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Why do they need to modify the .torrent? If they simply read passing .torrent files and acted as a peer-then-seed, wouldn't they get the same benefit? Perhaps
by jbert 17y ago
Why do they need to modify the .torrent?
If they simply read passing .torrent files and acted as a peer-then-seed, wouldn't they get the same benefit?
Perhaps the problem with that is they want to firewall off non-customer IPs. Would this make them look like a bad torrent peer and so get poor download rates from other peers? If so, couldn't they snag their customer's incoming data blocks to populate their seed?
- chancho 17y agoMaybe they are relying on the (now invalid?) assumption that tracking is always legal while seeding is not.
- jbert 17y agoBut just tracking gains them nothing, surely? They need to hold a seed themselves to get the bandwidth benefits? Or have I misunderstood what they're doing?
- chancho 17y agoOh Ok I see. It appears (from the dearth of quoted text on the linked article) that they are running both a tracker _and_ a seed. The seeder is for their customers only, because then they don't have to pay for upstream access. The p2p connections stay within their network. They don't want to seed normally because they don't want to connect with non-customers, and being choosy like that would make them appear to be a bad peer. So they use this second tracker to inform their customers of this special seeder and of each other. Sounds like a win-win to me.