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DMCA has a couple of weaknesses - the most important being the the people using content isn't obliged to prove their rights, it is up to the content / material owner to prove that the rights have not been given.
The second weakness is that DMCA is very narrow in scope. You complain about this video at this URL, and they remove it. Tomorrow it gets put back up on another URL, and that requires another DMCA, and so on. There is seemingly no penalty for repeated abuse, especially when it comes to "user generated content".
The third weakness is that DMCA does have a ramp up effect: The penalties and liabilities for violating someones copyright twice is two times once. It doesn't get any more severe, over time.
The final weakness is that each DMCA is treated in a vacuum. There is no provision to handle sites that are are made entirely out of stolen content, each copyright holder has to complain about each piece of content individually. In the case of a torrent style site, that could involve thousands of different copyright holders all over the world. There is no simple way to say "well, we have had 5 valid complaints about the content on your site, so please show that you have the rights to the rest". There is no way to force a content related showdown under DMCA.
The intent of the law was big. The reality is that there are holes big enough to drive a torrent site through.
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