should tracker staff get paid?

To be precise on a subject that has been touched upon in this thread, giving benefits in any way for a donation, makes it not a donation. In the USA and a lot of other countries, giving benefits/rewards/incentives for donations makes it donation solicitation.

However, paying employees or even yourself with donation money is allowed, so long as you officially document it as a form of employment when you file those taxes.

you don't get benefits from donations.
if someone donate he is donate because he want too and not because the benefits.
I donate many times too some trackers and never ask for return
what you call benefits its just a gratitude for your donation, and besides.. no one force you to donate and its up to you if you donate or not.

I´m sorry but I think that in the moment that the user gets something else than the thanks, even if it is only one of those useless and ridiculous star, the thing stops being a donation.

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Originally Posted by stoi

Well its not really a voucher for more download (ok sometimes it is if the tracker gives you 350gig for a tenner, and have no hit and run policy, i can see that) its more you donate so you do not get banned.

but on BCG you cant get banned for a low ratio, and you cant use a buffer to just "download" anything you want, you can even download 1TB and not upload byte and still not get banned on BCG. but i am seriously considering bringing Gigs for £ back, i have even halfed the donation amount from the other month, thinking make it lower, more may donate, but its basically just the same ones donating, but at half the price.

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While that argument works on a filesharing forum the chances of getting a court to understand it/accept it are pretty slim. All they're going to see is the offer of cash for easier download.

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Originally Posted by integral

To be precise on a subject that has been touched upon in this thread, giving benefits in any way for a donation, makes it not a donation. In the USA and a lot of other countries, giving benefits/rewards/incentives for donations makes it donation solicitation.

However, paying employees or even yourself with donation money is allowed, so long as you officially document it as a form of employment when you file those taxes.

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Which is retarded. It's basically the same as filing for doing something illegal. It'd be like paying your dealers if you are a narcotics shipper and filing it. :noes:

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Originally Posted by xnugx

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Originally Posted by integral

To be precise on a subject that has been touched upon in this thread, giving benefits in any way for a donation, makes it not a donation. In the USA and a lot of other countries, giving benefits/rewards/incentives for donations makes it donation solicitation.

However, paying employees or even yourself with donation money is allowed, so long as you officially document it as a form of employment when you file those taxes.

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Which is retarded. It's basically the same as filing for doing something illegal. It'd be like paying your dealers if you are a narcotics shipper and filing it. :noes:

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Trust me when I say that if you are making a large amount of money and not paying the Government their share, the Taxman will come and fuck up your life, eventually. :yup:

And not all websites have blatant ways of collecting money. For example, TL uses an incentivized advertisement as their way of collecting money. ScT uses some kind of donation front. So it wouldn't necessarily be counted as reporting something illegal.

Should tracker staff get paid? No , never.. ever..

And if ppl are fool enough to staff for a site that's more of a shop (as it was pointed out earlier some big p2l sites are making lots of money) then who gives a #^%$^%$ ... They should see what's going on around em and abandon the ship before its sunk.. With them in it.. The users could make the difference by not supporting those p2l sites but unfortunately most ppl don't give a $#^# as long as they get what they want..

In my opinion if I were a staff of some tracker a dinner per year paid by the tracker would be great :D

/me thinks that getting paid for being on staff is bullshit ... Donations are donated by the users for one purpose , making the site better . So any sort of extra cash should follow that purpose ...

I think a lot of people forget that fact that when you begin to profit from warez, the stakes change quite a bit in the legal area. PayPal keeps logs of everything, forever.. So if for example you use this donation acct to buy a new ipod, or start sending money to your bank account (which is then considered as income btw), they'll know if they ever take you to court and start seeking evidence.

Doesn't matter if you have some sort of "front" for the donation profit scheme. Just like you and I could figure that out, so could the authorities. They aren't as stupid as most people assume :P


btw, doing p2l would be considered in the court as further facilitating in the distribution of warez, because in accordance with the rules you set on that site, you help extend the longevity and ability of such account to obtain copyright material :P

So those two together are what, +3 years in prison if ever convicted?

Sage advise:

You'll never get paid for a job that someone else is willing to do for free.

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Originally Posted by Skizo

Sage advise:

You'll never get paid for a job that someone else is willing to do for free.

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one exception being : porn actors

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Originally Posted by KFlint

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Originally Posted by Skizo

Sage advise:

You'll never get paid for a job that someone else is willing to do for free.

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one exception being : porn actors

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yeah, coz y'all gotta be good to do that shit. like with the cam rollin and shit.

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Originally Posted by Polarbear

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Originally Posted by stoi

But we are not "selling" anything.

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let's hope none of you (tracker staff) will ever have to debate this question with a highly paid prosecutor. i think he might beg to differ.

i didn't refer to bcg by the way. i don't even know wether you have a pay2leech system or not.

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OiNK was accused of something like, "making money in the name of 'donations'". They even said OiNK membership could only be obtained by payment. And when torrentfreak wrote otherwise, the authorities responded something like "180,000 OiNK members must have been more generous then I expected ." wacko

The point is if authorities were to break into a tracker, they would not give a flying f about whether a tracker has P2l or not....they can make up their own stuff and people (plus media) will easily buy it. Yes, P2L might be additional cause for severe the punishment but how worse can it make?

editZ: oink bail extended to 10th lozl.

Salary for staffers - that would have been great, lol.
Staffing is and should always be a hobby. Once u pay em you'll lose the dedication and the passion that most unpaid staff have.

In my opinion, in private tracker, we all share and devote for others, so everyone is a volunteer. The donation should just have to buy and maintain the server.

I think people in general should get paid if they're helping the owner make money. What I mean by this, is that if the site is making a profit off of advertising, donations, whatever; then, there should naturally be a distribution of wealth. This seemingly simple concept is at times hard to grasp ,which in turn, cause issues among management.

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Originally Posted by yayyyyyy

and what about uploaders keeping the site alive?

and people being active on IRC and forums keeping the community alive?

should we all get paid? don't think so otherwise it would be ever simpler to sue a tracker :(

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Agree with what you say man :yup:

I donate regularly to the sites I love and I feel deserve it, sites that are run by staff that have a genuine love for that they do, not sites that are blatantly cash cows. The sysops never know what is around the corner and what issues the sites they run will face, having additional money at hand could greatly aid in the likes of a quick site relocation.

Back on topic, no, I don't believe tracker staff should be paid, it should be done for the pure enjoyment of being part of a site they have a genuine love for. The minute people start doing it for money, it all goes to shit.

i think they should for providing a service to us but then again if the poop hits the fan and they arent payed its a lot easier to avoid the inevitable ! difficult one to call really

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Originally Posted by squirr3l

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Originally Posted by Polarbear

let's hope none of you (tracker staff) will ever have to debate this question with a highly paid prosecutor. i think he might beg to differ.

i didn't refer to bcg by the way. i don't even know wether you have a pay2leech system or not.

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OiNK was accused of something like, "making money in the name of 'donations'". They even said OiNK membership could only be obtained by payment. And when torrentfreak wrote otherwise, the authorities responded something like "180,000 OiNK members must have been more generous then I expected ." wacko

The point is if authorities were to break into a tracker, they would not give a flying f about whether a tracker has P2l or not....they can make up their own stuff and people (plus media) will easily buy it. Yes, P2L might be additional cause for severe the punishment but how worse can it make?

editZ: oink bail extended to 10th lozl.

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Accusations and facts are totally different things. The authorities can say anything they want, and they will in order to get people worked up.. But in a court, accusations hold no value without proof. When they bring up the evidence on the server, clearly stating that you give $x, you get x credits then that clearly brings up debate about selling warez because you're directly selling the ability to download just that.. You could shoot back at me saying ISP's are selling warez b/c they give you the ability to download it, but there are many more uses for the internet than warez and ISP's don't advertise anything of the illegal sort. On a torrent site, when you buy those GB's, you can use them for only one thing: Downloading warez.

That doesn't even include what happens when they get the paypal transaction records (which they can) and see you've been sending a couple grand a month to escort services and other personal things like your bank account and such.

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Originally Posted by Brandon

.....paypal transaction records (which they can) and see you've been sending a couple grand a month to escort services....

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WALLHAX, how did you know?

:blink:

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Originally Posted by Skizo

Sage advise:

You'll never get paid for a job that someone else is willing to do for free.

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Generally true, but sometimes it depends on how well you do the job.

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Originally Posted by Brandon

On a torrent site, when you buy those GB's, you can use them for only one thing: Downloading warez.

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If a lawyer was prosecuting me basing their case on that I'd feel all warm and tingly inside knowing they're blissfully naive.

Bittorrent trackers do have the occassional legitimate download. Be it freeware software, royalty-free albums or even user-created content (tutorials, eBooks, How-To Videos...). As long as a tracker has at least some of these files then the tracker itself is not illegal, only some (albeit most) of the content is illegal.

Well i seeded over 1TB and download berly in the hundreds ...... On a site that i love ......
do i deserve to get pay for it ( it did cost me electricity,time) and a risk of getting a big fine ........ and am just a member there .....
The answer is nooooo why? cause every thing is free of what we download
and if you need money ( get a job like any other person) "Cashcrate"
- We all waste our time on stupid things ......... It doesn't mean we should get pay for them ....
:fst::fst::fst::fst:

@Peanut... you are right... you have electricity bills but think about it over again. You download software/movies/games worth over 1 million dollars every year (or maybe more....much more) so i guess that will compensate your electricity bill.

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Originally Posted by Peanut

Well i seeded over 1TB and download berly in the hundreds ...... On a site that i love ......
do i deserve to get pay for it ( it did cost me electricity,time) and a risk of getting a big fine ........ and am just a member there .....
The answer is nooooo why? cause every thing is free of what we download
and if you need money ( get a job like any other person) "Cashcrate"
- We all waste our time on stupid things ......... It doesn't mean we should get pay for them ....
:fst::fst::fst::fst:

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The staff at MacDonalds get paid for cooking my burgers and yet I don't get paid for eating them. It costs me petrol, time etc. and I take the risk of food poisoning.

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Originally Posted by Swax

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Originally Posted by Brandon

On a torrent site, when you buy those GB's, you can use them for only one thing: Downloading warez.

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If a lawyer was prosecuting me basing their case on that I'd feel all warm and tingly inside knowing they're blissfully naive.

Bittorrent trackers do have the occassional legitimate download. Be it freeware software, royalty-free albums or even user-created content (tutorials, eBooks, How-To Videos...). As long as a tracker has at least some of these files then the tracker itself is not illegal, only some (albeit most) of the content is illegal.

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That lawyer may seem naive to a bt pro like yourself, but the inference is not a great logical leap. I could see that argument actually working.

Also, the fact that a handful of non-infringing content is available on a tracker does very little to support the legality of a tracker that facilitates the infringement of PBs of infringing material.

Your points may stand true in a vacuum, but they are extremely weak and it is highly improbable that a judge will find such arguments persuasive.

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Originally Posted by Swax

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Originally Posted by Brandon

On a torrent site, when you buy those GB's, you can use them for only one thing: Downloading warez.

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If a lawyer was prosecuting me basing their case on that I'd feel all warm and tingly inside knowing they're blissfully naive.

Bittorrent trackers do have the occassional legitimate download. Be it freeware software, royalty-free albums or even user-created content (tutorials, eBooks, How-To Videos...). As long as a tracker has at least some of these files then the tracker itself is not illegal, only some (albeit most) of the content is illegal.

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every country has different laws. in most western countries any expert in copyright law would smile at you when he'd hear that.

a chinese company that fakes industrial design doesn't get legal if they create something by their own sometimes.

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Originally Posted by ftnftw

That lawyer may seem naive to a bt pro like yourself, but the inference is not a great logical leap. I could see that argument actually working.

Also, the fact that a handful of non-infringing content is available on a tracker does very little to support the legality of a tracker that facilitates the infringement of PBs of infringing material.

Your points may stand true in a vacuum, but they are extremely weak and it is highly improbable that a judge will find such arguments persuasive.

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For the lawyer to make such an inference* would involve ignoring the facts. The prosecutor would almost be making an assumption based on biased and incorrect information from the authorities.
Jumping to conclusions, as a lawyer, does not appease most judges, assuming the case is fair.

I am by no means trying to claim that donating to a torrent tracker is a wise act, as the authorities would see it as a contribution to misbegotten wealth for the tracker's owners through malfeasance.

I am merely mentioning a point that is constantly iterated and ever clearer; that judges are no longer as susceptible to assumptions made by the media (or prosecutors) as they once were.

(*=that only Warez can be downloaded)

I am a part of a tracker staff and i don't get paid.It works just fine for me because along with my position i have a certain power and i can do plenty of great thins to help the tracker's developement.