The Pirate Bay Tops 10 Million Users

An anonymous reader suggests we go over to Slyck for news that The Pirate Bay has cracked 10 million users. The publicity from the upcoming court case probably helped. "Today, The Pirate Bay asserts itself as the self-proclaimed 'World's Largest Tracker' by topping over 10 million peers, while managing over 1 million torrents. Peter Sunde of The Pirate Bay told Slyck, 'We're very happy to be part of all of this and we hope our users keep sharing those files!... And we're looking to break 20 million as well.'"

Comments

It all comes down to $$$

[ihaveamo]

I don't believe they do it for the love, (or some damn-fool idealistic crusade, for that matter). Anyone know how much money a site like the pir8 bay makes?? (Just banner revinue, or something more insidious)

Re:It all comes down to $$$

[CSMatt]

All the Pirate Bay administrators are doing is providing a tracker, which can very well (and does) link to legal content as well as illegal. The fact that they are generating income from ads placed on search results is irreverent. You might as well say that Google is guilty of infringement as well, since they index both legal and illegal material with a similar business model and are constantly defending their ability to do so.

Re:It all comes down to $$$

[TheGoodSteven]

I also doubt that Smith & Wesson produce guns simply for their love of firearms. I won't reject your argument; of course if there was no money to be had they would quickly disappear. However this line of reasoning can be made toward numerous other companies with negative outcomes that are many times worse.

Re:It all comes down to $$$

[Damon Tog]

You might as well say that Google is guilty of infringement as well, since they index both legal and illegal material with a similar business model and are constantly defending their ability to do so.

A couple of other companies have used a similar argument, shortly before getting shut down. Napster and Grokster were basically search engines that could be used for both legal or illegal purposes, but the courts didn't buy it.

Google, or an ISP, can reasonably argue that they provide services that are mostly used for lawful purposes, even though some illegal activity takes place. The difficult argument that the pirate trackers are faced with is that when you are providing a service that is being used primarily to infringe copyrights, even if the service can be used to share Linux distributions, you're potentially liable.

Re:It all comes down to $$$

[Anonymous Coward]

It's always a rediculous argument. Oh it's just a tracker, wink wink nudge nudge. Oh we don't transport contraband across the border we provide trucks for both legal and illegal goods we simply don't pass judgment on those using the service. Another post claimed they only take in enough revenue to cover bandwidth. Do they do it full time? If so are they living in their parents basement? Where'd they get the money for all the equipment? It's all rationalization. Saying it's all digital information makes it all better. What if you spent five years working on a video game. You start selling the game and it's moderately popular so you start making 10K a month. Some one posts it on Pirate Bay then miraculously your revenue drops to 2K a month and you have to go back to working at Fries Electronics and you can't aford to make another video game. Is it still a victimless crime? You put five years of your life into a game and Pirate Bay benefits not you. Does it really make you feel better while you're working 9 to 5 that thousands of people are enjoying your game for free while you can't aford to make another? Go out and use the popularity to get a job at professional gaming company? So you have to work 9 to 5 at a gaming company so people can get your game for free? And what about the five years of your life? And what if the company ha to then lay you off because their games are being pirated as well? A the core it's about getting something for nothing and Pirate Bay are seen as folk heroes for providing the service while they get to make money for facilitating the pirating of copyrighted materials. This isn't about striking a blow for liberty it's about stealing other people's work. Want the game or movie or album? Pay for it. Don't want to pay for anything? There's lots of free stuff on the web. Don't like the free stuff but you like the commercial stuff? Well the commercial stuff costs money to make. Believe it or not you won't die if you don't get the new Brittany Spears album for free. When I was growing up we didn't have free downloads and some how we managed to survive. I've heard arguments that illegal downloads increase sales yet sales have steadily dropped ever since downloading became popular. At this stage it's a no win situation so I personally look forward to all the music and movie studios closing their doors. Then people will really have something to complain about. I just hope there's enough mirrors to go around so people can see who to blame. The people running those companies will just move on to another industry it's the average person that watches the movies and listens to the music that will suffer.

Re:It all comes down to $$$

[alexgieg]

Oh we don't transport contraband across the border we provide trucks for both legal and illegal goods we simply don't pass judgment on those using the service.

This is a perfectly reasonable line of action. Why should some goods from abroad be tagged "illegal" by some clueless bureaucrat? I know what I want to buy. I don't need them to block me from purchasing what they dislike.

What if you spent five years working on a video game. You start selling the game and it's moderately popular so you start making 10K a month. Some one posts it on Pirate Bay then miraculously your revenue drops to 2K a month and you have to go back to working at Fries Electronics and you can't aford to make another video game. Is it still a victimless crime?

Then you did a poor market research. You see: offline games can be pirated easily, don't expect generally underfunded teens not to pirate them. Online subscription-based games, on the other hand, not so much. On one extreme, WoW alone has 10 million paying players and counting, with just a few, almost empty pirate servers scattered here and there; on the other, Steam offers almost any game you might wish, all under a cheap monthly fee. And online free games, where your revenue comes from advertising and/or selling in-game items? Well, just look at the profits those South-Korean software-houses make. Some of those games have more than 25 million players.

But talking about children and teens again, I don't get it. Why do game and media companies focus so much on selling to people who have NO MONEY?!? For the typical teen, who only has a computer because his dad gave him one on Christmas, paying $50 on a game is most of the time impossible, period. I'm 30-years old and only now I'm starting to be in a position where spending $50 now and then on useless entertainment is becoming something I can do without a second thought.

If you're a lone developer really wanting to make money by selling offline games, I suggest you make something very casual-friendly (10 minute play time is ideal), playable by people in their 30s and 40s who aren't gamers (think the Solitaire or MineSweeper loving kind), and good enough to be picked up by something like RealArcade. It's convenient enough and, at $15 or $20, also cheap enough for its target audience. Two clicks, they have the game installed, Real has its share, and you have your money, everything with hardly any piracy at all, since those games are not what (poor) teens usually look for when they want to play something.

At this stage it's a no win situation so I personally look forward to all the music and movie studios closing their doors. Then people will really have something to complain about. I just hope there's enough mirrors to go around so people can see who to blame. The people running those companies will just move on to another industry it's the average person that watches the movies and listens to the music that will suffer.

As the fine folks of the Swedish Pirate Party have put it, the ease with which anyone can copy anything on the Internet has caused a dichotomy to develop between entertainment business, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, technological development and online privacy. For the entertainment business profits to remain as high as they were before the Internet developed the only long term solution is both for key technological developments to be blocked as well as for intrusive (and very exploitable) online surveillance laws targeting all citizens to be passed and enacted in as many countries and jurisdictions as possible. It's either this, or the entertainment business adapting to a lower revenue stream.

So, if our options are between and unencumbered technological developments, a free Internet, and no authoritarian surveillance society, with the downside of "music and movie studios closing", as you put it; or a strongly controlled technological landscape, a locked Internet with mandatory ISP content analysis, and government backed intrusive preemptive surveillance of online activities, with the upside of music and movie studios making tons of money; I know which one I prefer. What about you?

Biggest tracker and it shows

[drcagn]

As much as I love TPB for its antics, it really is a crappy tracker. It's hard to search and it's filled with shit.

Re:1:10?!?

[darkhitman]

Of course, one should hope that the majority are seeding the rest of files

You must be new to Bittorrent.

Re:But remember kids - piracy actually *helps* peo

[Mike89]

because they only download movies they wouldn't watch otherwise.

I download movies I wouldn't pay to see at the cinema. If I like it, I buy the DVD.

And shows they watch anyways. For "backup" purposes.

Half of the shows I like aren't broadcast in my country, and if they are, in no particular order.

And computer programs and games they are thinking about getting. For evaluation purposes.

I can't argue with you on this one, but a lot of the community here uses all freeware/open source and has no need to pirate shitty overpriced software.

Maybe if the Pirate Bay is able to make so much money off this, the RIAA/MPAA should get smart and do the same. I'd happily buy the TV shows and movies I download now if there was a legitimate way to pay for them and get them in a format that I actually wanted (Xvid, please). If DVDs didn't have 10 minutes of forced watching at the start, they'd get more sales out of them too. Do you really think the multi-million (billion?) dollar corporations need you here to stand up for them?

eMule, Gnutella, Gnucleus & Tom Slyck

[Antiocheian]

I just had a look at the news section and I think slyck.com seems to be aware of two p2p networks only: Bittorrent and Limewire (not generally Gnutella, just Limewire).

The only time Slyck mentioned eMule was when he questioned the reasoning of Sourceforge in awarding eMule as the "Best New Project" of 2007. He didn't mention eMule at the title of the article of course.

Not that a juggernaut like eMule needs Slyck, but smaller open source projects like Gnucleus did and Tom almost never said a word about them. He was too busy advertising Limewire for his buddies.

How sad is it...

[Smordnys s'regrepsA]

...that I use it for downloads all the time, and never took the time to notice I could sign up for an account? That being said, what do they keep track of on your account? I don't want something tied to my name that could be used against me in court.

Pay them to work

[Mr2001]

And we could just switch to FOSS movies, TV and computer programs anyways. It has to be true - I read it on Slashdot! No need. Here's a novel idea: how about paying people to create movies, TV, and computer programs?

You know, paying them directly for working, for doing what they enjoy and are good at. Not for making copies, which is something any trained monkey with a DVD burner can do.

Recording a song, filming a movie, or writing a program takes just as much effort, and deserves just as much compensation, no matter how many copies are eventually made. At least that's what common sense tells us. Copyright, however, links the author's compensation to the number of copies he can sell -- which makes little sense on its face, and no sense at all in a world where copying is a trivial matter that anyone can perform for himself, with no skill or investment needed. Authors and consumers alike would benefit from a more sensible business model.

Well, it sure helps *ME*

[Smordnys s'regrepsA]

...because they only download movies they wouldn't watch otherwise. Wouldn't watch at the current prices, yes. If I wasn't downloading, I would be waiting for the DVD. Even then, I wouldn't be buying - I'd rent or borrow. I'll start paying for things when they start setting a price I like, in a respectable time frame. If they released the DVD the same day/week/month as the theatrical release, then they would see more of my money. I'd pay a little extra DVDs that come out early, but still have special features/deleted scenes/etc.

Same with the programs and games - need something decent but more my price range, or they'll continue to lose out on any of my money - though I usually just stick with freeware, so I can share my love with uptight "I just want to stay legal" friends.

Did I just feed the trolls? Sorry.

Re:But remember kids - piracy actually *helps* peo

[kamapuaa]

I download movies I wouldn't pay to see at the cinema. If I like it, I buy the DVD.

So you don't rent them? If such movies really don't have any value to you, why do you bother seeking them out, and then spend your time watching them? Why don't you download the freely available movies on (say) archive.org? Obviously you think they're better in some way.

I can't argue with you on this one, but a lot of the community here uses all freeware/open source and has no need to pirate shitty overpriced software.

I very much doubt the amount of people browsing Slashdot from a Linux computer is more than a couple percent. Anyway if the software is shitty & overpriced, does that make it OK to steal it? Wouldn't that just drive people into using freeware/open source? Most Slashdot discussion of high-profile open source projects is given to how shit they are - Gimp comes to mind.

Your after-the-fact rationalizations are absurd. Just admit that you can steal easily and there's likely no direct personal consequences, so you go ahead and do it.

Wow!!

[cheesecake23]

The Pirate Bay asserts itself as the self-proclaimed 'World's Largest Tracker' by topping over 10 million peers, ...

OMG!!! It's the elusive triple redundant double reflexive superfluous tautology!! (I tried to make that triply redundant and doubly reflexive but failed dismally.)

This kind of construct is quite subtle. According to TFA, The Pirate Bay is not claiming to be the world's largest tracker, but the "self-proclaimed world's largest tracker". Positively Colbertian.

Why someone needs to stand up for the RIAA

[Dobeln]

"I download movies I wouldn't pay to see at the cinema. If I like it, I buy the DVD." I download movies, then... well, I sure as hell don't go out and buy a DVD. I'm fairly certain there is a substantial number of people like me among TPB users.

"Half of the shows I like aren't broadcast in my country, and if they are, in no particular order." I know, being able to watch The Wire Season five the day after it was on in the US is great. For me. But will I watch it again when it shows up on basic/medium cable in a year or two? The question sort of answers itself, no?

"I can't argue with you on this one, but a lot of the community here uses all freeware/open source and has no need to pirate shitty overpriced software." I am curious - if the "overpriced" (I.e. price>0) software is indeed "shitty", why do so many people pirate it on sites like TPB instead of downloading the superior FOSS alternatives?

Maybe if the Pirate Bay is able to make so much money off this, the RIAA/MPAA should get smart and do the same. Hmm... perhaps running a torrent site where you offer what others have produced for free is a different business proposition compared to actually *producing* the movies/TV shows/software on offer? Nah.

If DVDs didn't have 10 minutes of forced watching at the start, they'd get more sales out of them too. Probably, yes. But that's a marginal issue, and you know it.

Do you really think the multi-million (billion?) dollar corporations need you here to stand up for them? So it seems, considering I got modded "Troll" for merely offering up a contrary viewpoint to the self-serving Slashdot groupthink.

Re:But remember kids - piracy actually *helps* peo

[IamTheRealMike]

So? I don't see how this is anything except rationalization. There are films you simply must see, and you must see them right now, but you don't want to see them enough to actually go to the cinema. That sounds pretty lame to me.

The thing is that you don't have any inherent right to watch movies or TV shows. It's actually not a grey area at all. You didn't make that stuff, it's not yours, you watch it at the pleasure of those who put in the effort to make it. If they decide that DVDs come out at a different time to the cinema release, tough on you! Yeah I don't like it either, but it's not my decision, it's theirs, because they made the film! If it was really such a huge deal, some movie makers would start releasing movies with different schedule, that's how the market works.

Pretty much every problem you have can be solved by just waiting for these movies or TV shows to come out on DVD and then renting them.

Re:10 million users?

[v1]

I wonder if anyone has tried to bring up the notion that the legality of an action should be decided by the majority of the people. Once a P2P site gets to a certain point, doesn't the sheer size of its membership say something about whether or not it should be legal?

WTO

[tepples]

why can't you just grasp the concept that US law applies only on US land? Because the Berne Convention applies throughout World Trade Organization member states.

Re:10 million users?

[nomadic]

I wonder if anyone has tried to bring up the notion that the legality of an action should be decided by the majority of the people. Once a P2P site gets to a certain point, doesn't the sheer size of its membership say something about whether or not it should be legal?

No.

Re:10 million users?

[TurinPT]

wait what?

So what you're saying is... since pretty much the whole world wants bars of gold, the federal reserve should hand them out for free.
Makes perfect sense.

Problem with Pirate Bay's success

[russotto]

One potentially large problem -- for the eyepatch and jolly roger set, anyway -- with The Pirate Bay's ubiquity is that it's now a single point of attack for the xxAAs. It doesn't really matter what Swedish law says, eventually the industry will get it shut down, whether that means buying new laws, planting child porn on the operators, or just plain having them kidnapped and flown to the US for "trial".

Once that happens, an enormous source of torrents dries up. There used to be several others, but most of them have fallen by the wayside. No doubt several more will spring up in the event of TPBs demise, but it'll be a long, dry, several days while the xxAAs crow about their victory.

Re:10 million users?

[cdrguru]

Ask the people in inner-city Detroit or Washington DC. By this rule, murder should be legal, at least in those places.

Certainly prostitution, extortion and drugs should be legal. Just like the Internet.

Re:10 million users?

[Metaphorically]

Wtf? Not saying the parent is right or wrong but how the hell do you get the idea that most people in Detroit or Washington or even a large number of those people think that murder is okay? I assume you're using those two places because of the higher crime and murder rates but by no means is it comparable to the situation with file sharing.

Besides that the laws around copyright and copyright infringement are a lot more complicated than the idea that killing someone is wrong.

I guess I shouldn't even have justified this comment with a response but I'm just blown away that it somehow got modded insightful...