your thoughts on Pay2Leech sites?

for those who don't know what Pay2Leech is, it's you "donate" (& i use that term loosely) a certain amount of $$$ and you either get upload credits (ala BitMe or BitMeTV) or you get VIP status in which you don't have to worry about your ratio (ala SCC or TL).

as for me, i think it's OK. i mean, let's be honest... for a BIG site like TL, it takes a powerful server to make it run smoothly. that, and bandwidth isn't free.

i'm surprised many in the torrent community look down on these sites when the ppl running these so-called "pay2leeech" sites are only doing it so they can keep their server(s) online!

sure, the guy in charge of the "donations" get a little extra cash after every donation period (*ehem*ScT*ehem*TL*) but i think they deserve it for getting their site as BIG as it is and to where it is right now.

i'm sure if i had a site where i have around 10K+ members, i'd do the same!

sorry but sct isnt pay2leech

sites that are
tl
pisexy
tt
bitmetv
bitme

just to name a few

filelist

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Originally Posted by ZombieProphet

sorry but sct isnt pay2leech

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i never said ScT was pay2leech. i merely HINTED that their Admin gets a few extra $$$ after every donation period (hence, the *ehem* comment).

also, i'm not asking for a list of sites that are pay2leech! i'm asking for your thoughts about it...

Personally I dont mind sites that do it. I just hate sites that send you pms about it every other day. or have big flashy banners about the options.

If they leave it on the donations page its all fine... Just dont overpromote the option.

I never donate (well directly at least) because I don't want my real name and paypal on their logs, but I don't have any problem with it as long as the money is only going for servers. I don't even mind looking the other way if an admin skims a little to pay for his personal servers or uploaders' servers, perhaps.

But a site like TL is running solely to profit from it's members and uploaders, and that's just wrong. It's not on any small scale either, TL brings in tons of money every month. I don't understand how they're holding onto uploaders, but perhaps they're throwing them just enough to keep them happy.

I don't think there's a big problem with donating and getting a little upload credit in return. But, I don't agree with donating for VIP (and not having to seed anything back.) It paints a negative image of the tracker/community and makes me not want to bother seeding either.

Nobody forces anyone to donate. If someone wants to, I think that it's ok.

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Originally Posted by Hedonist7

I never donate (well directly at least) because I don't want my real name and paypal on their logs, but I don't have any problem with it as long as the money is only going for servers. I don't even mind looking the other way if an admin skims a little to pay for his personal servers or uploaders' servers, perhaps.

But a site like TL is running solely to profit from it's members and uploaders, and that's just wrong. It's not on any small scale either, TL brings in tons of money every month. I don't understand how they're holding onto uploaders, but perhaps they're throwing them just enough to keep them happy.

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To my knowledge they dont skim money. Alot of their files are posted with the seedboxes that their VIP donors pay for. They use multi 100mbit boxes to seed their files.
Not to mention the cost of the webservers themselves as well as scene access.

theres some1 here that can back this but pisexy makes $40,000 mo via "donations"

Alot of sites making money out of the Scene and P2P users ..
Very disappointing imo

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Originally Posted by iNSOMNiA

Alot of sites making money out of the Scene and P2P users ..
Very disappointing imo

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thats why the mpaa and the riaa are so pissed.

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Originally Posted by Melvinmeow

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Originally Posted by Hedonist7

I never donate (well directly at least) because I don't want my real name and paypal on their logs, but I don't have any problem with it as long as the money is only going for servers. I don't even mind looking the other way if an admin skims a little to pay for his personal servers or uploaders' servers, perhaps.

But a site like TL is running solely to profit from it's members and uploaders, and that's just wrong. It's not on any small scale either, TL brings in tons of money every month. I don't understand how they're holding onto uploaders, but perhaps they're throwing them just enough to keep them happy.

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To my knowledge they dont skim money. Alot of their files are posted with the seedboxes that their VIP donors pay for. They use multi 100mbit boxes to seed their files.
Not to mention the cost of the webservers themselves as well as scene access.

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You'd probably know better than I would, but I've read a couple of well respected tracker admins and sysops ranting about torrentleech's profit driven motives.

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Originally Posted by ZombieProphet

theres some1 here that can back this but pisexy makes $40,000 mo via "donations"

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I dont think they make that much, if they do then people on that site need to wake up and stop supporting a huge scammer.....


HE ask for donations, to buy a house, go on trips and many other things... trust me about $300 to $500 a month goes into his site.. Last i was told all the clowns on his site lost scene access along time ago and the ones that got it back left, could be wrong but thats what i have been told by a few..


I do know when i was a admin there and the main reason wb was started was because of the way that site was run and how he scammed many people...


IF he makes that kind of money off his site then its just time before mpaa/riaa and different goverments comming after him..



Wild

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Originally Posted by wildbytes

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Originally Posted by ZombieProphet

theres some1 here that can back this but pisexy makes $40,000 mo via "donations"

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I dont think they make that much, if they do then people on that site need to wake up and stop supporting a huge scammer.....


HE ask for donations, to buy a house, go on trips and many other things... trust me about $300 to $500 a month goes into his site.. Last i was told all the clowns on his site lost scene access along time ago and the ones that got it back left, could be wrong but thats what i have been told by a few..


I do know when i was a admin there and the main reason wb was started was because of the way that site was run and how he scammed many people...


IF he makes that kind of money off his site then its just time before mpaa/riaa and different goverments comming after him..



Wild

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i know we havent seen eye to eye in the past so i understand if u dont answer my question. how much does it cost to run a tracker like urs? off topic why did u change the layout of your tracker?

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Originally Posted by ZombieProphet

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Originally Posted by wildbytes

I dont think they make that much, if they do then people on that site need to wake up and stop supporting a huge scammer.....


HE ask for donations, to buy a house, go on trips and many other things... trust me about $300 to $500 a month goes into his site.. Last i was told all the clowns on his site lost scene access along time ago and the ones that got it back left, could be wrong but thats what i have been told by a few..


I do know when i was a admin there and the main reason wb was started was because of the way that site was run and how he scammed many people...


IF he makes that kind of money off his site then its just time before mpaa/riaa and different goverments comming after him..



Wild

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i know we havent seen eye to eye in the past so i understand if u dont answer my question. how much does it cost to run a tracker like urs? off topic why did u change the layout of your tracker?

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Well it all depends on how big your site is and how many active peers you have..
a new site can get by for about $100 to $200 a month but as you add to the site members and other things you will need to upgrade. We use 2 servers and other sites use 3 or 4 all depends on your setup. But i would say between $200 and $1000 a month. we are in the middle of that and look to upgrade to a 3rd server in the next 2 months.

about the site layout change, well its because i never really like the first one. There are 4 working themes on WB, 2 with the old look and layout and 2 new themes.



Wild

I don't mind. They have to have money to pay for costs of site upkeep, and if donations just aren't doing it, then I can't blame them. As long as they don't offer incentives that can potentially damage the site if too many people do it (hit and run, etc.), then offering a few GBs for some money isn't too bad. Even if they keep a few dollars of it for profit, I don't mind that much, unless they turn the whole tracker into an entirely corporate affair.

its great, means people like me who dont donate find it easier to keep a good ratio since theres less people seeding stuff and more people downloading

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Originally Posted by ZombieProphet

theres some1 here that can back this but pisexy makes $40,000 mo via "donations"

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Thats a lot...:lol:

I wouldn't donate since:
a. I pirate media because I lack that money.
b. Personal information logged etc.
c. File-sharing is exactly that. I don't want to pay off a tracker cause I can't keep a ratio the orthodox way.

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Originally Posted by NA_Magus

I wouldn't donate since:
a. I pirate media because I lack that money.
b. Personal information logged etc.
c. File-sharing is exactly that. I don't want to pay off a tracker cause I can't keep a ratio the orthodox way.

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Just remember this... If no one donates to help pay for these sites, then 95% or better would be gone. Then what. Most people dont have scene access to get things. there is always newsgroup but most will see if you dont pay, will slow speeds and wont be able to get files older then 3 to 7 days depending on your isp...




Wild

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Originally Posted by NA_Magus

I wouldn't donate since:
a. I pirate media because I lack that money.

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But donating a mere amount of 5-10$ wont hurt that much considering the amount you download in a month.

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c. File-sharing is exactly that. I don't want to pay off a tracker cause I can't keep a ratio the orthodox way.

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I agree to that. pay2leech is kind of lame , and donations should come automatically from the members , as a way to say 'thanks' to the site and moreover supporting the site financially. At the same time , "I wont donate , 'coz that's what filesharing is supposed to be" is also a lame way of thinking.

[edit]
PS: I know, members dont donate like that, but the best community I have seen is at ScT: their dontation bar ( of 400 euros or something ) becomes full at the middle of the month normally, and they give only a star for donating.

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Originally Posted by ZombieProphet

theres some1 here that can back this but pisexy makes $40,000 mo via "donations"

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I do know he pockets alot of the donations. There has even been several complaints about him through paypal and other sites he has used to receive donations in the past. Last estimate figure I heard was $10,000 a month that goes to the inner pocket fund, which I believe to have been an amount mentioned in a scene notice a few years back.

As far as how much goes into a site.
On the webservers alone we spend between $200 - $300 a month. I plan on adding an additional server soon as well which would increase that slightly.
Those figures mentioned by me and wildbytes are stricktly for the webservers alone. That does not count the figures if the site uses seedboxes to host alot of the files as well. Which would ussually cost more than the webserver does monthly depending on how many boxes they have hosting files and the speeds of those lines as well. We spend roughly between $1000 - $2000 a month on our boxes. (Over 3/4 of those figures come from staff or uploaders who share the same uplinks. I wont give the exact figure we spend a month but you get the idea.) If we spend that much on a small site like mine then what does a site like TL use when they have a whole lot more bw and boxes seeding the files?
Of course sites like PI that dont even use seedboxes making so much profit doesnt make other sites that acctually do use all the donations that are brought in look very well. Youll find most of the small sites dont really even make enough in donations to pay the monthly bills. I know LegendaryT's staff like mine pay for alot of the servers monthly bills. We ussually get enough to cover the webserver on my site, anything left over goes for upgrades or addition bw/other stuff for our seedboxes. I ussually pay for most of the hardware out of my own pocket. Theres alot of us in these communities that do what we do for the joy/fun of it. Just because some people are out there for the profit side of the buissness doesnt mean we all are.

P.S. On the sidenote, youll find most sites dont acctually keep logs of what you donate anyways. Paypal and other payment methods have logs, however, if the site was ever raided by the FBI, ect... they dont have any jurisdiction to check any financial info through paypal unless the owner of the account gives them permission to do so.
(I know this from personal experiences I had with 2 agents last year. They asked for permission to view my paypal accounts info and I denied them access to it and there wasnt really anything they could do about it once I said no.)

Does anyone know how much TL makes? They have like 90,000 (or more?) users and a bunch (maybe ~10,000?) so-called "VIP's".

there is nothing wrong with it it keeps the site running

damn tht's good..

I used to be against the pay2leech conept till few days ago but after chatting with a mod at a pvt tracker I have changed my opinion atleast against few pvt trackers like TL etc . They really have a lot of money to be paid for abndwidth etc and so they need this money..

Also the posts above of Wild and Melvin confirms the same facts..

btw was not aware of PI making so much money. Also as ppl said above that PI uploades etc don't have seed boxes then how come we get good download speeds from there..

Upload credits are fine, but I'm wary of VIP free leeching. That's because I have two 100M servers and I feel like I'm already contributing in a big way (bandwidth is money). I guess for any pay2leech sites, I may stop seeding earlier.

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Originally Posted by N@LiM

I used to be against the pay2leech conept till few days ago but after chatting with a mod at a pvt tracker I have changed my opinion atleast against few pvt trackers like TL etc . They really have a lot of money to be paid for abndwidth etc and so they need this money..

Also the posts above of Wild and Melvin confirms the same facts..

btw was not aware of PI making so much money. Also as ppl said above that PI uploades etc don't have seed boxes then how come we get good download speeds from there..

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Some users might have seeding boxes and i am sure alot of the uploaders have seeding boxes, but i am sure 90% or more dont have scene access...

Wild

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Originally Posted by wildbytes

Some users might have seeding boxes and i am sure alot of the uploaders have seeding boxes, but i am sure 90% or more dont have scene access...

Wild

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i c.. probably thats the reason for their long pre times

this sort of thing dont bother me until the site starts splattering vip crap all over the place, like 2 pms a day, it gets annoying. BS was one of those sites, but im no longer a member there, I just let it go, got too annoying.

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Originally Posted by aburyach

Does anyone know how much TL makes? They have like 90,000 (or more?) users and a bunch (maybe ~10,000?) so-called "VIP's".

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i don't know the exact figures but i'll tell you this - they make a LOT! so many that before, PayPal suspended their account because too much money was going in! before they "upgraded" their PayPal account, remember that before, they only took a certain number of "donations" because of this.

:blink:

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Originally Posted by wildbytes

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Originally Posted by N@LiM

I used to be against the pay2leech conept till few days ago but after chatting with a mod at a pvt tracker I have changed my opinion atleast against few pvt trackers like TL etc . They really have a lot of money to be paid for abndwidth etc and so they need this money..

Also the posts above of Wild and Melvin confirms the same facts..

btw was not aware of PI making so much money. Also as ppl said above that PI uploades etc don't have seed boxes then how come we get good download speeds from there..

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Some users might have seeding boxes and i am sure alot of the uploaders have seeding boxes, but i am sure 90% or more dont have scene access...

Wild

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Correct some do have seedboxes. But from when I was a uploader there a few years ago it wasnt all that many. And even less than that have scene access. When I uploaded there I had axx and alot would msg me asking where I was getting the releases so fast. Im quite certain 90% if not more of the people who upload scene releases there are simply grabbing them off other sites.

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Originally Posted by r0uJe

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Originally Posted by aburyach

Does anyone know how much TL makes? They have like 90,000 (or more?) users and a bunch (maybe ~10,000?) so-called "VIP's".

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i don't know the exact figures but i'll tell you this - they make a LOT! so many that before, PayPal suspended their account because too much money was going in! before they "upgraded" their PayPal account, remember that before, they only took a certain number of "donations" because of this.

:blink:

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Nowhere did it say they had it suspended for that, that I recall.
Most times you see sites get their paypal accounts revoked. Its due to homos reporting the sites for receiving donations for illegal files (Mostly XXX files arent liked by pp).
I know a friend from a site who had his account revoked due to someone adding a comment in the donation saying thanks for the porn.
I have another friend who has had his pp account suspended for selling collectors edition GI Joes. When he asks them why his account is canceled they tell him for selling explicit/offending materials. Its GI Joes for christs sake, whats offending about those? They let people sell Dildos, porn dvds, and even inflatable stripper poles and people arent offended by those?

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Paypal just gets a little rediculious with what they suspend accounts for.

this sort of thing dont bother me until the site starts splattering vip crap all over the place, like 2 pms a day, it gets annoying. BS was one of those sites, but im no longer a member there, I just let it go, got too annoying.

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Exactly. I dislike sites that send you msgs everday asking for money. Or even sites that add big flashy banners saying to donate throughout their pages.
Sites that occasionally ask in the News items Due to money issues maybe like every 3 - 4 months or so... yeah thats fine and very acceptable. If they are having issues coming up with the $$$ for the servers by all means mention it but they shouldnt be having issues every 2 weeks. I would rather see a site ask when donations are needed and stay open... then see a site that needed donations not ask and just decide to close its doors for good.

I dont mind sites which accepts donations from their members, coz it must cost a hell to run a tracker. but seriously i hate those sites which offer an account if you donate. like gfxnews.ru , bwtorrents.com and many others
and those sites which displays ads even while accepting donations like TL :angry:

^^ lol, yeah... i forgot TL has ads now, too! thank God Firefox blocks it...

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Originally Posted by aburyach

Does anyone know how much TL makes? They have like 90,000 (or more?) users and a bunch (maybe ~10,000?) so-called "VIP's".

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I heard a year ago, that they receive 1,000 vip payments (eur 25 each) per month minimum

If you add ads, lottery etc they easily can reach an amount of eur 35,000 - 40,000 per month on average

But I am really wondering about their userbase, before I read your message I thought that members have gone over 150,000. I mean there are doing some wipe out frequently but they hand over so many invites.

Now to the topic, I don't like pay2leech, I prefer sites like oink, publishing their monthly expenses at the home page and the amount collected.

Just imagine what would happen if oink would offer pay2leech ...

They are saying that oink admins are rude, dictators etc but I really appreciate the fact that they don't offer pay2leech. They could make really good money out of it, but they refuse it and that's why they will last for much longer (hopefully).

I know that there are other trackers in line with oink's policy, but almost all others have scene content, meaning that their content can be found elsewhere after a day or so. Oink's content is really unique and cannot be found anywhere else, as far as I know.

The other problem I have with pay2leech is that it's a big step towards commercializing a tracker. There must be a tipping point where it becomes a fullblown, illegal movie and TV subscription service. Authorities would have a clearer motive to shut you down. But of course, copyright infringement is illegal anyway...

I've leeched all those sites and never paid a dime.

no offence folks but if i owned a torrenmt site i wouldnt make up these $40000 numbers etc. i would keep it hush hush and not even let staff know which is what really goes on.

thats just some dumb ass user that has too much time on their hands and created these numbers

but other than that i have got VIP freeleech accounts on some sites and i thinbk its woirthwhile (a) if the content is as fast as it is and (b) the speeds and site cointinues to grow. Giving thyem donations is just the same as paying to leech though. for some sites u have no option as sites such as bitmetv and scc are just a bitch to upload in and even with a seedbox/server u cant upload unless u r glued to the releases and grab as soonb as they hit the site. if ur 10 mins late then kiss bye to the ratio as there aint gonna be a buffer!

even glued to the pc is like 6 hours of work so why not just pay the site for a buffer - imk sure 90% of the recent users on bitmetv have doinated when they first joined. i have alkso done that on scc as it has kickass pretimes for tv and merely helping the site will imporve the content eventually