TorrentFreak Interviews The Pirate Bay Staff, As the Torrent Website Celebrates 13th Anniversary (torrentfreak.com)

For most people out there, The Pirate Bay has been their on and off go to source for torrents. The website this month celebrates its 13th anniversary. TorrentFreak spoke with several crew members of the "world's most resilient torrent site" this week. Here's an excerpt of the conversation:While they are not happy with the circumstances, they do say that the site has an important role to fulfil in the torrent community. "TPB is as important today as it was yesterday, and its role in being the galaxy's most resilient torrent site will continue for the foreseeable future," Spud17 says. "Sure, TPB has its flaws and glitches but it's still the go-to site for all our media needs, and I can see TPB still being around in 20 or 30 years time, even if the technology changes," she adds. Veteran TPB-crew member Xe agrees that TPB isn't perfect but points to the site's resilience as a crucial factor that's particularly important today. "TPB ain't perfect. There are plenty of things wrong with it, but it is simple, steadfast and true," Xe tells TorrentFreak. "So it's no real surprise that it is once more the destination of choice or that it has survived for so long in spite of the inevitable turnover of crew." And resilient it is. Thirteen years after the site came online, The Pirate Bay is the "King of Torrents" once again.

Comments

Discussion on Pirate Bay

[rockout]

What are the chances that the discussion here will focus on the Pirate Bay's remarkable resilience and not devolve in 3 minutes into a pro/anti piracy collection of rants?

Re:Discussion on Pirate Bay

[Falos]

slim none blah blah

However you feel about that drama, you can still appreciate the idea of a site which demonstrates (yet another example of) the hard reality that "you can't stop the signal". At best, you can stop a repeater.

Re:Discussion on Pirate Bay

[Flavianoep]

I'm anti-piracy, but that's not reason for me to rant about it. I'm also anti-DRM, and pro unrestricted access to any form of media or info under a fair price, so you can bet I've lost all hopes of having the world shaped according to my views.

Re:Discussion on Pirate Bay

[FlyHelicopters]

However you feel about that drama, you can still appreciate the idea of a site which demonstrates (yet another example of) the hard reality that "you can't stop the signal". At best, you can stop a repeater.

Don't be silly, of course you can... The government just doesn't care about this all that much...

When is the last time the people running TPB were shot?

Do that a few times and you may find fewer takers for the job...

Re:Discussion on Pirate Bay

[SuricouRaven]

I view it as a simple binary choice. Piracy will always exist, and be rampant, without the use of draconian measures to prevent it. Not just in the form of very restrictive DRM, but very strict legal measures to back it up and restrictions on technology. Those measures have to do away with little things like trials or presumption of innocence, because the sheer number of infringements would overwhelm the court system otherwise. Look at the DMCA: It makes it trivial for a copyright holder to pull anything they want off the internet with nothing more than an accusation, backed up by no evidence, with no penalty for errors or abuse, and it's still barely making a dent. This means you can't have a world where there is a little bit of piracy and a little bit of restriction: It has to be all or nothing. I choose the piracy - even if it means eventual economic losses to the media industry, the loss of pop stars and big-budget television seems acceptable.

I am reconsidering this though, in light of certain more recent evidence: Piracy rates may be rampant, but the entertainment industry seems to be flourishing. Hollywood breaks their records every year, usually with some sci-fi-action film that should have maximum appeal to the demographic most likely to pirate. Music revenues are up as well, as legal downloads have overtaken the loss of CD sales. This is not what I predicted - I underestimated just how successful legal media sources would be. Netflix is killing piracy.

Re:Thieves and crooks!

[MitchDev]

Democrats and republicans!
Religion and businessmen!

Re:Thieves and crooks!

[jellomizer]

Which is sad, the Torrent technology has a lot of promise, being that it was mostly used for pirated media gives it a bad name, where many ISP just will block it.

It's still legit?

[Dracos]

Is it still legit and not an FBI honeypot? That's what a lot of people have been wondering since the strange happenings of the last takedown attempt.

Re:It's still legit?

[AmiMoJo]

Would be FBI give a shit? I don't think they would bother with individual downloaders.

Anyway, the site is being watched by far too many people, and any malware injected would be quickly spotted and dissected. Look at the lengths they want to keep their malware secret in the Playpen prosecutions of people accused of looking at child pornography, they wouldn't waste it on some people downloading MP3s.

TPB is fast, clean (they don't even have downloads any more, just magnet links) and impossible to kill. It's cultural importance can't be underestimated.

What does that even mean?

[tacokill]

Please explain. How would TPB be a honeypot? The only files they offer for download are torrent files, which in and of themselves, aren't illegal. So why would the FBI or anyone else make it a honeypot? What would they learn about the users from that?

Re:What does that even mean?

[SuricouRaven]

Downloaders, nothing worth knowing. But uploaders? They could trace the people who submit the torrents in the first place, and those might be worth the effort. With a bit of luck it might even lead to some of the high-profile groups.

Re:What does that even mean?

[rockout]

Seems doubtful. Aren't most of the files anyone cares about first being uploaded to newsgroups? After that, anyone can grab a movie and try to be the first to put it on TPB. Catching that guy isn't going to get you anywhere.

If you think TPB is a honeypot, I've got a few questions about 9/11 and jet contrails that I need to ask you. You know, before I politely excuse myself and find a normal person to talk to.

Re:What does that even mean?

[zennling]

hasn't it happened before where the torrent files are being provided by the rights holders themselves, to get the ip's of users? because ot the way torrents work, they are actually uploading the file as well and can be prosecuted as sharing the file?

Aargh!

[cyberzephyr]

Aargh!

Re: Future is walled gardens for hardware...

[houstonbofh]

I just bought Tomb Raider for Linux today. That came out for Windows in 2013... So delay is not a fix, just a delay. (And I bought it because I support native Linux ports. And Humble had it on sale... :) )

Re:Thieves and crooks!

[SuricouRaven]

Torrent technology had a single niche. People who needed to:
1. Distribute tons of data.
2. Do so on a zero or near-zero budget, otherwise they'd just use a conventional HTTP server or CDN.
There are not many groups who fit both those criteria. Pirates, and linux distros. Both use torrents.

And PIRACY DISCUSSION

[rockout]

Well, that took longer than I thought, but there it is.