P2P technology.

That also means users have to install the startup’s software in order to make use of the DVR functionality — or watch any of the TV channels in real time, for that matter. And finally, they have to cough up $2 per month for TVU’s DVR service. But while all these factors make the service seem unlikely to succeed, something tells me that TVU’s audience is a forgiving one.

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People all over the world are downloading movies via BitTorrent, according to new research (PDF) presented at last week’s P2P Research Group convening at the 75th IETF Meetings in Stockholm. And we’re literally talking all over the world: A popular movie torrent analyzed as part of the research was within a week accessed by people from 165 countries. “Considering that there are about 192 countries recognized by the UN, this is a sizable spread of the swarm across the countries,” said Bell Labs researcher Vijay K. Gurbani.

The fact that Hollywood fare is popular around the world probably isn’t all that surprising, but the research also shows that foreign movies can be just as popular. In fact, a Cantonese movie analyzed by the researchers received even wider global distribution through BitTorrent than a Hollywood flick with roughly the same number of downloads.

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Stop slowing down our torrents! That’s the message BitTorrent Inc. has been sending to Canadian ISPs this week with a last-minute submission (PDF) to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). Bell, Rogers and other Canadian ISPs have been throttling their subscribers’ BitTorrent traffic for years, and the CRTC recently started public hearings to figure out if government intervention is necessary.

The whole episode is reminiscent of the controversy that broke out when Comcast started to slow down its subscribers’ torrent downloads in the U.S. — especially when it comes to BitTorrent Inc.’s allegations. The company did, however, share a few interesting tidbits in its submission that clarify how much of an impact such throttling measures have and what BitTorrent is doing to address network congestion issues.

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Wayne Rosso, the long-time outspoken P2P exec, pulled out of efforts to reformulate The Pirate Bay earlier this week, as first reported by CNET. Swedish public company Global Gaming Factory had announced yet-to-be-executed plans to acquire the enormous legally troubled file sharing site and tracker last month. Rosso explained to us this week that he walked away because, “The the deeper the discussions got with [Global Gaming CEO Hans] Pandeya the more obvious it became that there was a lack of a real plan to move forward.”

Every day there is a new development in The Pirate Bay saga, and none of them bring confidence in the site’s potential to exist long-term. While our aim is not to give him a self-promotional platform, we figured it was worth asking Rosso what exactly it would take to make a legal P2P service work. Turns out Mr. Bombastic has some solid ideas.

Rosso said the allure of TPB’s 20 million file-sharers had already drawn serious interest from major labels in the short time he’d been affiliated with GGF. However a key factor of a successful service, and one that didn’t seem to be an option for The Pirate Bay, would be to switch over from an infringing offering to a non-infringing offering at precisely the moment when new owners take over. If a new owner had to turn off the tracker while prepping an alternative, a huge chunk of users would depart and never come back. And on the flipside, leaving the tracker on under new ownership means assuming its liabilities. Rosso emphasized that a new site owner would have to be rigid about copyright law; any grey area makes the project a non-starter.

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The Pirate Bay has been front and center of the blog and mainstream tech news cycle over the last month, ever since the site’s founders announced they had found a buyer. Hardly a day goes by without new and oftentimes conflicting reports about the impending sale. First it’s off, then back on. One day the site’s founders seem to get out of P2P, the next it appears they’re trying to take it to the next level. Also conflicting are reports about the Bay’s new business model. Is it weird and delusional, as Business Week and Torrentfreak surmised, or extremely innovative, as CNET proclaimed?

A European copyright association was so confused by all the back and forth that it already celebrated “the closure of the Pirate Bay” earlier this week. Sorry to break it to you, guys, but the site is very much up and running. Aside from that, however, hardly anything is certain. But we’ll give it our best shot at summing up and explaining all of the recent news, including the status of the sale, the way you’ll pay for your Pirate Bay downloads in the future and the odd tale of the court summons via Twitter.

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Much has been written in recent weeks about the future of The Pirate Bay, as well as about BitTorrent piracy in general. The sale of the site spooked some, while others are hoping to transform the new Pirate Bay into a legitimate, multimillion-dollar business. One aspect that has been largely overlooked is that the current Pirate Bay, due to the nature of P2P, is actually a relatively small and cost-efficient operation. The site’s trackers facilitate countless downloads of Hollywood blockbusters and music albums, but according to an insider, running these trackers could cost as little as $3,000 per month.

The implications of a number like that are huge. Not only does it mean that anyone with a medium-sized checkbook could replicate The Pirate Bay’s infrastructure in a heartbeat, but it also casts shadows over the hopes of anyone thinking about selling digital content online. Music fans were not longer willing to pay $20 for audio CDs once they noticed that blank CDs only cost a dime. How are they going to feel about download stores knowing that running the world’s biggest download service is that dirt cheap?

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The Pirate Bay’s impending sale has been worrying BitTorrent users around the world. One reason for these worries is that the Swedish pirate platform has been the backbone of many of the web’s BitTorrent sites and communities. Take the Pirate Bay’s tracker servers away, and sites like Mininova would be left in a dry spell, with users unable to download pretty much anything at all.

However, two weeks after the announcement of the sale, it looks like the often-feared BitTorrent meltdown won’t happen. Not only are new trackers popping up everywhere, ready to fill the gap, but there’s also some new technology that could help interconnect these trackers to a giant, federated mesh network without any single point of failure.

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