Apple has made a huge mistake by offering the fourth episode of the popular science fiction TV-show "Stargate Atlantis" instead of the season premiere via its iTunes store. Soon after the episode leaked it spread to BitTorrent and other P2P networks.

The mistake was has not been made public by Apple but caused quite a bit of uproar among hardcore fans of the show. In an attempt to set things straight, Apple offered the actual season premiere and $2 iTunes credit to all the Stargate Atlantis fans who accidentally downloaded episode 4.

The mistake was apparently caused by a mix up between the production number and the broadcast number of the episodes. Stargate Atlantis is not shot in a chronological order and the fourth episode, named “Doppelganger”, was the first episode that was shot for the fourth season, it therefore carried 401 as production number. The iTunes store mistakingly thought that this was the broadcast number and offered it as the season premiere.

The wrong episode was available in the iTunes store for 24 hours before it was replaced by the real season premiere episode “Adrift”

Not surprisingly, the leaked episode – which is scheduled to air two weeks from now – is already widely available on BitTorrent and other filesharing networks. It’s not known if Apple will be compensating MGM, the production company of Stargate Atlantis, but we are sure they will be more careful next time.