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mosc
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Joined: Jan 31, 2003 Posts: 18197 Location: Durham, NC
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 9:08 am Post subject:
What about bittorrent |
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In another topic, http://electro-music.com/forum/post-58119.html#58119 , a discussion of bittorrent came up. Maybe this is of more general interest, so I'm starting a discussion here.
steve wrote: | Out of personal interest.. I'm not sure of your experience with Bittorrent but it really isn't a P2P application in the sense of things like Napster where the user searches for content. Used correctly it gives more control over who content is delivered to whilst giving you the benefit of the swarm.
How that can be less applicable then a simple public http or ftp link to the archive I'm not sure, are intellectual property issues your concern?
I can see that you might be worried about some peoples prejudice against p2p due to the media storm, but used correctly bittorrent is a very controlled and yet network efficient system for delivering content.
I'd even go as far to say that it's the most responsible or 'environmentally friendly' way to transfer data on the internet Smile (If you consider the internet as an environment and it's efficiency as it's health!)
I'm just interested in your opinion rather than trying to change your mind btw. |
In this case, there is certainly a concern about intellectual property. I guess the whole thing seems seedy to me. I went to the bittorrent web site and read about it a bit. I didn't see anything about conditional or private distributions. I checked the search feature for Beatles and found quite a few Beatle songs for download. This is obviously illegal. I wouldn't want electro-music.com associated with anything like that.
If G2 patchers want to put their patches up on such a system, or on any other distribution method, that's OK with me. Each individual is free to do as they please. But when people post to electro-music.com, they aren't giving electro-music.com or anyone else the rights to redistribute their material, except in the form and context that in which is is posted here. |
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monobass
Joined: Nov 30, 2004 Posts: 275 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 9:46 am Post subject:
Re: What about bittorrent |
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mosc wrote: | In another topic, http://electro-music.com/forum/post-58119.html#58119 , I guess the whole thing seems seedy to me. I went to the bittorrent web site and read about it a bit. I didn't see anything about conditional or private distributions. I checked the search feature for Beatles and found quite a few Beatle songs for download. This is obviously illegal. I wouldn't want electro-music.com associated with anything like that. |
Conditional distributions are handled via trackers as I mentioned in the other thread and wouldn't appear in public searches.
I guess to me your argument is a bit like not wanting to use or be seen to endorse public transport because of all the fare-dodgers, or not wanting to support the use of Internet Explorer because it is also used to view pornography or offensive material. Search for 'beatles mp3' on Google and you'll find some illegal links to Beatles music, that doesn't make Google seedy. _________________ Steve |
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elektro80
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Joined: Mar 25, 2003 Posts: 21959 Location: Norway
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 9:50 am Post subject:
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It doesn´t really make much sense to use bittorrent for small files. The patch archive will not be a 4.3 GB iso. _________________ A Charity Pantomime in aid of Paranoid Schizophrenics descended into chaos yesterday when someone shouted, "He's behind you!"
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monobass
Joined: Nov 30, 2004 Posts: 275 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 9:54 am Post subject:
Re: What about bittorrent |
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mosc wrote: | If G2 patchers want to put their patches up on such a system, or on any other distribution method, that's OK with me. Each individual is free to do as they please. But when people post to electro-music.com, they aren't giving electro-music.com or anyone else the rights to redistribute their material, except in the form and context that in which is is posted here. |
But how is receiving the same zip from a peergroup of Electro-Music.com users any different or better than distributing via HTTP? _________________ Steve |
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monobass
Joined: Nov 30, 2004 Posts: 275 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 9:59 am Post subject:
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elektro80 wrote: | It doesn´t really make much sense to use bittorrent for small files. The patch archive will not be a 4.3 GB iso. |
Well I don't think that is actually neccessarily true for the case in point (The patch archive will be large one day!). Also I think that's maybe a judgement made on the common perception of Bittorrents use. This thread is about the bigger picture of the politics of digital distribution rather than specific uses. |
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elektro80
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Joined: Mar 25, 2003 Posts: 21959 Location: Norway
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 10:05 am Post subject:
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1. It doesn´t really make much sense to use bittorrent for small files. The patch archive will not be a 4.3 GB iso. It will be more like 5-8 megs.
2. I am daily watching hundreds of attempts to break into one of my honeypots and to set up torrent trackers. That is why I am keeping my segment free of bittorrent services.
3. Why set up yet another service when http delivery will work just fine? _________________ A Charity Pantomime in aid of Paranoid Schizophrenics descended into chaos yesterday when someone shouted, "He's behind you!"
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elektro80
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Joined: Mar 25, 2003 Posts: 21959 Location: Norway
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 10:09 am Post subject:
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_ Steve _ wrote: | This thread is about the bigger picture of the politics of digital distribution rather than specific uses. |
It is? OK.
You would love to see us using bittorrent for the distribution of the patch archive because this means that ...? ? What? _________________ A Charity Pantomime in aid of Paranoid Schizophrenics descended into chaos yesterday when someone shouted, "He's behind you!"
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monobass
Joined: Nov 30, 2004 Posts: 275 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 10:13 am Post subject:
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elektro80 wrote: | _ Steve _ wrote: | This thread is about the bigger picture of the politics of digital distribution rather than specific uses. |
It is? OK.
You would love to see us using bittorrent for the distribution of the patch archive because this means that ...? ? What? |
You should read the original thread where I agreed that because the electro-music bandwidth has enough capacity then Bittorrent is not a necessity in this case. I was interested on how Mosc's negative view of bittorrent was founded.
Down boy _________________ Steve |
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Spandex
Joined: Nov 17, 2005 Posts: 24 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 10:52 am Post subject:
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elektro80 wrote: | 2. I am daily watching hundreds of attempts to break into one of my honeypots and to set up torrent trackers. That is why I am keeping my segment free of bittorrent services. |
They used to try to break into mine and set up IRC proxies to make them harder to trace whilst trading porn. I used to blame the skript kiddies, not the IRC protocol
But anyway.. I think everyone can agree
1. It's just a protocol and is no more evil than a hammer or a rock... unless you use it for something bad
2. If it's not needed don't install it. |
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mosc
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Joined: Jan 31, 2003 Posts: 18197 Location: Durham, NC
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 11:01 am Post subject:
Re: What about bittorrent |
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_ Steve _ wrote: | But how is receiving the same zip from a peergroup of Electro-Music.com users any different or better than distributing via HTTP? |
How is the original source of the material posted on bit torrent identified? _________________ --Howard
my music and other stuff |
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monobass
Joined: Nov 30, 2004 Posts: 275 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 11:13 am Post subject:
Re: What about bittorrent |
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mosc wrote: | _ Steve _ wrote: | But how is receiving the same zip from a peergroup of Electro-Music.com users any different or better than distributing via HTTP? |
How is the original source of the material posted on bit torrent identified? |
I'm not sure I totally understand your question Mosc but I'll try and answer.
The content is not posted or hosted or advertised via Bittorrent, you have no actual connection to bittorrent.com. The application is merely a way of taking a torrent file, which is a tiny file sort of like a key (~30kb).
The torrent file provides the user with the access to the content which is hosted from the original site (for example gamespot.com). Once user 'A' has downloaded the content he can choose to 'seed' the download (it is actually also seeded during download, so that person can start sharing the partly downloaded content with other valid users straight away).
Then the next person 'B' who comes to gamespot.com can download that whole unchanged file from gamespot.com and user 'B' simultaeneously, in theory perhaps doubling the bandwith available. Users 'A' or 'B' cannot change the content of the original file, it is simply a mirroring process.
If in this example Gamespot.com went down then people could still download the file as originally posted on Gamespot.com due to other people still 'seeding' the file. it's a self-healing and non-centralised distributive method of delivering content.
The important point though is that the data stays intact in its original form. |
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Stanley Pain
Joined: Sep 02, 2004 Posts: 782 Location: Reading, UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 11:55 am Post subject:
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i think we're all aware of how torrents work... the question is, what is the point?
i see no legitimate use for torrents. the idea of sharing large files in such a way might be legitimate in some utopian socialist context where licensing and private ownership aren't an issue, but the reality is people use it to download series 2 of LOST, porn or cubase sx3 for free.
i'm not saying this in a bid to get on a moral high horse, but the reality of the situation is that torrents are used to avoid paying people for their work.
but to say that a g2 patch shoule be torrented is laughable. |
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monobass
Joined: Nov 30, 2004 Posts: 275 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 12:03 pm Post subject:
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Stanley Pain wrote: | i think we're all aware of how torrents work... the question is, what is the point? |
Well my interpretation of what mosc has said on this thread and the other one is that he wasn't aware.
Stanley Pain wrote: | i see no legitimate use for torrents. the idea of sharing large files in such a way might be legitimate in some utopian socialist context where licensing and private ownership aren't an issue, but the reality is people use it to download series 2 of LOST, porn or cubase sx3 for free. |
So how does a distribution method change the status of legally distributed files which are subject to the disclaimers of this website? You see no legitimate use for distributing legitimate files in a way which saves the person offering the files bandwidth and allows the downloader to get it quicker?
Stanley Pain wrote: | but to say that a g2 patch shoule be torrented is laughable. |
Definitely! So remind me who said a single g2 patch should be torrentable? |
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jksuperstar
Joined: Aug 20, 2004 Posts: 2503 Location: Denver
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 1:11 pm Post subject:
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Quote: | i'm not saying this in a bid to get on a moral high horse, but the reality of the situation is that torrents are used to avoid paying people for their work. |
I'd disagree with this, along with the negative slant on torrents in general.
I use torrent to download linux .iso images, which can be very large. Much of the work is done by people who aren't paid, and as such, don't have $$ to spend on high server bandwidth. Much like Howard.
But, as was presented, the original file is simply distributed among many "servers", dynamically, which simply distributes the cost. Just because some people use this forum for copying illegal files, has nothing to do with torrent or how it works. The Bit Torrent protocol simply distributes the downloading bandwidth from 1 single server to as many people that download the file and allow it to be shared. So instead of 1 person paying $100 for bandwidth, 100 people pay $1 toward their ISP service and the file still gets to the people who need it. The process of getting the file is no different than downloading the .ZIP from e-m.com. You come here, get the torrent key, and start downloading. the only difference is where the data actually comes from. |
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v-un-v
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Joined: May 16, 2005 Posts: 8933 Location: Birmingham, England, UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 1:15 pm Post subject:
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Stanley Pain wrote: |
i see no legitimate use for torrents. the idea of sharing large files in such a way might be legitimate in some utopian socialist context where licensing and private ownership aren't an issue, but the reality is people use it to download series 2 of LOST, porn or cubase sx3 for free.
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err yeah right? well I disagree. IMO anyway. LOST?- well I don't have a TV so I can't comment there. Porn?, well there's no stopping that I'm afraid- it's one of the oldest professions in the book! Perhaps if you feel strongly about that- start by complaining to a newsagent? Cubase? Well Steinberg are a BIG company with a lot of money- are you really and honestly bothered about big corporate software companies losing out?? Again, how many people here can put their hands on their hearts and honestly say that they have never taped a record, radio or TV programme?!
If people could stop being so bothered about p2p and torrents etc etc and actually see a positive use for them. We could be the first site EVER to demonstrate what a powerful tool these programs are- rather than getting all worked up and hot under the collar because a few irresponsible people elsewhere are also using them for illegal purposes.
A shining example (as far as I'm concerned anyway) is this article I picked up from the internet sometime earlier this year;
"Thursday April 7th, 2005
Tools Of The Trade
by Scott Chitwood
P2P: Creative Use Of Personal File Sharing
The first thing most people think of when they hear P2P file sharing is trafficking of illegal software (warez), music and movies. Discussing the use of P2P clients in a forum sets off all kinds of alarms for admins and moderators, even if the thread doesn't cross over into talk of illegal activities.
The thing is, there are many legitimate uses for P2P networks and clients that are often overlooked by those who would wish to protect us from ourselves. Many P2P users are finding that setting up a private P2P network helps them secure sensitive files from the general public while allowing them to share with family, friends, and in a growing number of cases, customers — all without having to upload files to a server or have dedicated FTP space.
Here's a great case of targetted use of P2P, as submitted to us by Michel Filion.
As a photographer I often have the need to transfer large documents, mostly images, to my clients. I had considered an FTP site but for economic reasons I opted for a Dot Mac account (iDisk) to partially fulfill my business needs. Partially, because I'm limited to 250megs of storage and because the service is sometimes painfully slow.
Now I've found a way to transfer large documents to clients using LimeWire. I simply alpha-numerically rename the document or folder I want to send (12 to 14 characters) thus severely limiting the chance that other users would enable an exact search. (For obvious security reasons, you might want to compress and password encrypt your document or folder). I then manually place the document in my designated ''shared'' folder and restart LimeWire.
The document now appears in LimeWire's library and is ready to be uploaded. I then notify my client that the document bg507khf2bz87 is available and that he can search for it using is own p2p software and proceed to download. The advantages of this method are that the documents can be downloaded at the clients leisure as long as your sharing software is open, that downloads can be resumed at a later date, and that because you only have two users sharing a document , the download speeds are quite fast and best of all, it's free.
I hope you will find this interesting enough to share. I strongly believe in the future of file sharing software and its legal and unabided use."
See? there you go- at least one legitamate reason for p2p/ torrent etc.
BTW- Mosc cheers for starting this thread It IS VERY important and the sooner we clear the air on this one, the better! _________________ ACHTUNG!
ALLES TURISTEN UND NONTEKNISCHEN LOOKENPEEPERS!
DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER GEFINGERPOKEN UND MITTENGRABEN! ODERWISE IST EASY TO SCHNAPPEN DER SPRINGENWERK, BLOWENFUSEN UND POPPENCORKEN MIT SPITZENSPARKSEN.
IST NICHT FÜR GEWERKEN BEI DUMMKOPFEN. DER RUBBERNECKEN SIGHTSEEREN KEEPEN DAS COTTONPICKEN HÄNDER IN DAS POCKETS MUSS.
ZO RELAXEN UND WATSCHEN DER BLINKENLICHTEN. |
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Spandex
Joined: Nov 17, 2005 Posts: 24 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 1:37 pm Post subject:
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And even given all that, there's an important distinction.. BitTorrent is a protocol... not a service like a Limewire directory. There is no central "BitTorrent" site you can search for things on. The fact that some sites choose to aggregate links to various Torrents that infringe copyright doesn't mean that everyone has to!
To think that the protocol is the problem is like refusing to use HTTP because porn/warez sites also use HTTP. Very silly indeed.
To re-iterate what I said above... whether or not BitTorrent would be useful is a question worth discussing (and it seems it wouldn't be very useful in this case).
But, once you understand how BitTorrent actually works, the question of whether or not it's "bad" because of warez or porn becomes so foolish it's not worth discussing. And foolishness annoys me, hence why I'm wasting my time posting here.
@v-un-v: IMHO you should stick to the fact that protocols are just tools.. only the uses people put them to can be judged "good" or "bad". Trying to argue that some forms of piracy are "not that bad" is unlikely to change the minds of people who object to P2P because of it's illegal uses. It's more likely to have the opposite effect to what you intended |
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v-un-v
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Joined: May 16, 2005 Posts: 8933 Location: Birmingham, England, UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 1:49 pm Post subject:
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Spandex wrote: |
@v-un-v: IMHO you should stick to the fact that protocols are just tools.. only the uses people put them to can be judged "good" or "bad". Trying to argue that some forms of piracy are "not that bad" is unlikely to change the minds of people who object to P2P because of it's illegal uses. It's more likely to have the opposite effect to what you intended |
yeah- that's pretty much what I meant to say. When I re-read what I had written- it looks like I'm angling for an argument in good and bad- which I'm not/ or wasn't. _________________ ACHTUNG!
ALLES TURISTEN UND NONTEKNISCHEN LOOKENPEEPERS!
DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER GEFINGERPOKEN UND MITTENGRABEN! ODERWISE IST EASY TO SCHNAPPEN DER SPRINGENWERK, BLOWENFUSEN UND POPPENCORKEN MIT SPITZENSPARKSEN.
IST NICHT FÜR GEWERKEN BEI DUMMKOPFEN. DER RUBBERNECKEN SIGHTSEEREN KEEPEN DAS COTTONPICKEN HÄNDER IN DAS POCKETS MUSS.
ZO RELAXEN UND WATSCHEN DER BLINKENLICHTEN. |
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Spandex
Joined: Nov 17, 2005 Posts: 24 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 2:21 pm Post subject:
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While I'm on the subject.. calling people "foolish" isn't a great way to change minds either.. so I apologise.
But my point stands. BitTorrent is just a protocol. Not a way of sharing warez. |
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Hyde
Joined: Jul 15, 2004 Posts: 118
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 2:31 pm Post subject:
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elektro80 wrote: | It doesn´t really make much sense to use bittorrent for small files. The patch archive will not be a 4.3 GB iso. It will be more like 5-8 megs. |
The archive (patches and performances) I zipped was 11.2 megs as of the other day. Does this mean that you guys are considering dropping a few of the sub-folders (experimental, building blocks) because they are unfinished? |
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blue hell
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Joined: Apr 03, 2004 Posts: 24079 Location: The Netherlands, Enschede
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 2:43 pm Post subject:
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Hyde wrote: | Does this mean that you guys are considering dropping a few of the sub-folders |
This is a bit OT here, but no patches are skipped, not that I'm aware of anyway. Just a few more days of patience I guess :-)
Edit, BTW : your zip is slightly over 5 MB. |
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elektro80
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Joined: Mar 25, 2003 Posts: 21959 Location: Norway
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 3:28 pm Post subject:
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v-un-v wrote: | If people could stop being so bothered about p2p and torrents etc etc and actually see a positive use for them. We could be the first site EVER to demonstrate what a powerful tool these programs are- rather than getting all worked up and hot under the collar because a few irresponsible people elsewhere are also using them for illegal purposes. |
Way back before this thread was started I told mosc that I think the Bittorrent concept is excellent. However, I don´t see any point in making any political statements re the use of Bittorrent. BT isn´t even suited for these files anyway. As for the first site EVER... nope..
Another matter is that bittorrent traffic is choking sections of the net. We have some of the electro-music.com servers on a network which is BT free. And it will stay that way.
Quote: | because a few irresponsible people elsewhere are also using them for illegal purposes |
I am not convinced we are speaking of a few _________________ A Charity Pantomime in aid of Paranoid Schizophrenics descended into chaos yesterday when someone shouted, "He's behind you!"
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elektro80
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Joined: Mar 25, 2003 Posts: 21959 Location: Norway
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 3:37 pm Post subject:
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Spandex wrote: | BitTorrent is just a protocol. Not a way of sharing warez. |
I just did some googling. It sems like the internet are full torrent directories. It does indeed seem like people have found it suitable for sharing warez and copyrighted stuff like movies and music. -But.. I am not quite sure what this discussion is about.. ? Is it irresponsible of us NOT to use Bittorrent just in order to make some kind of political statement? _________________ A Charity Pantomime in aid of Paranoid Schizophrenics descended into chaos yesterday when someone shouted, "He's behind you!"
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monobass
Joined: Nov 30, 2004 Posts: 275 Location: UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 3:46 pm Post subject:
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elektro80 wrote: | Way back before this thread was started I told mosc that I think the Bittorrent concept is excellent. However, I don´t see any point in making any political statements re the use of Bittorrent. BT isn´t even suited for these files anyway. As for the first site EVER... nope.. |
Is it not allowed to have an abstract discussion on this forum then? Seeing as I had already agreed before this thread started that it's not suitable for this specific use at this particular time
I never intended to make a political discussion, I used the word 'politics' because it's clearly a subject on which people do not agree and have strong feelings!
elektro80 wrote: | But.. I am not quite sure what this discussion is about.. ? Is it irresponsible of us NOT to use Bittorrent just in order to make some kind of political statement? |
What I'm actually interested in is people making moral and value judgements on a piece of technology, based on how other people use it... I find that a pretty irrational and baffling situation to be honest.
If you don't want that sort of discussion on your forum then just say so, cos I'm getting the impression you would rather I disappeared |
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elektro80
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Joined: Mar 25, 2003 Posts: 21959 Location: Norway
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 4:01 pm Post subject:
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BT is an excellent protocol for sharing very large files. Right now we are not looking at very large files to be shared. Another matter is that BT is perfect for certain sharing scenarios. From what I have seen from my logs of the file download pattern from electro-music.com, we are not quite there yet.
Please go on discussing this. Your initial suggestion was OK. BT is one possible protocol/service for sharing big files. The archive won´t be shared by BT, but I don´t see why you guys cannot discuss BT anyway.
Trivia: I recently bought the game "Call of Duty". The latest game updater was officially distributed using BT. The download took ages to complete. This is probably because I was downloading the legit games updater and not the full "Call of Duty" warez package. Last edited by elektro80 on Thu Nov 17, 2005 5:32 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Stanley Pain
Joined: Sep 02, 2004 Posts: 782 Location: Reading, UK
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Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2005 4:14 pm Post subject:
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like i said, i wasn't getting on my high horse.
i'm sure there are people out there downloading linux .iso images, but a very quick glance through the torrent sites i'm aware of shows that porn, tv shows, warez and other illegal file sharing seems to be far more popular.
i'm really not offering an opinion on whether that's right or not, it's just my observation. maybe if i was more into shareware/freeware or open source i could use bit torrent without feeling as if i was going to burn in hell.
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