funds info from a concerned what.cd VIP

[OlegL]

I didn't donate more money to what.cd for one simple reason: I ran out of money. I also need to have money, so I could buy food. But trust me, I won't forget about what.cd.

[whatcdfan]

Actually, everyone on the torrent scene should realize that trackers are a business, and require funds to operate. There are economics involved whether you want there to be or not, and if you feel there should always be improvements on trackers, those sites must profit, to enact said improvements. And if you think it's the sysops responsibility to pay out of pocket on top of the thousands of hours it takes to set up, grow, and maintain a site, then you really have less respect for staffers than you should.

I see you have a hard time understanding me, ah..my bad English.No where did i tried to argued that trackers dont need money to run/maintain rather i said the money they receive should be used to run/enhance the quality of the service instead of serving the personal needs of the staff members.The concept of private torrenting differs from that of a profit making online service, here we have everyone playing their part, each and everyone has its own share of responsibility even members upload/seed sometimes more then they leech so should they be given a chance to make a payout for the surplus?,here we have a system/culture of userclasses where worthy members are promoted to look after the different affairs. All in all everyone has to play their part and lend a hand to get the things going and if according to you (not sure though) sysops should get some part of the donations for their personal uses then everyone other member also in accordance with the time and effort they have put in.

Everyone that gets benefited by the tracker in one way or the other, should (if they can) bear the responsibility of paying for the expenses.

[Polarbear]

okay, statement from a sysop:

I do like the way oink is mentioned in this means the owner was found to make a profit from oink in the court case and to be honest cannot remember wether any other staff where implicated in taking any money so cannot comment on that.
But the mention of an ex site that did make money in a statement to try and clear this I find quiet ironic

From BBC News

The jury was told that police found almost US $300,000 (£183,580) in Mr Ellis's Paypal account and that he received $18,000 (£11,000) a month in donations from people using his website.

Mr Ellis told the court there was no intention to defraud copyright holders.
He said the donations were to pay for the server's rental and any "surplus" would eventually be used to buy a server.
He agreed he had about 10 bank accounts with some £20,000 in savings when police raided the house he shared.

The BBC also reported this:

"The court heard that membership to Oink was free, but by invitation only, and anyone wishing to propose a friend had to make a five dollar payment."

Any former member knows that the above is untrue.

The 300,000 were the combined sum of all donations OINK ever got. The money was used by Ellis to pay for the servers and hosting, which probably cost him several thousand dollars a month.

Ellis didn't really have a luxury life style. One could say that he lived under poor conditions.


Managing a huge bittorrent tracker is like running a small company. At some point you have to trust other people with money. You're dealing with employees that don't receive any salary and that you haven't ever met in person in most cases. In other words you don't know who they are. You have no leverage because you can't sue them for taking your money. An online friendship breaks really fast when it comes to several thousand dollars or more.
In such an enviornment it can't be avoided that some take the money at run. Happens all the time.

I wouldn't even have the time for the amount of work they do and they get nothing but recognition in an online community. Bad deal if you ask me. That's why we should respect the majority of tracker staff who are loyal workers dedicated to their site. They are the second most important people on a tracker. The most important ones are the users because they deliver the product and the money.

It's hard to tell how much profit trackers really make compared to their actual costs. Only a few people running a tracker have detailed insights and they wouldn't talk about it. As long as I'm not forced to invest money to download I frankly don't care.

[Intr4ns1t]

I see you have a hard time understanding me, ah..my bad English.No where did i tried to argued that trackers dont need money to run/maintain rather i said the money they receive should be used to run/enhance the quality of the service instead of serving the personal needs of the staff members.The concept of private torrenting differs from that of a profit making online service, here we have everyone playing their part, each and everyone has its own share of responsibility even members upload/seed sometimes more then they leech so should they be given a chance to make a payout for the surplus?,here we have a system/culture of userclasses where worthy members are promoted to look after the different affairs. All in all everyone has to play their part and lend a hand to get the things going and if according to you (not sure though) sysops should get some part of the donations for their personal uses then everyone other member also in accordance with the time and effort they have put in.

Everyone that gets benefited by the tracker in one way or the other, should (if they can) bear the responsibility of paying for the expenses.

You stated that everyone needs to realize trackers aren't and can't be a business. I pointed out why you were wrong. Get over it.