Thom Yorke, the perpetually paranoid siren of all things technological and lead singer of British alternative-rock band Radiohead, last week released his second solo album Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes, exclusively for purchase on BitTorrent.This paywall introduction is a first for BitTorrent Inc, which is the corporate entity and public face of the immensely popular BitTorrent file-sharing platform. BitTorrent allows users to freely upload and download any and all media, most of which is explicitly not paid for. It’s no secret that BitTorrent has earned the ire of the television, music, and motion picture industries, and this turn to the legal mainstream is certainly a surprise.Yorke’s album is the first of its kind to be offered on BitTorrent Bundle, a freemium offering introduced in June 2013. BitTorrent Bundle allows users to access a small amount of content from participating artists for free, while some is available for download beyond a virtual “gate” for simply providing an email address.While artists such as Madonna, Moby, and Public Enemy have all used BitTorrent Bundle to share their minor artistic endeavors, this time around is the first where an entire album is offered as a paid download.Users are able to download one song and the accompanying music video for free; the rest of the seven songs on the album are available for $6. As the current arrangement stands, Yorke will get 90% of sales and the remaining 10% will go to BitTorrent.For those seeking to download the entire album, a lightbox appears with options for Paypal or credit card information, with a required email address submission. Users also are offered a link to purchase a vinyl copy of the album, which is not yet in CD format.In the week since the album became available, BitTorrent says that 1.8 million downloads have been made. This number, at Yorke’s request, does not include how many of the downloads are actually the full album purchase and not the free teaser song and music video.The download count of almost 2 million at least shows interest among the public in a reasonably priced digital download. If future releases perform as well, it may show BitTorrent the potential of perhaps rolling these releases into a subscription offering like Spotify.But BitTorrent is a victim of its own success. It is known primarily as a place where users can quickly download digital content, for free. Convincing users to pay for a one-off album is one thing, but a subscription service may require access to premium content found nowhere else, an extremely difficult in task in these days where media is freely available through, you guessed it, BitTorrent and the legions of sites like it.