Originally Posted by
respawn40
Erm... it sounds to me that you have almost zero experience with coding, running a tracker, common sense, etc. I don't have any experience running a tracker, and I have no clue how to program; but I like to think that I have some common sense.
1) From everyone that I've talked to, you shouldn't expect member donations to keep your site alive. You yourself (or whoever the SysOp is) should be able to keep the site afloat for at least a year. This shows members that the site plans on staying there, and so they may wish to donate.
2) You said you have little coding experience and whatnot, so why not find someone who actually does? Surely it will result in a better tracker, in both function and design. If you're still learning quite a lot, then why not hold off on creating a tracker until you're better able to make a better one? If your tracker is nothing more than a place to download files, then what makes it any better than any of the already-established trackers? I already know that those are stable, fast, etc; so why would I want to join yours?
3) Don't host it in the US. That's probably the WORST place on Earth that you could decide to host a site. The US is a country that actively seeks out filesharers. Your host will most likely bend immediately to an order from the RIAA/MPAA, and they will shut you down. As stoi said, you don't hear of anybody hosting in the US getting taken down, because, well, nobody hosts there!
But anyways, this is just what I think... If I were you, I would reconsider many of the choice that you've made :p