Has anyone made a good beginners guide to torrenting?

Im relatively new to torrenting and up until a few days ago I thought a "good" site to find torrents was TPB. Googleing "guide to bittorent" doesn't really yield many good results, either they are full of things that I already know or they are telling me how to set my router to open a gateway.

On this site I am confused by a lot of the terms and also confused about the basics of finding torrents. Is there anything I can read that explain the more advanced basics of the best way to torrent?

Thanks, a noob.

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Has anyone made a good beginners guide to tormenting?

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You have come to the right place, here you will get everything that will guide you to become a better tormenter. You will learn new and creative ways to cause to experience severe mental or physical suffering to other fellas.

Very soon you will be exposed to the might of great people over here like Mjacky, OlegL, Darth Rings to name a few.

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Originally Posted by anigav

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Has anyone made a good beginners guide to tormenting?

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You have come to the right place, here you will get everything that will guide you to become a better tormenter. You will learn new and creative ways to cause to experience severe mental or physical suffering to other fellas.

Very soon you will be exposed to the might of great people over here like Mjacky, OlegL, Darth Rings to name a few.

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Damn OSXLion autocorrect.
Can a mod please change the title of the thread?

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Damn OSXLion autocorrect.
Can a mod please change the title of the thread?

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Not before we torment you :ermm:

TPB is a good site to find torrents. There are others that have different strengths. Have you had some particular problems there or are you just going by some random comment you've seen posted somewhere?

As for torrenting, if you've been able to download torrents from anywhere then you've learnt most of what you need to know as a beginner. After that it's a matter of reading different things, evaluating the differences between them (as different people always give different advice) and asking questions about specifics you are unsure of. So what is it you particularly want to know?

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Im relatively new to torrenting and up until a few days ago I thought a "good" site to find torrents was TPB. Googleing "guide to bittorent" doesn't really yield many good results, either they are full of things that I already know or they are telling me how to set my router to open a gateway.

On this site I am confused by a lot of the terms and also confused about the basics of finding torrents. Is there anything I can read that explain the more advanced basics of the best way to torrent?

Thanks, a noob.

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You're new to torrenting or tormenting ? I can recommend several members here that will torment you till you end up in the corner a gibbering mess sucking your thumb and asking for mummy.
As for torrenting, the best way to do it, is to wrap yourself in tinfoil, go out into a thunderstorm and hold a coathanger above your head, then wait to have your life illuminated. Once you have inducted enough electricity you will be able to torrent at lightning fast speeds (pun intended) making mere mortals green with envy at your l33t skillz.

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Originally Posted by temisturk

TPB is a good site to find torrents. There are others that have different strengths. Have you had some particular problems there or are you just going by some random comment you've seen posted somewhere?

As for torrenting, if you've been able to download torrents from anywhere then you've learnt most of what you need to know as a beginner. After that it's a matter of reading different things, evaluating the differences between them (as different people always give different advice) and asking questions about specifics you are unsure of. So what is it you particularly want to know?

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Thanks for your helpful comment and not getting hung up on the title like the others.
I guess I have seen a lot of posts bashing public torrent sites, not necessarily here, and I guess I would weather belong to a community where I felt safer to seed rather than be a leacher on a public tracker.
Specifically I was wondering about how people normally go about joining private sites, do you ever pay a membership fee, what safeguards do they have to prevent you from being traced. Do people generally have different sites for different interests, or comprehensive sites for movies, tv, software, music and audiobooks in one place. Are there sites where you can request certain material?
What are ways to stay safer from legal action when torrenting? Are there ways to hide your location, MAC address, IP or proxify all of your torrent traffic?

I said this in my introduction, but I have used torrents for years to download software and to share files with friends, but I only recently started to get large quantities of entertainment media of the web this way so I'm newer to that aspect than the actual use of a torrent client etc.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Damn OSXLion autocorrect.

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I called it, you jesus mac freak. Why are you getting started with torrents anyway? I already know you like getting ripped off, so buying all your media shouldn't be a problem, but why are you trying to piss off your fake god?

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Originally Posted by timtebow

and I guess I would weather belong to a community where I felt safer to seed

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The lord will find you no matter where you try to hide. And he will punish you.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Thanks for your helpful comment and not getting hung up on the title like the others.
I guess I have seen a lot of posts bashing public torrent sites, not necessarily here, and I guess I would weather belong to a community where I felt safer to seed rather than be a leacher on a public tracker.

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You're welcome. :)

Safety is a relative and rather subjective concept. There is a lot of heat and light around filesharing lawsuits but if you google to find details of successful prosecutions you will find there are very very very few. There are certainly a lot of threats though but if you hold your nerve you really can face them down. Joining a private site really won't protect you much (think about it--if you can join a site without them visiting you at your home to verify your identity, then so can anyone working for an anti-filesharing company).

The only real protection comes from a VPN or a seedbox, both of which you will have to pay for. Or you could pay for access to a newsgroup. You could also download from direct download sites but they're much harder to find content on (they're not well indexed) and they're not "moderated" so you have to be much much more careful of fakes and infected files.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Specifically I was wondering about how people normally go about joining private sites, do you ever pay a membership fee, what safeguards do they have to prevent you from being traced.

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Firstly, NEVER pay for membership of a torrent site. Anyone who asks you for money up front is a scam site. Once you've become a member then you might choose to donate, but that should always be voluntary.

Some sites open registrations periodically. Or you can request invites on forums such as this (you will need to keep posting here for a couple of weeks before you're allowed access to that part of the site).

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Do people generally have different sites for different interests, or comprehensive sites for movies, tv, software, music and audiobooks in one place. Are there sites where you can request certain material?

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It's horses for corses. If you click on the "what trackers offer" link at the top of this page you will see that some sites offer a wide range of material and some are more specialised. You can choose to join either sort, or both. It really depends on where you find the material it is you want to download. Most sites allow requests.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Thanks for your helpful comment and not getting hung up on the title like the others.
I guess I have seen a lot of posts bashing public torrent sites, not necessarily here, and I guess I would weather belong to a community where I felt safer to seed rather than be a leacher on a public tracker.
Specifically I was wondering about how people normally go about joining private sites, do you ever pay a membership fee, what safeguards do they have to prevent you from being traced. Do people generally have different sites for different interests, or comprehensive sites for movies, tv, software, music and audiobooks in one place. Are there sites where you can request certain material?
What are ways to stay safer from legal action when torrenting? Are there ways to hide your location, MAC address, IP or proxify all of your torrent traffic?

I said this in my introduction, but I have used torrents for years to download software and to share files with friends, but I only recently started to get large quantities of entertainment media of the web this way so I'm newer to that aspect than the actual use of a torrent client etc.

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It smells to me that you aren't probably that n00b as you are pretending to be, besides I can tell you've been reading this board for quite some time and aware of the rock'n'roll's here, for sure.

It'll be very interesting to see how long will it take you to appear in the invites section. Good luck :)

http://filesharingtalk.com/threads/4...-Torrent-Users

There are tips scattered all over that thread. I once even assembled as list on a text file and all.

The search engine on this forum will also provide useful insight in topics such as P2P security.

real noobs don't ask for guides for simple reason that they really are noobs.
//0.02$

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Originally Posted by mjmacky

I called it, you jesus mac freak. Why are you getting started with torrents anyway? I already know you like getting ripped off, so buying all your media shouldn't be a problem, but why are you trying to piss off your fake god?

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Originally Posted by timtebow

and I guess I would weather belong to a community where I felt safer to seed

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The lord will find you no matter where you try to hide. And he will punish you.

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I feel the need to point out to you that I am an atheist and also a New England Patriots fan.

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Originally Posted by temisturk

You're welcome. :)
Some sites open registrations periodically. Or you can request invites on forums such as this (you will need to keep posting here for a couple of weeks before you're allowed access to that part of the site).

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Thanks, Is there a board where people post the sites that are currently open for registration?

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Originally Posted by whatcdfan

It smells to me that you aren't probably that n00b as you are pretending to be, besides I can tell you've been reading this board for quite some time and aware of the rock'n'roll's here, for sure.
It'll be very interesting to see how long will it take you to appear in the invites section. Good luck :)

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My first page view of this site was on monday morning, a few hours after Kim Jong-Il's death was announced. Im not sure what you mean by rocknrolls, but I plan to appear in the invites section asap since my primary reason for coming here was to discover private trackers.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

I feel the need to point out to you that I am an atheist and also a New England Patriots fan.

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Doesn't explain why, out of all the combinations of letters you could have used to make a user name, you chose that one. A true atheist would have been overcome by a genuinely nauseous feeling when presented with a description of who Tebow is. Also, Apple people are inherently religious, sorry that you had to find out this way.

You should report yourself, realizing the major error on your part.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Is there a board where people post the sites that are currently open for registration?

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Yes - http://filesharingtalk.com/threads/2...pen-for-Signup

[QUOTE=timtebow;3637799]
Thanks, Is there a board where people post the sites that are currently open for registration?
QUOTE]

The What Trackers Offer link at the top of the page also provides some info like that. Also you can see http://btracs.com/

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Im relatively new to torrenting and up until a few days ago I thought a "good" site to find torrents was TPB. Googleing "guide to bittorent" doesn't really yield many good results, either they are full of things that I already know or they are telling me how to set my router to open a gateway.

On this site I am confused by a lot of the terms and also confused about the basics of finding torrents. Is there anything I can read that explain the more advanced basics of the best way to torrent?

Thanks, a noob.

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I started by reading the guides on this site, then I joined a private like IPT for instance, then read more guides in those sites.

Obviously a good ratio is the key to using private trackers.
by getting one rar file on some new popular torrents instead of all of the files is very usefull for a n00b, choose the rar files to keep and deselect the ones you don't need, then keep it seeding and repeat this with other torrents again.

This makes you a seeder in a shorter time and it an economical way of recovering your ratio in hard times or building a buffer that gives you some leeway. it's a bit of trial and error but when it works it can rebound your account. the upload then should out perform the download very quickly.
That was one of the best tricks in bit torrent I've learned that has saved my ratio many times.

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Originally Posted by Alien5

This makes you a seeder in a shorter time

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Not technically, but that partial RAR seeding trick is an excellent one. Some people prefer using the sample instead, in movie and TV torrents.

Now you mentioned this, there was also a thread in the tutorials section with even more tips like this one.

It's here: http://filesharingtalk.com/threads/3...ivate-Trackers

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Originally Posted by mjmacky

You should report yourself, realizing the major error on your part.

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Is there a way to change usernames? I would gladly do so.

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Originally Posted by Alien5

That was one of the best tricks in bit torrent I've learned that has saved my ratio many times.

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Thanks for the tip, this is a great one that I will remember when I start to use private sites.

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Originally Posted by temisturk

It's here: http://filesharingtalk.com/threads/3...ivate-Trackers

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Thanks temisturk. And sorry about what I said on the other thread, I wasn't trying to be a dick but instead just explaining my mindset behind how i use bit torrent when ratio doesn't count.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Is there a way to change usernames? I would gladly do so.

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As I believe mjmacky hinted at, you can create a thread in the report section to have your name changed, if you're serious about this.

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Originally Posted by temisturk

Thanks temisturk. And sorry about what I said on the other thread, I wasn't trying to be a dick but instead just explaining my mindset behind how i use bit torrent when ratio doesn't count.

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I'm glad you said that because your reply there really left me speechless. But as much as I applaud your honesty I'm one of the people who seeds public torrents--one of the people you take from without giving back to--so I'm not sure I want to continue helping you.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Is there a way to change usernames? I would gladly do so.

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You gonna change it to tombrady?

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Originally Posted by Funkin'

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Is there a way to change usernames? I would gladly do so.

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You gonna change it to tombrady?

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I would have just suggested "nottimtebow"

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Originally Posted by temisturk

I'm glad you said that because your reply there really left me speechless. But as much as I applaud your honesty I'm one of the people who seeds public torrents--one of the people you take from without giving back to--so I'm not sure I want to continue helping you.

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Thanks for being one of the generous people. I have a couple questions about how to seed I guess since maybe I'm just confused about the process. It seems to me that often during my torrent downloads i will maintain for instance a 200kB/s download speed and a maybe 4kB/s upload speed. Once I'm done it the download speed drops to 1kB/s and the upload stays about the same. A lot of the time they both stop. I'm not limiting the seed ratio or the upload speed, leaving both at unlimited, but it seems to me that I really don't provide a whole lot of service to the community. I might get to a 0.100 ratio if I download the average 700MB movie while I sleep. When I wake up I normally turn off my computer or put it to sleep and go to class. If I shut down, the torrent obviously stops and if I take my laptop to class I have to quit out of the client because my university monitors their network. Now until I need another torrent download I have little incentive to reopen the client. Im not going to leave my computer on and running day and night for a week to build up a ratio that does nothing for me. I mean, if I am able to download overnight 700MB, but unable to seed the same amount in a week, are people actually benefiting from my seeding? Arn't the same people that I got the content from still there giving it out? Are they going to lessen in number because I now seed? I guess I just feel that wasting power running my laptop (i could run folding@home and get two jobs done at the same time) but I just don't think its worth it. I don't feel like I am a selfish person, I volunteer occasionally, I give small donations to various charities, I sometimes use paypal to give a dollar or two to a developer of free software. I guess to me seeding isn't one of the ways I give back to the community, I'm sorry I'm not more compelled but I guess I just don't see much of a point.

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Over worded attempt to justify not seeding.

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I would accept the reasoning of, "I'm just self-serving leecher" over the explanation you gave any day. You take while others give, just accept that this is your stance on the matter. However, to actually address what you posted, why not just seed when you have your computer on and while you still have the file? It's pretty much that simple. Why the fuck would it matter that your client is closed sometimes or that you leave your computer in sleep mode? It's not going to stay in those states forever. The reason you were able to download in the first place is because there are others leaving their clients running and seeding the files. The reason public torrents can be so slow is because most are like you, only in for the take, thus content not currently popular will take awhile to complete.

As far as the security risk, or the copyright infringement risk, you've already exposed yourself. This is because when they monitor a particular torrent they would be doing it long term instead of just popping in at some random time.

In case you haven't really followed the advice about how to change your username, here's a follow up:
Go here:
http://filesharingtalk.com/forums/72-Report-Section
Create a new thread saying you want to change your nick, then tell them what you'd like your new nick to be. A mod will review it, and most likely change it if available and appropriate. I imagine the primary reason we aren't allowed to change nicks ourselves is to avoid scamming abuse.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/311565/sat...ght-live-tebow

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Originally Posted by mjmacky

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Originally Posted by timtebow

Over worded attempt to justify not seeding.

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I would accept the reasoning of, "I'm just self-serving leecher" over the explanation you gave any day. You take while others give, just accept that this is your stance on the matter. However, to actually address what you posted, why not just seed when you have your computer on and while you still have the file? It's pretty much that simple. Why the fuck would it matter that your client is closed sometimes or that you leave your computer in sleep mode? It's not going to stay in those states forever. The reason you were able to download in the first place is because there are others leaving their clients running and seeding the files. The reason public torrents can be so slow is because most are like you, only in for the take, thus content not currently popular will take awhile to complete.

As far as the security risk, or the copyright infringement risk, you've already exposed yourself. This is because when they monitor a particular torrent they would be doing it long term instead of just popping in at some random time.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/311565/sat...ght-live-tebow

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That SNL skit was great.

The problem with seeding intermittently for me is that most of the content that I download tends not to stay in the same format forever. For instance, If I download some software it comes as a package file, and as soon as I install it I normally delete the package, especially if its say, the Adobe Creative Suite which is probably like 6 gigs. Im not starved for space, but I would be if I had to leave content like that on my hdd. As for movies and music, I normally change the format, either to fit them on a DVD or get the songs into iTunes. Again, often the originals get deleted to save space.

You are right, its probably easier to just say I'm a self serving leecher.

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Originally Posted by tombrady

You are right, its probably easier to just say I'm a self serving leecher.

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Why do you have to be so harsh on yourself? Changing format is a totally legit reason, especially when it's put together in a redundant or retarded fashion, e.g. RARs.

If 6 gigs is a struggle to make space then Why not invest in a new bigger hard drive.

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Originally Posted by Alien5

If 6 gigs is a struggle to make space then Why not invest in a new bigger hard drive.

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Find me a 2tb 2.5 inch drive and ill install it.
6 gigs was a single file, and no, its not a huge problem to have one, or two or even like four. But if i had to keep every original file that I torrent I would quickly run out of space.

What I was thinking was maybe I should buy an old desktop PC, like a apple powermac G5, and load it with cheap 3.5 inch HDD's, leave it in a corner with a wired connection straight to my router for optimal speed and use that as a box that I just leave on all of the time and use to torrent everything, then just copy the files to my laptop. This would allow me to seed and probably never run out of space, as well as meaning that I don't have to run the torrent client on my computer.

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Originally Posted by tombrady

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Originally Posted by Alien5

If 6 gigs is a struggle to make space then Why not invest in a new bigger hard drive.

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Find me a 2tb 2.5 inch drive and ill install it.
6 gigs was a single file, and no, its not a huge problem to have one, or two or even like four. But if i had to keep every original file that I torrent I would quickly run out of space.

What I was thinking was maybe I should buy an old desktop PC, like a apple powermac G5, and load it with cheap 3.5 inch HDD's, leave it in a corner with a wired connection straight to my router for optimal speed and use that as a box that I just leave on all of the time and use to torrent everything, then just copy the files to my laptop. This would allow me to seed and probably never run out of space, as well as meaning that I don't have to run the torrent client on my computer.

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If you can't find a desktop for free I recommend getting a pogoplug instead - they go for about 25$ and probably take up way less energy. And why copy to the laptop if you can just stream from whatever server you decide to use.

Wait, who's Tom Brady? Can I make fun of him?

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Originally Posted by mjmacky

Wait, who's Tom Brady? Can I make fun of him?

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seriously?

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Originally Posted by mjmacky

Wait, who's Tom Brady? Can I make fun of ridicule him?

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fixed.

What I was thinking was you could buy an old desktop PC, like an old Desktop PC and load it with dutch porn from the 1970's leave it in a corner with a wire straight to you mums router for the porn then just copy the porn to your laptop.

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Originally Posted by tombrady

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Originally Posted by mjmacky

Wait, who's Tom Brady? Can I make fun of him?

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seriously?

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Does he have anything to do with soccer?

Attachment 95738

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Originally Posted by mjmacky

Wait, who's Tom Brady? Can I make fun of him?

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You could but I don't think it would really bother him.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz...ompletion.html

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Originally Posted by tombrady

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Originally Posted by temisturk

I'm glad you said that because your reply there really left me speechless. But as much as I applaud your honesty I'm one of the people who seeds public torrents--one of the people you take from without giving back to--so I'm not sure I want to continue helping you.

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Thanks for being one of the generous people. I have a couple questions about how to seed I guess since maybe I'm just confused about the process. It seems to me that often during my torrent downloads i will maintain for instance a 200kB/s download speed and a maybe 4kB/s upload speed. Once I'm done it the download speed drops to 1kB/s and the upload stays about the same. A lot of the time they both stop. I'm not limiting the seed ratio or the upload speed, leaving both at unlimited, but it seems to me that I really don't provide a whole lot of service to the community. I might get to a 0.100 ratio if I download the average 700MB movie while I sleep. When I wake up I normally turn off my computer or put it to sleep and go to class. If I shut down, the torrent obviously stops and if I take my laptop to class I have to quit out of the client because my university monitors their network. Now until I need another torrent download I have little incentive to reopen the client. Im not going to leave my computer on and running day and night for a week to build up a ratio that does nothing for me. I mean, if I am able to download overnight 700MB, but unable to seed the same amount in a week, are people actually benefiting from my seeding? Arn't the same people that I got the content from still there giving it out? Are they going to lessen in number because I now seed? I guess I just feel that wasting power running my laptop (i could run folding@home and get two jobs done at the same time) but I just don't think its worth it. I don't feel like I am a selfish person, I volunteer occasionally, I give small donations to various charities, I sometimes use paypal to give a dollar or two to a developer of free software. I guess to me seeding isn't one of the ways I give back to the community, I'm sorry I'm not more compelled but I guess I just don't see much of a point.

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Seeding has nothing to do with giving back to the community, seeding is just one aspect of the way your BitTorrent client works, no seeds = shit speeds.

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Originally Posted by tombrady

I guess to me seeding isn't one of the ways I give back to the community, I'm sorry I'm not more compelled but I guess I just don't see much of a point.

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So in other words you're just a leecher that doesn't give back? Merry Christmas to everyone but you :)

I give back...most of the time I leave the pc on when I'm out, easy.

Merry Christmas