Quote:
Originally Posted by Gilles
Hello Ike, pardon my ignorance but what are 'torrents'..?
Regards!
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Torrents are form sharing files using decentralized trackers. It works like this....
A file has an associated torrent file that has been created and published on the web (thepiratebay.org is the very best one)
You download torrent file and open with a torrent client program (uTorrent or BitTorrent are 2 examples)
The client program then connects you with other people sharing that file (hosts) for you to download.
Sounds a lot like napster, right?
Here's the beauty of it though - you never actually download the file itself. No one actually shares the file itself. The torrent file acts as a "map" to know how to request blocks of binary code from the hosts, and then in turn assemble those blocks of binary into a working file on your computer.
The legal ramifications and consequences of such activities are hotly debated, suffice it to say that since you are not actually downloading the copyrighted data directly, no one can demonstrate what you have actually done. It is SO effective at this that ISPs actually have gone through numerous generations of attempts at stopping this type of activity and they have all failed. Several ISPs were successfully sued by people engaged in torrent trafficking because the ISPs knew what they were doing and throttled their bandwidth (essentially cut them down to dial up speeds as "punishment" since they had no other form of recourse) but the ISPs couldn't prove anything and the denial of service was deemed illegal. Hah! That decision was then later actually confirmed by Congress who passed a bill that outlawed such practices - not because they support copyright infringement, but because this is America and if you can't prove I did it then you've got the wrong guy
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