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BitTorrent Community After SuprNova Shutdown

prostoalex writes "Folks from MonkeyMethods.org have researched the BitTorrent world after many popular destinations (SuprNova among others) have been shut down. Since BitTorrent always relied on the presence of trackers and servers hosting them, MonkeyMethods decided to see whether the shutdown impacted the BitTorrent community. So has the shutdown of centralized SuprNova had any impact? "In this case, centralization is a feature, not a necessity. Just look at del.icio.us most popular and you'll see BitTorrent sites every couple days, as people uncover new places to find the files they're looking for.""

16 of 377 comments (clear)

  1. Finding things is harder... by mg2 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Since the MPAA went on its rampage, finding the stuff I've personally wanted has become more difficult.

    It's funny, though, that they would tear down SuprNova but somehow TorrentSearch slipped through the cracks, and so there is still some activity out there.

    The big question now is whether or not exeem will be worth a damn.

    1. Re:Finding things is harder... by Joe+Tie. · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Weird, I keep Azureus going for pretty long stretchs, I'm sure at least five days at a time, in KDE with no crashes. The only time I used to get them with azureus was a version or two back with the unified gtk-qt theme engine. This is on debian unstable with sun's java 5.

      --
      Everything will be taken away from you.
    2. Re:Finding things is harder... by badasscat · · Score: 2, Interesting

      People have been suggesting Azureus but I was under the impression that Shareaza was not a bittorrent client.

      Shareaza has a BT client built-in, along with eDonkey, Gnutella and Gnutella 2. It's a great concept (a FOSS-based all-in-one P2P app) and it's a pretty slick looking app but unfortunately the performance is nowhere near any of the standalone apps for the various protocols it supports. (I have verified this in side by side testing.)

      Azureus is what I use, although it's got some issues as well. It's clean and well-organized and gives you a lot of info on the files you're downloading, but it seems to have some sort of memory leak or something... it runs fine at first and transfer speed is never an issue, but after a few hours of running it will bring my entire system practically to a halt. It is impossible to just leave it running in the background, which is really what you're supposed to do with BT.

      I've got a decent system, too - P4 2.4, 512MB, etc. so that's not the issue. It's either a problem with java (Azureus is java-based) or it's a leak in Azureus itself.

  2. Not really affected at all. by bob301 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The only effect SuprNova's shutdown had on me was to force redundancy on me- now, I get my files from a variety of sources. Sure, it's a little bit harder to browse what's new from 5 different pages, but it also keeps me focused on what I went looking for in the first place.

  3. One falls, others rise by Stevyn · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I used to use Suprnova. Then it went down. Now I use Lokitorrent and I get much better transfer rates. It just goes to show the RIAA/MPAA that when you stop one website, another will take it's place and probably do better. This is the same as Napster to Kazaa.

    I understand that Loki was around while Suprnova was still up, but I never used it. Now I use it.

    1. Re:One falls, others rise by Stevyn · · Score: 2, Interesting

      While I like your analogy, because I like analogies, there is one thing you're forgetting.

      With each iteration of P2P apps/networks/protocols, less and less involvement is on the party hosting it. With Napster, IIRC, their servers stored the specific information of where to get the songs. Then kazaa tried to distribute that amongst other servers/nodes. Others services did similar operations, but I don't know too much about them so I can't comment. Now we have bittorrent.

      Bittorrent is similar to asking a guy on the street where you can find something. In some cases, you're asking the guy where the latest linux distro's ISO can be found. In other cases, you're asking the guy on the street where the dvd-rip of iRobot can be found. In the end though, you're simply asking something to point you in the right direction. These sites aren't doing anything illegal (as far as I know, which isn't a whole lot so please correct me if I'm wrong), but just telling people where they can find what in some cases are copyright infringements.

      And if the MPAA is sucessful in shutting these sites down, then something new will come along. Eventually, it will be so abstract it won't be illegal. Hell, bittorrent may come out on top as lokitorrent fights it.

  4. Re:first by Lord_Dweomer · · Score: 4, Interesting
    What a troll...but I'll bite.

    Ok, who cares how this illegal copyright infringement community is affected? How about the members of that community? I'm sure there's TONS of people on /. who have used those sites, and this is VERY relevant to us, whether you agree with our ethics or not.

    You know, I'd really like to see some sources for your complaint of terminology used for movie and music copyright infringement vs. that of software infringement, because frankly I can recall seeing EVERYBODY being called swindlers, thieves, pirates, etc. I mean, didn't the RIAA start that campaign?

    And if you already own a copy of the work, then it is not illegal. I know I've downloaded a movie on more than one occasion when my DVD got scratched beyond repair.

    --
    Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
  5. Comparison to Napster by Lord_Dweomer · · Score: 4, Interesting
    This is kind of like what happened when Napster first went down. Everybody panicked, but once people started communicating, people started to learn where html sites were that linked to songs or FTP servers. Then Kazaa came along and all was good again.

    But once all the other P2P apps came along, again we lost some of the consolidation of files. But people still adapted, and people began learning what networks were good for certain types of files.

    Today with bit torrent, we are able to have entire trackers devoted to types of content, such as anime, tv shows, etc, and even before Suprnova and others went down, I still checked a few BT sites for all my files. However, I have to admit, it was pretty damn convenient to just go to Suprnova (which I think easily had the best interface and site mapping) and take a gander at what had been added that day.

    I hope mininova takes off, because I enjoy it, but it really doesn't have the traffic or variety it needs yet to be a big competitor. Torrentreactor is still going strong, and so are several others. Frankly, I wish there was a markup language for bit torrent files that could include info such as what type of file it was (tv show, movie, song, album, etc), and possibly what season/episode, recording method, duration, etc. That way that info could be used with an RSS feed and I could REALLY tailor a personal site to all my needs without having to check each of the seperate sites.

    --
    Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
  6. dont compare eXeem to Kaaza.... by kidoman · · Score: 3, Interesting

    See if you added fullblown adware to the soup that eXeem is, then probably it would frustrate u as much as Kaaza does. However, one very critical improvement that eX(eem|lite|.*?) has is that it uses the Bittorrent protocol internally. So as long as you get the file with enough downloaders and seeds (which happens very quickly to gamez/moviez/pr0n) you are almost assured to get the file very quickly.

    No more waiting as in eMule. And I dont think I have successfully downloaded any file from Shareaza recently.

    Also the built in comments/rating system is the thing that will prevent the network from being MP**'s playground. If aint work work for you, let others know.

    Personally, I am gonna implement a Java/.NET based client for this as soon as the protocol stabilizes (which should happen in a couple of months when we hit 1.0.)

    ~~~ 0wn3d

    --
    ~~bada bing, bada bang, bada bong and voila~~
  7. Re:Exeem! by dj245 · · Score: 3, Interesting
    As it is, leechers are a significant problem for many torrent networks.

    Except Empornium. Empornium has a permanent user share ratio that when it fall below a certain amount, (like .2 or something) you can only upload data. Empornium has several problems, but leechers isn't really one of them.

    --
    Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
  8. Go anonymous and shove it in their face! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Go with MUTE and they can't stop you!

    Technology that protects your privacy.
    Now with three clients for all platforms.
    Free, GNU, Open Source and a growing network.

    http://www.planetpeer.de/wiki/index.php/MuteDownlo ads/
    http://mute-net.sf.net/

  9. Why not a BitTorrent tracker worm/virus? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Seriously.

    Imagine a mass zombie network of illegal (or legal) content run by people who have no idea they're participating in it.

    If they can create a worm/virus that turns thousands of computers into spam and DDOS zombies, why not one that turns them into BitTorrent trackers (or seeds, or link lists, etc...)? Most of us know how much fun it is to try and get thousands of zombies to stop doing anything, and if they do manage to get one or two shut down, then that's just one or two less insecure computers for the rest of us to deal with. Win/win.

    Granted, there's no money in it, so it'll never happen, but it'd be fun to see viruses/worms used to distribute pirated (or hey, even legal) content.

  10. Re:SUPPLY AND DEMAND by zmollusc · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Throwing millions of dollars at a film doesn't stop it sucking ass.
    If the filesharing doors were truly thrown open, then you could still make a big budget film and make money on it. How? By controlling the supply. Sell tickets in advance for 'jaws 5' and start filming when you have got $90,000,000.

    --
    They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
  11. Re:SUPPLY AND DEMAND by G-funk · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Movies will still get made, but they will be low budget indie-type movies made by artists for art's sake. And they will, 99% of them, suck donkey dick. I've seen low budget films, and they are just BAD. Good movies require millions of dollars to make. Name the last 10 really good movies you saw. Or 20, or 50. How many were low budget (something you or I could make) and how many had budget in the tens of millions?

    You've already answered this. Supply and demand. If enough people really want to see $100 million plus movies, they'll pay to see them. They'll realise pretty quickly that if they don't pay to see spider man, there's not gonna be a spider man 2. And if they refuse to pay, then they didn't want to see it so badly in the first place. Most importantly: All the future unmade movies have no right to exist. If the movie industry ends, so be it. I like big some big budget flicks, and I pay to see them at the cinema, even tho I have a broadband connection and azureus and I don't have to.

    Besides wich even if copyright were thrown out monday morning, the ??AA are still free to excercise whatever technological means they please to stop (most) people copying their garbage.

    --
    Send lawyers, guns, and money!
  12. isoHunt's .torrent index stats by AmVidia+HQ · · Score: 4, Interesting

    With my work on indexing BitTorrent sites, I can shed some light: nothing changed.

    From http://s3.isohunt.com/stats.php?mode=btSites

    You can see smaller sites on the list relative to Suprnova (it had more than 30,000 torrents online at any one time), but total torrents available didn't change (60,000+ online). As I keep adding more sites, index size is getting bigger than before SN died actually, online torrent count is close to 70,000. Peers also remain at above the 1 million mark.

    --
    VIVA1023.com | Political Fashion.
  13. Best torrent sites... by ylikone · · Score: 1, Interesting

    I use the following... and see no slow-down in bittorrent usage.

    http://www.mininova.org/
    http://www.torrentreactor.to/
    http://lokitorrent.com/
    http://www.torrentspy.com/
    http://www.thepiratebay.org/
    http://torrentbox.com/
    http://www.mybittorrent.com/

    For every one site that shuts down, two more spring up to take its place.

    --
    Meh.