Torrenting

I use it for absolutely everything, films tv books music and games. It does seem to be a dying art though (not that it will ever die), a lot of the younger people I speak to at work don't seem to know what it is, they don't seem to engage in any piracy tbh, happier to have 10 different subscription services dipping into their bank accounts every month.

There's been threads about this before on boards. Some view it as theft as its not like you paid for it. Others view it as victimless as its not like you stole it from a shop. Then there's those who justify it. It's sharing etc. No different than giving someone a blu ray etc.

I hate the latter though. Like come on now, let's call a spade a spade. Connecting to 50 strangers computers to get a file is not the same as lending a blu ray.

Is what it is. Millions do it.

I love a bit of torrenting :)

I'd download a car

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4939441/files

I say torrenting is gonna get even more popular and not how it is now. 3d printers are still early days but you can already download files to print a gun!

Can you imagine what they will be like in 30 years? Every home might have one like a TV. Companies like nescafe could sell files to print a coffee machine say. That's all gonna go on torrent sites.

Could be a crazy future.

Used to torrent a lot. These days I only torrent if I want to watch something I can't get elsewhere. Typically if a new series is released on amazon or so.e other streaming service i will pay the 7 quid and cancel it after a month, much less hassle

Nice try FBI man!

If you can afford to pay for music ,use spotify, or youtube, if you have fast broadband a pc or ,laptop you can afford to pay for it. people used to just record songs on cassette in the days before the web existed . pc games are very cheap on steam, steam sales, free games on epic store , i see no point in torrenting a pc game.

most console games are 300gig plus, i don,t think anyone is torrenting ps4,ps5,or xbox 1 games .you cna also buy merch if you want to support your favorite bands .I use an app to download videos from youtube , i know people in rural area,s where all they have is a 4g connection on mobile ,theres no acess to broadband .Unless they get a satellite dish installed .i think its morally wrong to pirate movies if you can afford to pay for netflix.is there anyone really torrenting a 300 gig pc 4k game .theres also the risk of malware,virus, s if you are using torrent websites for game files i,m happy to watch any film in 1080p hd.

I have Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime (though I might cancel that one). I still torrent because not everything is available on them (such as HBO stuff), and I'm not paying for another subscription even if the likes of HBO Max does become available here.

The future with 3D printing is rather interesting, all sorts in theory is possible once you have the plans available, lots of old school Jap cars I'd love to 'download'.

If I can't find something I want to watch on one of the myriad of streaming apps I use then I torrent. I do torrent plenty of audiobooks though.

I amassed a decent collection of jazz, soul, reggae and African music through Vuze. Most if not all of the artists and studio engineers are dead and I got my ears opened to a wide variety of art so I'm guilt free. Spotify is the real enemy paying a pittance to modern day performers it makes money off.

It really whips the llamas ass.

I'm not sure how you deduced that. Someone who successfully phishes is actually directly taking money from another person. You missed the point; it wasn't about the technicality of stealing, it was about the actual net result of the act.

In my case, I said I torrent stuff that I would never otherwise pay for. The last thing I torrented was the utterly dreadful Escape Room 2. If torrenting didn't exist, I would never pay for it, in any format, and would be quite happy never watching it.

Therefore the injured party, whilst technically a victim of "crime" has not suffered any loss whatsoever.

Other people do take money from studio pockets, by torrenting in lieu of paying, be it digital, cinema, physical, whatever. I never suggested otherwise.

But in most cases people torrent stuff because they can, but will still prefer to watch most things either via sub, cinema, TV, whatever.

In my case I go to the cinema very regularly, I do have valid subs, and I also buy physical blu-rays of a lot of movies I had to intially torrent to be able to see, because I do believe in supporting things.

95% of what I torrent is stuff that I would never have paid for in the first place, that I'd happily go without if the option wasn't there. The other 5% is typically stuff that simply isn't legally available via any means in Ireland.

EG I previously mentioned Posessor Uncut. I had to torrent that because it was only available on Amazon Prime via VPN.....in a censored version. So I torrented the unrated version, and subsequently bought the unrated Blu-Ray. It will never be taken out of the packaging.

I still torrent the odd thing, but I get most my entertainment from Netflix, Prime, Crunchyroll and Spotify. If I can't get it on any of them, I'm likely to torrent. But I notice there's definitely a helluva lot more people doing illegal streams. I don't know how, even the best quality illegal stream is not good enough for me. Torrenting gives you the best possible picture (but it may take a few downloads to confirm the good one, but thankfully there are still plenty of trusted uploaders). I'm probably going to cancel Prime as I haven't even opened it in months, but it's cheap at a fiver I think. And Crunchyroll may be merged into PS+ soon so will be one less sub (albeit the PS+ will probably increase in price).

But I find torrenting is only good for relatively recent stuff, or extremely popular older stuff. I've been trying to find the best legal way to watch all 4 seasons of Spartacus again, but it's just not available over here, and I've been unable to find a decent stream or torrent. The complete series on Bluray is only about €20 now, so that's now an option too.

Paying however much for Disney and then on their streaming service they release a "premium film" for an additional 30 quid? that's a torrenting.

Don't get the complaint about Disney on this one. The premium film is for new releases put on the platform instead of being released in cinema as they were closed due to Covid.

Cost was €21.99 not €30 and if a family of 4 for example wanted to go to cinema to see it then they would have spent considerably more so it was not a bad deal.

Rarely torrent anything at all nowadays, last one I did was a 40GB Justice League 4K rip and I still haven't gotten around to watching it yet....

Most stuff is on IPTV now so I don't really download that much at all anymore...

Pay for Netflix and get the Prime 30 day trials every now and again (never bother renewing it as I'd usually get through anything I want to watch on that platform in a week or two), use a lot of the Catchup Services for telly and the rest I torrent.

With every content owner now trying to create their own VOD platform, and most of them being awful, there's no way I'd even consider encouraging them by subscribing.

I'm happy enough to pay for content, we'd be regular cinema goers and I had a fairly large DVD collection back in the day but the sheer inconvenience of having to jump between so many different platforms and the abject frustration at having to deal with some of the awful user interfaces (looking at your here Amazon!) has driven millions back onto the torrent sites.

Ah yes. torrenting is so much easier for millions of people than Amazon Prime's complicated interface.

Anyhow the point about having multiiple apps/platforms is valid.

I wonder if there'll every be one app that gives access to all on one platform would be very useful.

I haven’t Torrented in years either, partly from a lazy assumption that ISPs would block the traffic. I also don’t like the idea of my IP address being visible to authorities who could trace it through my ISP if they wanted to. From the way it sounds, neither of those concerns are really justified, so I may just dip a toe in again.

I would torrent considerably less if the Irish catalogues on a lot of streaming services didn't lack so many shows or films. In some cases a platform will have season 3/4 of a show but not season 1 and 2.

ya.. I guess it's the laziness thing... I can just tell Alexa to "play XYZ" and it starts playing on my Firestick instantly... vs having to turn on my computer... log onto the torrent site.. search for the file... choose a reliable source ... start downloading... etc etc

Greater barrier to entry vs just sitting back on my couch and shouting out a sentence.

The monthly cost doesn't bother me either, as I pay using my spare phone credit (which is paid for by the company)