Looks like d/l content through torrents is going the way of the dinosaur, or Napster at the turn of the century, if you want a more recent example.

I started using torrents about two years ago. I was into watching the TV show Breaking Bad on AMC. My IPS, for no good reason, took AMC from its basic cable package and made it a channel you could only get if you paid for a "higher tier" of service. To me, a typical bullshit move to get me paying more for my cable service. I don't know what gives them the right to to this, but that really doesn't matter much. They do what they do and there's really nothing you can do about it.

So I asked around and was introduced to torrent downloading, which is a pretty kool thing,...or was.
Basically a torrent, which is a peer to peer kinda deal, allows you to download a file, piece by piece, from many different sources. The torrent file seeks out the info, finds it through connecting to others who also have the torrent file, then gets and reassembles the info onto your PC. (truth is I'm not very well versed in understanding how torrents work, this is just my impression from what I've read)

Read more about torrents through these links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitTorrent_%28protocol%29

Very interesting info here about p2p file sharing through viewing this timeline:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_file_sharing

The sites I used most were The Pirate Bay, Mininova, EZTV, and Demonoid. here is a list of sites that dealt in this type of file sharing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_BitTorrent_sites


And I was able to get the Breaking Bad episodes the same night they aired. I'd burn em to DvD and watch them the same night. I thought this was absolutely awesome. I was getting over on the cable company that was trying to force more $$ outta me.

I did that and started to get into downloading torrents in general. First thing I searched for were copies of the Batman TV show from the 60's, because I wanted to see these again. They were no longer on TV and for some legal reasons were not (and still are not, as far as I know) available on DvD to buy. Some nice people recorded all the Batman episodes when they were on TV Land and made them available to others through a torrent. This is no easy undertaking and I have to say these people should be well thanked and appreciated.

So, over the last two years I never went overboard with it but I did get TV shows, movies, lots of porn, and other stuff since I started using Utorrent, which is my torrent downloading program. Never had a problem at all (I rarely went for anything brand new, mostly old shows and old favorite movies) until I made the mistake of going for the new theatrical release of Star Trek last year (awesome movie imo). I got it and watched it, it was a pretty good quality copy (on a scale of 1-10, id give it a 9--just some minor pixelization during darker lit scenes) and was a very happy trekker. Yea, I should have gone to the movies to see it, or bought the DvD, but I didn't and so it goes. I think my mistake was going for such a popular title at the same time that the movie was just released on DvD (this was a rip from the DvD itself, not a "cam", which I never go for).

So I ended up getting an INFRINGEMENT OF COPYRIGHT NOTICE from my ISP specifically in regards to Star Trek ( they had agents collecting torrent info such as IPs) with a threat of being banned from using its service. I really wasn't too concerned. If they wanna stop providing me with their service I would switch to another provider. But it would have caused a big hassle so I stopped downloading torrents for around 4, 5 months. (my cable company finally won the AMC war with me by forcing me to switch over to the digital box setup, but as a result I now do get AMC again so it's a win/win, in a sense. The rates did not go up a ridiculous amount and the digital boxes were provided for free.)

I didn't respond to the letter and have not a heard a thing from them since. I did start using torrents again but not for anything that I would think they would have agents tracking. For instance, I just started watching Dexter and I have been able to get the 1st 3 seasons (kool and different kinda show, I'm enjoying it).
there is a possibility that Showtime could have people tracking Dex d/ls, but I figure the older the season the less likely.

I don't have HBO and tonight I wanted to take a look at the pilot for The Boardwalk Empire. So I looked to see if it was out there. Sadly, the best site to look for a show like this was down. It was probably a fortunate thing because as a result I did a lil googling concerning the state of peer2peer file sharing through torrents.
What I read was pretty much very, very, very bad. The big companies are coming down on torrents and torrent sites like never before. They will not stop until the process of sharing files this way is squished like a bug.

It's a bummer, but I'm just glad I was able to take advantage of it for a time. And I have all these old 60's Batman episodes on DvD, and they simply are not for sale anywhere (legally-also got The Man From Uncle/The Invaders and a few other shows I dug as a kid but wasn't sure I wanted to go out and buy the DvDs [I might go for a few seasons of Uncle]).

We have been very lucky, us innerwebbers, to have lived through these times (the late 90s to mid 2000's) when the innerwebs was realy a truley free and interesting and open way to share and learn. In many ways it made the world a much smaller place, and I don't think that's something that can be taken away. But the days of "free" internet and taking advantage of the web for free things, has, imo, come to an end.

Sure was fun though

Anyone else here use torrents or any opinion on their use?
Anti-pirateing or do you even give a shit?
Ever have any probs with your ISP over stuff you do online?

I use torrents downloading indirectly. With 3 other people in the house downloading stuff that way, most of the time someone wants what I do and I can get it from one of them over our network. If it's something for your personal use, I don't see how it's any more wrong than using a DVR (or tape recorder in the old days). If you're downloading to sell copies, that might be a be piratey.

We've never been contacted by our service provider regarding downloads... that I know of. However, we've never signed into the email account that comes with the service from our provider, so it's possible they have and I just don't know it.

Htown is the torrent King. I've been using them since before PD died. In fact, I turned Pat onto them before he passed. I used to use UTorrent, but it BLOWS compared to Azureus/Vuze. Vuze frikkin' ROCKS, and it's more private. A lot of those sites you mentioned are crapping out, but "btjunkie" is by far the best one.

I stay away from movies I can get from Netflix or anything in the theater. Mostly I find old TV shows(Batman), and Music discographies. for example, the music you d/l from torrents sounds 200% better than the CD's I've owned for years. I don't know how It works, It just does. I also find reallly really rare movies (Song of The South) there.

As far as the Networks coming down on the sites? Only sites based in America are screwed! God Bless Red china!!!!@

htownsteve wrote:

Htown is the torrent King. I've been using them since before PD died. In fact, I turned Pat onto them before he passed. I used to use UTorrent, but it BLOWS compared to Azureus/Vuze. Vuze frikkin' ROCKS, and it's more private. A lot of those sites you mentioned are crapping out, but "btjunkie" is by far the best one.

I stay away from movies I can get from Netflix or anything in the theater. Mostly I find old TV shows(Batman), and Music discographies. for example, the music you d/l from torrents sounds 200% better than the CD's I've owned for years. I don't know how It works, It just does. I also find reallly really rare movies (Song of The South) there.

As far as the Networks coming down on the sites? Only sites based in America are screwed! God Bless Red china!!!!@

That's true about American sites,but only to an extent. The Pirate Bay was out of Sweden and you can see in that time line link up there what they have gone through. The powers that be are reaching out across the waters to squelch even those they supposedly have no jurisdiction over.

That's also very true about music and discographies. I got an amazing torrent that had not only all of Todd Rundgrens solo and Utopia stuff, but all kinds of live bootlegs from the 70's thru to the 2000's. 5gb's of Todd
And like you say, not only is the quality better but you can go and seek out lossless digital quality music. I always look for .flac versions of the music I'm looking for first, and then if I must work my way down to mp3 (i rarely go for anything less than 190kbps). More times than not I do find .flac copies.

And again, with rare movies, you are correct sir. I just found The Groove Tube, which I have not seen since I viewed it in a theater in the 70's.

I wish I got into torrents earlier but I can't complain.

I haven't figuered out the mystery of the flac file yet. The mp3's sound amazing as they are. You check out any of the Beatles or Floyd re-mixes yet?

Demonoid was off for a while, but they are still the best are far as trust goes. mininova and Pirate bay kinda suck the last year or so. Check out "btjunkie".
BTJ and Demonoid are I use anymore.

htownsteve wrote:

I haven't figuered out the mystery of the flac file yet. The mp3's sound amazing as they are. You check out any of the Beatles or Floyd re-mixes yet?

Demonoid was off for a while, but they are still the best are far as trust goes. mininova and Pirate bay kinda suck the last year or so. Check out "btjunkie".
BTJ and Demonoid are I use anymore.

I was just checking out btjunkie over this last hour. Looks kool but I wish stuff was better organized. I see it is to an extent and I can get used to their way.
The Pirate Bay was excellent as far as organization and feedback thru commemts.

Flacs are like .wav (or .wave) sound files in that they are not compressed in any way. They are the actual same exact quality sound that is presented on the CD (or other source). They are the best quality you can get in a digital form, I'm pretty sure.
I tend to go for 256-320kbps mp3's, which are really nice quality, but the sound is still taken (or ripped) from the source and then compressed into a mp3 type version.

I seriously checked out Pink Floyd (Ive had really great Beatles hi quality stuff for years now) and found some great stuff, .flacs of many albums, awesome bootlegs like The Wall and The Final Cut demo tapes and home recordings by Roger Waters. I did this Wall 30th anniversary mix CD that I gave out for Xmas in 2009. I'll get that info and post it in this thread asap.

You can download the two CD's at the bottom, and all the info should be in those links, with the jewell case work and CD label stuff that I made to package it in.
I'm very proud of this project and I'm glad to share it. If anyone d/ls this lemme know what you think of it.




https://www.facebook.com/?sk=ff#!/album.php?aid=6024&id=100001466618386

Both disc's, each as one track, are available here, through Rapid Share
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Disc One: mp3 / 104 minutes
320 kbps / 147mb

http://rapidshare.com/files/414106882/The_Ultimate_Wall__disc_one__MASTER_RECORDING__Zvon2008__v-mp3.mp3
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Disc Two: mp3 / 55 minutes
320kbps / 126mb

http://rapidshare.com/files/414108366/The_Ultimate_Wall__Disc_Two__MASTER_RECORDING__Zvon2008__v-mp3.mp3

I'm in the process of liostening to a 54-song MP3 I made of 'Soundgarden' songs I've never heard.

SG is one of my ALL_TIME favorite bands, and I found two torrents on wednesday chock-full-of stuff I never heard.

KEEP IN MIND.......i covet, collect, find, qwhatever, SG stuff. I own SG single-discs you'll NEVER find on Ebay. I had to add stuff to the SG site on Wikipedia two years ago. Chris Cornell is the 2nd best singer on the planet, (next to Mike Patton, of course) , SO...imagine my suprise when I discovered

FIFTY-FOUR fucking songs by my favorite band! That I, HTOWNSTEVE, had NEVER heard!

The world of Torrents is amazing, broad, and expanse.

You've heard the expression, "Dare To Dream"?

I got one better. "Dare to remember...I dare you."

Dare to fucking remember. I double-dare you. I mother-fucking Double-dare your ass.

Think of a TV show you loved when you were a kid. A show YOU WILL NEVER see again.

Go here:http://btjunkie.org/

And type in "fraggle Rock" or "alf" or "Different Strokes" or.....in Vegas' case....midget facials


FUCK "Youtube"

The shit me and the Z-man are talking about is ALL of it. FUCK a bunch of stupid "shorts" on 'Youtube". This is the real deal. Every episode, Every show. labeled.


Oh yeah, It also works with music. hehehe.

If only I could remember...

Newsgroups were even better Steve. When newsgroups were free, man, those were the days. I used to get access free as part of my comcast account but comcast in their infinite wisdom decided that customers were "misusing" the newsgroups because it was being used for getting porn more than anything else. Not that it should be any of their fuckin business what you use your service for. Newgroups are still out there but now you have to pay for em. Everything that was free at the start of the internet has been turned into a way to make $$, and that's the way it'll go from now until the end of time. Comcast shut them down a while back but I found some old shows there and also when I got into the torrents.

One show I never expected to find.
Its probly too old a show for you to have seen. I guess I was around 9 when it was on. It was called Captain Nice and I was amazed to find some episodes online.
They were still funny too. Buck Henry created it.

Another show I found was The Rat Patrol. Kind cheap looking today, as far as production values, sets and whatnot, but I was really into it then.
Time Tunnel was another, Land Of The Giants. I don't recall having seen any of them recently so maybe I never looked for em.

OOO, I'm gonna go look now.

WOOT.
Found it already on btjunkie.
Theres one torrent for the entire series but Im just gonna chk out a few. The first one for starters.

Oh yea, another I found and got the whole first season for was The Invaders. That was a trip to watch and didn't age as badly as some of these old TV shows from the 60s.

The one draw back about torrents is that you need seeders. The newsgroups were like a warehouse full of stuff that was just there. Torrents are more reliant on people keeping things active and available in order for them to be shared.

The Time Tunnel has very few seeders, so itll be slow to get. I'm only seeing one right now and that sucks. D/L speed of like 2kb/s. Itll take a few days to get

There are times when something will have a shitload of seeders and I get d/l speeds of 400-800 kb/s, which is just sick.

Oh, and BTW Steve SG is awsum and I agree Cornell has one of the best voices in rock.

Got the pilot episodes for Land Of The Giants and Time Tunnel.
Watched LotG and I have to say I was into some pretty shitty shows when I was 10 yrs old, lol.

Zvon wrote:

Got the pilot episodes for Land Of The Giants and Time Tunnel.
Watched LotG and I have to say I was into some pretty shitty shows when I was 10 yrs old, lol.

There's always that, too. I did "Fraggle Rock" for my daughter last year, and I still got the theme song stuck in my head.

Time Tunnel turned out to be even better than I remembered it. Maybe I never saw the pilot episode.
Very intelligent adult kinda show, for the 60s. At least at its start. (you might remember these old TV shows LVG)

Dunno if your a Batman fan, or animation fan Steve, but this is an excellent full DvD animated Batman flick

http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5839401/Batman_Under_The_Red_Hood_%28DVDRip%29

If you like that kind of thing def worth the d/l.