'Torrenting' & Ratio

[Aristocles]

I am putting this here because it is really about 'torrenting'.

I think most here agree that at some sites, ratio is not so easy to maintain.

I was, unfortunately, arguing with a guy on a tracker forum about using the seedbox to keep ratio and buffer high. It is a fairly large tracker; but it's a niche tracker with small swarms- often very few to no REAL leechers (there are some of the "partial seeders" who get counted as leechers). I told the guy that in my experience the seedbox was not a great aid over the client & pc route, with places such the one in question. Some, but not vastly. He shot back about the glories using of a seedbox on the tracker and acted as if I needed advice. . .

Shortly I find out that we both have ratios of < 2:1 and his is slightly higher than mine. Then I see his upload amount is very significantly higher than mine. He has done this in four weeks. So, I conclude that the guy has done something that most 'torrenters' find not viable, to wit, he has used the seedbox (with 125GB allowable space) to download only stuff from that tracker, and has milked each torrent as much as possible in a short time shitcanned it. Most all people 'torrenting' use more than one tracker and indeed have a multiplicity of interests, no? Isn't the practiced mentioned, odd?

I told him that with time and a client/pc setup and no real interest in getting things for myself (usually leecher-less) I could accomplish the same.

Am I missing something here, guys?
:unsure::unsure:

[ca_aok]

Sounds like he's RSSing/autodownloading each new release in an attempt to build a lot of buffer fast. Plenty of people do this, perhaps you just haven't seen it before.

As for having a multiplicity of interests, he can worry about those when he has some free space on his box, or use his home connection for those.

[IdolEyes787]

Seedboxes are to a large extent people's response to the incongruities between upload speeds of various countries/IPS.
Unfortunately with no leadership shown by most trackers it is has become like an escalating arms race where the proponents feel they have ample justification ,there are no real winners and the poorest are the ones who suffer most.

The sad fact is since for most people seedboxes are a non-sustainable ( and limited) resource so the normal course is over-seed build as big a buffer as possible( which usually requires dumping of files) in the time allowable and" live " of it for as long as possible .
At least that is the way I see things .

I wish more sites would show a bit of courage/vision like BCG ,iTS and FSC and reward long-term seeding( something a person can control) as much as speed ( something a person can't).

[Aristocles]

Thanks, guys.

[Roark]

Seedboxes are to a large extent people's response to the incongruities between upload speeds of various countries/IPS.
Unfortunately with no leadership shown by most trackers it is has become like an escalating arms race where the proponents feel they have ample justification ,there are no real winners and the poorest are the ones who suffer most.

The sad fact is since for most people seedboxes are a non-sustainable ( and limited) resource so the normal course is over-seed build as big a buffer as possible( which usually requires dumping of files) in the time allowable and" live " of it for as long as possible .
At least that is the way I see things .

I wish more sites would show a bit of courage/vision like BCG ,iTS and FSC and reward long-term seeding( something a person can control) as much as speed ( something a person can't).

People can control speed, they can buy a seedbox. Sites, on the other hand, have a much harder time tracking how long someone is seeding with any accuracy - there's nothing stopping someone from limiting their upload to 0 for example. As a result, the sites with the most ratio pressure generally have the best retention.

The winners are everyone in the swarm who get to download more content at higher speeds. As for the losers, well, with millions of people in the world starving, I can't say I'm all that concerned about the people, including myself, who can'/won't afford a server.

[stoi]

Well we dont really reward anything at the moment, because we dont have classes (well promotion demotions based on ratios or Average seed time anyway).

I do believe there is a place for seedoxes on trackers, but it will come to a point, where there are that many seedoxes, even the seedoxes struggle to get a ratio on these sites (it may take awhile, but it will get there eventually).

We are discussing this on BCG actually, in the latest tracker poll forum topic, and like I said in there, there is nothing wrong with seedboxes, on BCG ecause we have the seed point system, to negate the effects of them. IE if you just seed what you download, we give you the damned ratio, and you will never get banned.

As for retention, I cant quite agree, I know you said generally, but our oldest torrent is from 17 December 2006 and it still has 33 seeders on it, Oviously others die after a couple of months, but thats the same with most trackers, unless they only allow good stuff and only 0 day to be uploaded.

IE: if someone uploads AC2 360 it will last awhile, if someone uploads NBA 1997 for the PS1 it may not even get 1 snatch, never mind last a couple of months.

[soulreaper]

Seedboxes are to a large extent people's response to the incongruities between upload speeds of various countries/IPS.
Unfortunately with no leadership shown by most trackers it is has become like an escalating arms race where the proponents feel they have ample justification ,there are no real winners and the poorest are the ones who suffer most.

The sad fact is since for most people seedboxes are a non-sustainable ( and limited) resource so the normal course is over-seed build as big a buffer as possible( which usually requires dumping of files) in the time allowable and" live " of it for as long as possible .
At least that is the way I see things .

I wish more sites would show a bit of courage/vision like BCG ,iTS and FSC and reward long-term seeding( something a person can control) as much as speed ( something a person can't).

Nicely put. "Control" is the key word here.

[Di@monds]

In the end its about who is seeding, 30 seeders and you cant get more than 50kt/s or 1 seeder with fast connection/sb

[PancakeWaffles]

In the end its about who is seeding, 30 seeders and you cant get more than 50kt/s or 1 seeder with fast connection/sb

killotons?

[Disme]

Hmmm ... I don't know why so many people always complain about the ratio-system.

It's not that hard to maintain a decent ratio. I've been torrenting for a very long time now, and have been, and still am on a ton of trackers and I still have to see the first tracker where I couldn't maintain my ratio.

I have never had to use a seedbox to buffer my accounts. I just let things seed for ages with my home connection.

Off course I only download what I will be using or watching. There's no point in downloading something you know upfront you won't use. Seems rather pointless to me.

I can understand that there are people with a real shitty home-connection, that can never maintain a decent ratio, no matter how long they keep seeding a torrent, but than I would start using another filesharing method to get my files.

God knows there's plenty of different ways to get your files that don't have a ratio-system.

Many people are in favour of trackers without ratio's, but it happens frequently on ratioless trackers that I have downloadspeeds of 0,5-1 KB/s because of people that cap their upload, because that way they can seed for the required timespan, without actually uploading more than 5 MB or so.

[Roark]

Well we dont really reward anything at the moment, because we dont have classes (well promotion demotions based on ratios or Average seed time anyway).

I do believe there is a place for seedoxes on trackers, but it will come to a point, where there are that many seedoxes, even the seedoxes struggle to get a ratio on these sites (it may take awhile, but it will get there eventually).

We are discussing this on BCG actually, in the latest tracker poll forum topic, and like I said in there, there is nothing wrong with seedboxes, on BCG ecause we have the seed point system, to negate the effects of them. IE if you just seed what you download, we give you the damned ratio, and you will never get banned.

As for retention, I cant quite agree, I know you said generally, but our oldest torrent is from 17 December 2006 and it still has 33 seeders on it, Oviously others die after a couple of months, but thats the same with most trackers, unless they only allow good stuff and only 0 day to be uploaded.

IE: if someone uploads AC2 360 it will last awhile, if someone uploads NBA 1997 for the PS1 it may not even get 1 snatch, never mind last a couple of months.

It's a good point - I'm not on BCG so I tend to overlook them when making this point - I had sites like Bitmetv, oink, and hdbits in mind. It may turn out that what matters most is someone getting a critical mass of users to believe you are the pre-eminent source for that type of content. Look at bitmetv, not too long ago, they could barely keep the site online in the evenings because of the amount of traffic. And the best part is the traffic was all there to download 0-day tv shows, which are practically a commodity.

[supercoolkid]

I feel what you are trying to say. But look at it from the perspective of a guy one a really slow line. Or a guy whose upload speed is throttled. His only viable option is to seed each file he downloads to eternity hoping he would make the ratio and not get kicked out.

or get a seedbox and a decent buffer.

Perspectives are different. But I do agree that they should ease of the buffering so others have a chance to seed properly too. And also even if you have a great buffer, seed each torrent atleast for 1 month.

[IdolEyes787]

But wasn't the real reason that BMTV was flooded at certain times because people simply knew that certain torrents gave them the best chance of building some ratio on a ( in some cases) very hard to build ratio site so everyone and his brother tended to hop on at once?
I would also like to add to my previous comment that for sites not considered difficult to join it probably isn't feasible to even consider going ratio-less or something equivalent to it since people would then consider their accounts disposable and probably hit and run like crazy.

[Roark]

I feel what you are trying to say. But look at it from the perspective of a guy one a really slow line. Or a guy whose upload speed is throttled. His only viable option is to seed each file he downloads to eternity hoping he would make the ratio and not get kicked out.

or get a seedbox and a decent buffer.

Perspectives are different. But I do agree that they should ease of the buffering so others have a chance to seed properly too. And also even if you have a great buffer, seed each torrent atleast for 1 month.


I'm sorry, but even as someone who's had to seed downloads forever, I can't help but see the situation as an unmitigated boon to a tracker that has rare content. It seems 0-day trackers are now so common that it's much harder to get people to seed forever through ratio, but in the case of say oink, it definitely helped build a great music library. Meanwhile, if I have a great buffer somewhere and limited bandwidth, I'm going to seed as little as possible in order to dedicate my bandwidth to sites that need it.



But wasn't the real reason that BMTV was flooded at certain times because people simply knew that certain torrents gave them the best chance of building some ratio on a ( in some cases) very hard to build ratio site so everyone and his brother tended to hop on at once?
I would also like to add to my previous comment that for sites not considered difficult to join it probably isn't feasible to even consider going ratio-less or something equivalent to it since people would then consider their accounts disposable and probably hit and run like crazy.
That might have been part of it, but I'd be surprised if it was that significant. I used to get all my TV there because it's unrar'ed, and on a regular 8/1 line I'd be lucky to reach a ratio of 2.0 on a few hundred megabyte file. The real ratio at bitmetv came from long-term seeding of packs (and uploading of course). To your last point, those sites are screwed coming and going - people can get just new accounts if they're banned for ratio too. And yet Demonoid probably has the best collection of rare apps that I've come across.

[stoi]

Well i have been on all 3 ends of the spectrum.

Started out as a public tracker, lots of leechers and seeders, for a week, then death to all torrents (well not that bad, but it felt like it).

Global ratio only, popular stuff lasts for a awhile, not so popular stuff doesnt, lots of members donating then hit and running everything, which in turn means stuff doesnt last that long.

Our system, in all honesty why it does work i have no idea, its one of those mysteries of the universe i think lol but the simple premise is, you can download anything you like, and not have to worry about getting a hit on your ratio, believe it or not, most members are quite happy with a 1 ratio, they dont care about e-penis ratios, as long as they can use the tracker, they are happy, and as we do give you the 1 ratio on every torrent, members are not scared to download, and then in turn, seed for longer to let others download if they want it.

I think it works because they are not forced to seed (over SP to Cost), they choose to seed, there is a world of difference.

Only problem is, donations have went down a lot from gloal ratio to Sp ratio, i dont really care that much though, i still have not made a plea for donations in 7 years of running a tracker, and i wont start now, all i am saying is that is one drawback of doing it our way, but i will never ever go back to global ratio only, pissed me off seeing members donating every month, then hit and running everything they could because they thought they could, just because they donated.

There is a place for all of us, if you prefer one then use it, if you prefer the other then use it, its entirely up to you, I know BCG`s way is hated by a lot, ut i also know a hell of a lot love it so we can never please everyone.

[Quarterquack]

Our system, in all honesty why it does work i have no idea, its one of those mysteries of the universe i think lol

Probably because it's a game tracker. Think about it, you never threw out any of your old "physical" games. I'm sure not many people throw out that many digital ones either, for the sake of keeping the collection together. That's why people seed for long. Don't also forget that a lot of torrents on BCG intertwine, for example the TF2 game/online play combination is split up over 4-5 smaller parts, which in turn means 4-5 active torrents instead of 1.

Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong, but it does work. :P

[Cabalo]

I'm one of those who enjoys BCG's unique SP system.
As stoi said, the system does work and old stuff are well seeded and with decent speeds, which is very hard to find anywhere else.
I download mostly from newsgroups but recently I had the urge to go play again my all time favourite game (or better, its latest remake) and I didn't hesitate download it from there, no matter if I knew I would never reach 1:1. Besides, the full pack with mods etc couldn't be found anywhere else on the webs.
I kept it seeded for around a month, even though I had reached the SP goal long before, and don't ask me why. It just works.

(by the way, great skin, finally! Modern and pleasant to browse)

I still think there are some psychological aspects behind the ratioless sites that make it hard to keep the torrents seeded for long, but I don't have an explanation for those. I know it took me a while to not feel guilty not having achieved 1:1 on any torrent, no matter how hard I tried. Same happens with some friends of mine. It's the seedbox factor, I guess.