4 ms·

Private torrent trackers are also fuelled by this drive. The 'game' abstraction has been made so real with ranks, stats, leaderboards and so on. It really is qu

by glomph 14y ago

Private torrent trackers are also fuelled by this drive. The 'game' abstraction has been made so real with ranks, stats, leaderboards and so on. It really is quite amazing how willing people are to sink time into providing a service, moderating, sourcing, encoding (people sink LOADS of time into learning the finest details of x264), cracking, uploading and distributing all for for no material gain outside 'the game'.

kruk 14y ago
I don't think it's just about the game. I believe many people involved in distribution of illegal content do it out of a genuine desire to share. For every released movie, every song, a book or a piece of software there exists a group of people with no means of accessing it in a legal way (and probably another, much larger, of people who can't afford it).
- Nav_Panel 14y ago
  Additionally, some of the content (music) is actually completely or almost completely unavailable (even legally) outside of these sites. For example, old rare/obscure records - people rip them because they want to share, and people download because there is literally no other way to get a copy without potentially spending $100+ (not to mention the costs of a decent vinyl setup).
- marcamillion 14y ago
  Maybe SOME people involved in doing it was for a genuine desire to share. Let me tell you, though, there are a lot of rewards from being "first". Either the first person to get your hands on a pre-release item, or the first one to rip it, or the first group to release it, or the first racer to move it the fastest to the top. It is beautiful in its simplicity - but there are many incentives to get people to be 'the first'. Just like the price mechanism in modern day capitalist economies is beautiful in its simplicity to get people to move into a market were demand is high. So I think the vast majority of the people involved in "the scene" are doing it for the incentives/rewards that come with being first. If everybody tries to be first and is racing against everyone else, the entire system gets efficient at moving pre-release stuff very quickly. It's impossible to fight - which is why it still thrives today.
  - jiggy2011 14y ago
    What sort of rewards other than being known in the warez scene (not even under your real name). You can't buy anything with it or boast about it in public.
    - pyre 14y ago
      Sometimes pre-release sources are rewarded financially. I have no idea where the money comes from[1], though. This was the case for the Academy member that was busted a while back. IIRC, he was just selling his DVD screeners to pirate groups. [1]: I get that the group pays for it, but what the source of the money is, I don't know. Are people just sinking money into for the 'props' of being first? Is there a greater financial reward for being first (if so, where does it come from)?
      - Strom 14y ago
        Being first, or otherwise an interesting group means that FTP administrators want you to fill their servers with your releases. As a return, the group gets a bunch of unlimited use "leech accounts" to these FTP servers. A lot of money enters the scene via people who directly or indirectly buy "leech accounts" from these groups. These unlimited use FTP accounts give the buyer a very convenient way to acquire everything that has ever been released by anyone. Also, interestingly enough, while release groups selling FTP access is a common practice and done by basically everyone, FTP administrators can't sell accounts directly, as it is extremely taboo for people other than the members of groups to profit from the scene.
        pyre 14y ago
        So the FTP administrators are some sort of neutral ground, in that they distribute releases from a variety of groups. They are sort of the Warez Scene hosting providers? What are the incentives? Are these just people that have cheap access to fat connections, so the cost of running the FTP site is minimal? The ability to create 'leech accounts' for friends/family so long as they aren't sold (or is this also taboo)? Is unlimited personal access enough of an incentive?
- glomph 14y ago
  Oh of course. I just think it is interesting how the game aspect is used for leverage.
rdl 14y ago
All that stuff existed with TOPSITES, ftp, etc. before the torrent sites. The torrent sites are just the "retail" level of the game; the real players are getting prereleases, ripping, potentially cracking, and doing stuff on topsites.
- colonD 14y ago
  Especially appropriate considering the language used by the FTPd scripts to announce releases on the sites -- upping a new release was known as "starting a race."
- w1ntermute 14y ago
  Yeah, the scene is where it's at. I explained the scene in detail in a comment 2.5 years ago: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1636785 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1636785
- glomph 14y ago
  Oh I know that it all existed before, I am just commenting on how prevalent it is and how much it is built in by design. To be honest I think you are slightly out of date in thinking torrent sites are just the 'retail' level. The majority of pre retail releases of movies (CAM/R5/Screener/HDTV etc) these days are done by p2p groups. A huge amount of pre release leaks of bluray disks come from Chinese bittorrent sites. A huge proportion of games get uploaded to p2p sites before getting pred and many games are cracked by p2p groups before the scene groups get to them (with several notable cases of scene groups 'stealing' p2p releases). The one area where I feel like the scene could be said to be in a different league is in preing TV, but even that is slipping with p2p groups uploading full .ts streams and itunes rips.
  - rdl 14y ago
    Ah, that makes sense. I'm pretty out of date for anything post DoD/RZR, which was 2001.
jrockway 14y ago
Interesting reading: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warez_scene http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warez_scene
- w1ntermute 14y ago
  More info in my comment here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1636785 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1636785 One change from 2.5 years ago, now the scene does FLAC releases (finally): http://i.imgur.com/YZjUw.png http://i.imgur.com/YZjUw.png
  - jrockway 14y ago
    That's a good comment. I am personally most amused at the amount of bureaucracy involved.

by glomph 14y ago

kruk 14y ago

I don't think it's just about the game. I believe many people involved in distribution of illegal content do it out of a genuine desire to share. For every released movie, every song, a book or a piece of software there exists a group of people with no means of accessing it in a legal way (and probably another, much larger, of people who can't afford it).

Nav_Panel 14y ago
Additionally, some of the content (music) is actually completely or almost completely unavailable (even legally) outside of these sites. For example, old rare/obscure records - people rip them because they want to share, and people download because there is literally no other way to get a copy without potentially spending $100+ (not to mention the costs of a decent vinyl setup).
marcamillion 14y ago
Maybe SOME people involved in doing it was for a genuine desire to share. Let me tell you, though, there are a lot of rewards from being "first". Either the first person to get your hands on a pre-release item, or the first one to rip it, or the first group to release it, or the first racer to move it the fastest to the top. It is beautiful in its simplicity - but there are many incentives to get people to be 'the first'. Just like the price mechanism in modern day capitalist economies is beautiful in its simplicity to get people to move into a market were demand is high. So I think the vast majority of the people involved in "the scene" are doing it for the incentives/rewards that come with being first. If everybody tries to be first and is racing against everyone else, the entire system gets efficient at moving pre-release stuff very quickly. It's impossible to fight - which is why it still thrives today.
- jiggy2011 14y ago
  What sort of rewards other than being known in the warez scene (not even under your real name). You can't buy anything with it or boast about it in public.
  - pyre 14y ago
    Sometimes pre-release sources are rewarded financially. I have no idea where the money comes from[1], though. This was the case for the Academy member that was busted a while back. IIRC, he was just selling his DVD screeners to pirate groups. [1]: I get that the group pays for it, but what the source of the money is, I don't know. Are people just sinking money into for the 'props' of being first? Is there a greater financial reward for being first (if so, where does it come from)?
    - Strom 14y ago
      Being first, or otherwise an interesting group means that FTP administrators want you to fill their servers with your releases. As a return, the group gets a bunch of unlimited use "leech accounts" to these FTP servers. A lot of money enters the scene via people who directly or indirectly buy "leech accounts" from these groups. These unlimited use FTP accounts give the buyer a very convenient way to acquire everything that has ever been released by anyone. Also, interestingly enough, while release groups selling FTP access is a common practice and done by basically everyone, FTP administrators can't sell accounts directly, as it is extremely taboo for people other than the members of groups to profit from the scene.
      - pyre 14y ago
        So the FTP administrators are some sort of neutral ground, in that they distribute releases from a variety of groups. They are sort of the Warez Scene hosting providers? What are the incentives? Are these just people that have cheap access to fat connections, so the cost of running the FTP site is minimal? The ability to create 'leech accounts' for friends/family so long as they aren't sold (or is this also taboo)? Is unlimited personal access enough of an incentive?
glomph 14y ago
Oh of course. I just think it is interesting how the game aspect is used for leverage.

rdl 14y ago

All that stuff existed with TOPSITES, ftp, etc. before the torrent sites. The torrent sites are just the "retail" level of the game; the real players are getting prereleases, ripping, potentially cracking, and doing stuff on topsites.

colonD 14y ago
Especially appropriate considering the language used by the FTPd scripts to announce releases on the sites -- upping a new release was known as "starting a race."
w1ntermute 14y ago
Yeah, the scene is where it's at. I explained the scene in detail in a comment 2.5 years ago: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1636785 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1636785
glomph 14y ago
Oh I know that it all existed before, I am just commenting on how prevalent it is and how much it is built in by design. To be honest I think you are slightly out of date in thinking torrent sites are just the 'retail' level. The majority of pre retail releases of movies (CAM/R5/Screener/HDTV etc) these days are done by p2p groups. A huge amount of pre release leaks of bluray disks come from Chinese bittorrent sites. A huge proportion of games get uploaded to p2p sites before getting pred and many games are cracked by p2p groups before the scene groups get to them (with several notable cases of scene groups 'stealing' p2p releases). The one area where I feel like the scene could be said to be in a different league is in preing TV, but even that is slipping with p2p groups uploading full .ts streams and itunes rips.
- rdl 14y ago
  Ah, that makes sense. I'm pretty out of date for anything post DoD/RZR, which was 2001.

jrockway 14y ago

Interesting reading: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warez_scene http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warez_scene

w1ntermute 14y ago
More info in my comment here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1636785 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1636785 One change from 2.5 years ago, now the scene does FLAC releases (finally): http://i.imgur.com/YZjUw.png http://i.imgur.com/YZjUw.png
- jrockway 14y ago
  That's a good comment. I am personally most amused at the amount of bureaucracy involved.