Google is a great tool to compare the popularity of searches in a similar niche. When the number of people searching for something goes up, it is often a sign of increased popularity. We take a look at the search volume for three popular BitTorrent clients, how this changed over time, and how it differs worldwide.
Google insights graphs the search volume for the keywords you choose, and allows you to compare searches over time. We decided to take a look at three frequently used BitTorrent clients: uTorrent, Azureus (now Vuze) and BitComet. Below is a graphical representation of the search volume over time.
The graph clearly shows that Azureus was the most searched for client until the beginning of 2007, followed by BitComet. From then on, uTorrent took over and it continued to grow while BitComet and Azureus searches slowly decreased. Search statistics are of course only an indirect measure of the popularity of a BitTorrent client, but the graphs seem to follow the same pattern as actual usage statistics which we have reported before.
Search volume comparison
Worldwide
Another measure that is worth looking into is the geographical distribution of the searches. It is interesting to see how popular BitComet is in Asia. Currently, it is (based on searches) the preferred client in China, Taiwan, Thailand, Malaysia and Hong Kong. However, uTorrent is most often searched for in most countries, especially in Moldova. Azureus, on the other hand, is a popular search term in Greece.
uTorrent search volume worldwide
US
If we take a closer look at the US (you can do this for any country), we see that pretty much every BitTorrent client is popular in California. The graph shows that most uTorrent searches (relatively) come from Kentucky and California, Milpitas in particular. Azureus seems to be quite popular in Ohio, specifically in Salt Lake City. BitComet is the least searched for client of the three, but gets most search traffic from New York and California again, Monterey Park on this occasion.
uTorrent search volume in the US
Overall I would say that based on other statistics, the search data is a pretty close match to the actual BitTorrent client preferences. Google’s insights on the regional differences certainly have something to add to what we already know, but keep in mind that they are only search statistics. Most of all, it’s a fun tool to play around with on a Sunday afternoon when there’s not much news to go around.
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
Google’s Insights on BitTorrent Clients
31.Aug.08 
TorrentFreak 
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In June we wrote about TorrentRelay, a site which enabled anyone with a web-enabled device to download torrent without a BitTorrent client. A few months later, the site has evolved quite a bit. We take a look at the new site and the range of useful features that were added by the developer.
Mostly written in Perl, TorrentRelay provides any user with a web-enabled browser (including game consoles) with the ability to download torrents without having to install a BitTorrent client. The process itself is quite straightforward, and a brief description is available in our earlier interview with the developer. A more comprehensive guide can be found here.
Since the launch of TorrentRelay, Kevin Kowalewski, the creator of the site, hasn’t been letting the grass grow under his feet. During the last few months, things have certainly moved on, and now TorrentRelay offers lots of brand new features which are mostly unique to a service of this type. We take a look.
One of the new features is ‘Fast Relay’. It allows users to save their files before the torrent has actually finished, with a save link becoming available during the first few minutes of transfer. As the torrent downloads on TorrentRelay, the data is sent directly to a ‘Save As’ dialog on the user’s PC, cutting down on save time. ‘Auto Save’ allows the user to start saving automatically to their default Firefox ’save’ location. Selective file downloading from within torrents is available.
‘Load Again’, another new feature, makes it possible to easily restart previously loaded torrents, since the service is able to save a list of every other torrent used so far. TorrentRelay now also allows users to receive an email when a torrent has been completed, and the site now displays the combined speed and percentage completed of all active torrents.
Sites like TorrentRelay, or the Imageshack service we reported on earlier, are bandwidth intensive projects and of course, bandwidth costs money. While TorrentRelay continues to offer a free service like Imageshack’s, greater functionality is available to those who can afford a few dollars a month. The free version allows the user to download 3 torrents per day (2 simultaneously), each with a download rate of 500KBps and an upload rate of 250KBps
The ‘Prime’ service, costing $9.99 per month, allows intensive users to customize the experience and get a more feature-rich environment, allowing six active torrents and enhanced torrent transfer speeds. Prime also offers a personalized login which enables users to keep all their settings just the way they like them, regardless of login location. Other features include the ability to keep downloading after closing the browser, seeding to a ratio of 1.5 instead of 1.0, and a nice time-saving automated online RAR extraction.
One of the early applications of TorrentRelay was its Playstation 3 compatibility. Now it’s possible for ‘Prime’ users to stream video (.avi or .wmv) from torrents straight to the console. A video tutorial is available here.
Overall, TorrentRelay seems to be developing into a decent service with some nice features. It’s to be expected that bandwidth intensive users should pay a little for the service, and $9.99 isn’t going to break the bank, but it would be nice if some of the additional functionality of the ‘Prime’ account was available to all users.
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
TorrentRelay’s BitTorrent Download Service Expands
31.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
Indiana Gregg has become a well known name around the net, mainly for her contradictory, and self-obsessed rants regarding piracy. The Scottish singer and her producer husband are now going to try and cash in on that ‘net notoriety’ with a new site they claim will help the artists; the name, Kerchoonz.com
Love her or loathe her, Indiana Gregg has managed to become a minor net celebrity after her egomaniacal rant towards the Pirate Bay catapulted her into the public spotlight in a way her work was unable to.
Later she reflected on her rant, sometimes contradicting her earlier claims such as her millionaire status. So, considering the dismal status of torrents of her work, she needed another way to cash in.
Enter Kerchoonz.com. From what we can gather, it aims to be an online jukebox, mixed in with a music download service, maybe something like Jamendo. Ms Gregg’s husband, music producer Ian Morrow, explained the service to the BBC, saying “If you’re a musician you’ll upload your music to the site. Anyone plays it, you get paid. Anyone downloads it, you get paid. That’s it, simple. Everything’s free for the user.”
The main question then, is where the money will come from. Currently, they have a £250,000 investment from the Scottish Co-investment Fund. While this can fund the website initially, with a free end-user model it’s going to be incredible hard to gain any revenue. Advertising will be the only alternative, so until the site becomes popular, it will hemorrhage money. It doesn’t help that the site promises “no adverts attached!!!” which simply means that the site will be smothered in pop-ups and sponsored links. The payouts will probably be minuscule as well, so anyone expecting this to be a major source of revenue will be left unhappy.
Of course, over-exaggeration is nothing new for Gregg and Morrow. They claim they got the idea for the site after the release of Gregg’s album, “Woman at Work”. In an interview with the BBC, they claimed it had over 250,000 downloads. Our own research shows the upper limit to be more like 10,000 and the current activity of the torrents supports that. The name (Kerchoonz) appears to be derived from the word Gregg used whenever she talked about the Pirate Bay making money – kerching.
Another point to ponder is that while they claim there will be no DRM, watermarking will be used. One of the press releases for the site states “Kerchoonz tracks downloads and streams through a combination of the ISRC and play counts by utilizing unique coding and encryption within the application.” With this approach there could be privacy and profiling concerns, as with all watermarking.
Will the project succeed? At this stage it seems extremely unlikely, as there are already better services out there and any proposed rewards are likely to be extremely small. The recommendation and similarity aspects of both Pandora and last.fm have been the key to their success, letting people discover new artists. As to whether Kerchoonz will have it, who knows?
Right now, they are collecting emails and names, and a link to their privacy policy, but no actual policy. It’s polish like that that will make this public funded website go all the way…. to titsup.com. In the end, it sparks the phrase “Ave! Bossa nova, similis bossa seneca!” in that the only difference between Kerchoonz and The Pirate Bay, is that with Kerchoonz, you have a much smaller audience, but with some distant hope of getting some money back.
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
Indiana Gregg to Beat Pirates with Music Download Site
30.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
Today, Comcast officially announced a 250 GB cap, while threatening to disconnect users who exceed this limit more than once. Comcast is taking the heat once again, but they are not the only ISP that limits its users. Other ISPs, Qwest being one of them, have exactly the same policy - and the same threats.
The 250GB bandwidth limit that Comcast has announced is not as new as it may seem. For several months, even years, Comcast subscribers who went over an “unspecified limit” have been contacted by the ISP. Customers are presented with two options: cut back their bandwidth use, or find a new provider. Today, however, they officially announced a 250 GB limit, perhaps in an attempt to be more transparent about their network management practices.
We’ve wrote before that ISPs are looking for new ways to manage their network by introducing bandwidth caps and metered plans. Although we’re not in favor of it, we have to applaud Comcast for being open about it. Most other ISPs have similar policies, limiting their unlimited services, but they seem to get away with it. One of these ISPs is Qwest, one of the larger Internet providers in the western United States, who forces customers to accept an invisible 250 GB cap.
Qwest’s approach is quite aggressive to say the least. When customers reach the magic limit, their web traffic is is redirected to an “excessive use” page. The page informs the customer that they “noticed extremely high usage” on their Qwest Broadband account. The notification blocks all HTTP access from your computer, making it impossible to access any website. In order to proceed and release the block on your system, customers must acknowledge notification on this web page, and agree to a new service agreement.
There are no other options, no personal phone calls, no further explanation what acceptable use is, or how customers can track their usage. The new service agreement, dated August 12, 2008 (pdf), allows Qwest to limit your use in any way they see fit, and even terminate your service when the customer exceeds the (invisible) limit again. Note that Qwest does not specify how much bandwith customers are allowed to use. They only state (pdf) that “normal” subscribers use 1-3 GB a month (oh really?), and that 40.000 - 80.000 typically sized MP3 downloads is considered to be excessive use.
Comcast’s MP3 limit 250 GB limit comes down to 62,500 4 MB MP3s, so it is safe to say that Qwest has a bandwidth cap that is similar to Comcast - 250 GB. Unlike Comcast, excessive use is not specified anywhere in the service agreement, so customers can only guess, and hope that their service will not be limited or terminated out of the blue.
One of the affected Qwest users, who tipped us off, told TorrentFreak: “Since Qwest holds a monopoly in many areas, they can continue to reduce allowed bandwidth usage as they add new users while not adding new infrastructure. Such radical bandwidth limitation will have a chilling effect on further evolution of the Internet. If people can’t get bandwidth, then they can’t use bandwidth intensive services such as YouTube and Netflix. We may never know what the future could have been.”
Indeed, as we have said before, ISPs should think ahead. To most “normal” customers 250 GB may sound as a lot of bandwidth, but this might be totally different in the future. Making an online backup of your harddrive is pretty much impossible with a bandwidth cap like this, so will HD-streaming. It hinders innovation while it’s ignoring the real problem. ISPs should invest in their network instead, but I guess it’s not only the entertainment industry that finds it hard to adapt to technological change.
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
Qwest’s Unofficial 250 GB Data Cap
29.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
After four years of operation, the private torrent site AradiTracker has been closed down by the administrators. After surviving ISP troubles exactly one year ago, fresh legal action against the site forced it to close yesterday and it is very unlikely to return.
A year (and a day) ago we reported that Dutch anti-piracy outfit BREIN had forced the closure of six torrent sites after their ISP, LeaseWeb was forced to hand over the administrators personal details. One of those sites, the 24,000 peer Araditracker, initially went dark but then reappeared at a new host, seemingly surviving unscathed.
Since its birth Araditracker has operated for over 4 years, however visitors to the site yesterday saw an ominous message on the homepage. The short notice said that Araditracker had been shutdown by ‘the powers that be’ with the admins indicating that the site would not be back. Thanks was sent out to all staff and members for their support.
With details scarce, TorrentFreak managed to find a senior staff member willing to talk on condition of anonymity, he told us: “Early Thursday morning (BST) legal action was taken directly against Araditracker. For the moment we are unable to divulge details. As a direct result the decision has been taken to close the site. It is very unlikely to return as a torrent tracker.”
Araditracker was born on May 4th 2005 “when a couple of guys on another site wanted to do more than they could where they were”. It gathered a few thousand members in its first few months of operation up to a peak of 37,000, with the total peers averaging around 24,000. No Microsoft content was indexed and in order to keep a ‘family feel’ on the site, the indexing of pornographic content was banned.
The site had been hosted in the UK, The Netherlands and most recently Canada, running radio, IRC and forums. There had been some rumors that the site couldn’t afford to keep going through lack of donations, something which is denied. Our source told us: “Despite speculation, it was not the money. Although donations were not as good as they have been and we had started to reorganize some hardware to compensate, the reason aradi is off-line has nothing to do with donations.”
Although trackers are loved for the wide range of access to media they provide, many are loved equally on the strength of their communities, where like-minded people can hang out and create friendships. In this respect Araditracker was no different. “We had a huge ‘family’ community,” said our source, “that is something we were very proud of and encouraged.”
It looks like Araditracker will not be back (as a torrent site at least) so there’s likely to be a sense of loss amongst the now ex-staff and members. Here is a final message for them:
“There are not enough words that can express our thanks for all support from the staff, past and present, Knights, VIPs, Uploaders, and members of all levels that have shared Araditracker over the last three years. Araditracker had a real sense of community and this more than anything will be missed by most.”
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
Araditracker BitTorrent Site Shutdown After Legal Action
29.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
The upcoming trial against ‘The Pirate Bay Four’ has been delayed and at its earliest will begin at the end of this year - maybe even next year. Stockholm District Court initially said that the trial would start by the end of the summer, but gathering damage claims and serving summons took longer than expected.
After a two year investigation into The Pirate Bay, Swedish authorities filed charges against four people. Now, eight months later, there is still no date set for the trial.
“The process has taken a lot of time. First, it took time serving judicial summons to the defendants and then we had to gather damage claims from the complainants,” Anita Thimberg, a clerk at the Stockholm District Court, told DN.se.
Several of the lawyers, defendants and complainants apparently have fully-booked agendas, and it is difficult to schedule a date when everyone can participate. At the moment, it is still unclear how many days trial it will take once it starts. “We’re approximating between six to ten days,” Anita Thimberg said.
January 31st, four individuals - Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm, Peter Sunde and businessman Carl Lundström were charged with facilitating copyright infringement. The prosecutor asked for a $188,000 fine for each - and the confiscation of their computers. The four also face up to 2 years in prison, but this is very unlikely based on the evidence gathered by the authorities.
That’s not all though, as the entertainment industry has also filed for damages. This spring, the MPAA demanded $15.4 million from The Pirate Bay, to cover the damages they suffered from 4 movies and 13 TV-episodes that were made available via the BitTorrent tracker. In addition, the IFPI claimed $2.5 milion in damages and Antipiratbyrån asked for $1.1 million.
Pirate Bay co-founder Peter Sunde has always been positive about the outcome. Even in the worst case scenario the tracker and the site will remain online, Sunde told TorrentFreak. “In case we lose the pending trial (yeah right) there will still not be any changes to the site. The Pirate Bay will keep operating just as always. We’ve been here for years and we will be here many more.”
For now, the wait continues.
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
Trial Against The Pirate Bay Delayed
28.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
Some months back, Project Gazelle was launched. It was an attempt to build a new and improved BitTorrent tracker script. The ultimate goal is to produce a new framework for private torrent sites, faster than the common TB source, while being more secure from a code point of view, easier to modify, and more flexible.
TorrentFreak covered Gazelle at various points along its development. From inception, through beta testing, to its public début on What.cd, we’ve followed the development and progress. That progress has now lead to what could arguably be the most important day in any product’s lifecycle – initial release day.
Yes, all those nay-sayers and early fans that have populated the comment sections of our previous stories on Gazelle can finally prove what they’ve been claiming, as the first public release candidate of the script is now available for download.
Reactions from those that have given the site a try, have been mostly positive. The main negative comments stem from the fact it’s not an intuitive install. Part of that comes from the memory caching software – memcached – which gives the project its ‘blazing speed’. Also, right now the system uses XBTT as a tracker, but we’re told that it will have its own (multithreaded) tracker ready for later versions, codenamed ‘Ocelot’.
Also, as things stand, while they hoped for around a doubling of capacity over the older TBsource script, in practice it’s become more like double that, meaning a 10,000 user site under TBSource can probably handle 40,000 without any major difference in site response or system load. Project head WhatMan told TorrentFreak: “We out-shot our initial projections by a very wide margin.”
Interest in Project Gazelle has been fairly strong, and at least half a dozen sites are now running the new script. Perhaps more interestingly, though, is that Gazelle isn’t JUST a torrent site. Due to its modular nature, it can be used for regular sites as well. It’s a bit like a content management system in that respect, and perhaps our earlier comparison to Diferior wasn’t all that far from the mark.
If you’re interested in getting your hands on the Gazelle code, then just head over to the project site and follow the instructions. The whole kit-and-caboodle is released under a modified version of the GPL, so have fun.
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
Gazelle Rejuvenates the BitTorrent Tracker Community
28.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
Most people know Limewire as the application that can be used to download music for free, but earlier this year, the Limewire team opened up their very own music store. Starting at $0.27, the Limewire store offers high quality, DRM-free MP3s, and they today they added 1.2 million tracks to their library.
LimeWire is by far the most used filesharing application, with a market share of approximately 35%. Their popularity is declining worldwide - mostly due to the BitTorrent boom - but roughly 18% of all PCs worldwide still has the application installed.
Earlier this year, the company opened their official music store, which they have expanded ever since. Today LimeWire takes another step forward, as they announce the largest distribution deal since the store launched. They teamed up with “The Orchard“, which distributes more than 1.2 million songs, mostly from Indie labels.
Greg Scholl, President and CEO of The Orchard, said in a response to the announcement: “We’re pleased to support the LimeWire store, a retail offering that protects copyrights while fairly compensating artists and labels. This exciting entrant to digital retail offers us a unique opportunity to connect our clients with an online audience of potentially millions of new customers.”
Tracks from the Limewire store are 256kbps DRM-free MP3s and cost $0.99 each. However, there are significant savings to be had with some of the subscription plans. The ‘Platinum’ plan offers the best price, offering 75 ‘Download Credits’ for $19.99 a month, which works out to $0.27 per track. ‘Download Credits’, which is more reasonable that most other stores.
The LimeWire store is linked to the filesharing client (hmmm), meaning that LimeWire users will see “buy now” offer in the search results. This does of course drive a lot of new customers to the store, but it’s also an interesting marketing opportunity for record labels. Still, most of the big labels are hesitant to partner with the store.
The LimeWire team has also added some new features such as radio playlist integration. Users can browse the playlists of radio stations in their area, with direct links to buy the songs. “We’re focused on features that will allow people to discover new music as well as interact on a different level with their existing favorites,” Jason Pelzer, the LimeWire store Technical Director told TorrentFreak.
Playlist integration.
“LimeWire Store development has been running at full speed to provide a number of exciting new features, and we are enjoying the opportunity to improve our user community’s experience via the feedback they’ve provided,” he added.
One of the major downsides of the Limewire store is that it’s only available to US customers, due to licensing issues. In a way it’s also strange that the download store named after and developed by a P2P company, doesn’t use P2P to distribute their content. Other than that, the service looks like a good alternative to most of the music stores that are currently out there.
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
LimeWire Music Store Adds 1.2 Million Tracks
27.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
Much to the disappointment of more than 100,000 users, Latvia’s largest BitTorrent tracker has been shut down by the authorities. Following a joint operation by Lativa’s Economic Police and a local IFPI-affiliated anti-piracy agency, two administrators were placed under arrest.
File.lv, Latvia’s largest BitTorrent community, was taken offline a few days ago. The 100,000 member tracker reportedly went dark after a joint effort by the Latvian Economic Police and the IFPI-affiliated Latvian Music Producers Association, otherwise known as LAmpA.
According to various Latvian reports, the site was taken down and two of the main administrators placed under arrest. Other gaming and sport related projects connected to the tracker also disappeared. Reports suggest that up to 40 servers were seized.
The two admins, believed to be known as FileX and Tralivali, are believed to have been detained by the Economic Police, an outfit similar to the Dutch FIOD-ECD which was involved in the closure of OiNK. As usual, rumors are circulating that prolific uploaders are also being investigated, although that is far from certain at this stage .
Reports indicate that in 2007, admin ‘FileX’ received a letter from a German media company which requested the shutdown of File.lv. Failing that, it was demanded that File.lv should at least block users with a German IP address, with legal action threatened should they not comply. It’s unclear whether or not the site complied with the request, or if the threatened action is connected to the site’s recent disappearance.
Almost exactly 12 months ago, the Economic Police and public prosecutors met up at a ‘cyber-crime’ summit in Sigulda, Latvia, to discuss how piracy on the Internet could be detected and recorded in a fashion acceptable to the courts. One of the guest lecturers at the meeting was Jeremy Banks, head of Internet anti-piracy operations at the IFPI.
With this news about File-lv, it sounds like it took them a year to get organized.
If you are Latvian and have any further updates, please email us at tips@torrentfreak.com
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
Latvia’s Largest BitTorrent Tracker Shutdown, Admins Arrested
27.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
It might not come as a surprise when we tell you that the RIAA wants to turn the Internet into a virtual police state. Still, it’s quite scary to see what their “future Internet” would look like. Let’s take a closer look at the RIAA’s suggestions for the Anti-Piracy Trade Agreement Wishlist (ACTA).
ACTA is a big deal, and the entertainment industry is doing all it can to get it implemented as soon as possible. Thus far, they have managed to convince the G8 to push the agreement, and encourage member states to get the agreement ready for implementation by the end of the year.
One of the crucial questions is how “bad” the agreement will turn out to be. We reported earlier that ACTA might allow “competent authorities” to “search iPods” without the need for a complaint from a rights holder. The most absurd ACTA suggestions we’ve seen so far come from the RIAA, with a strong focus on the liability of ISPs.
The RIAA’s wishlist was published several weeks ago, but hasn’t received much press (thanks Brokep). There are several scary suggestions in there though, and if the RIAA could have its way, the Internet would be turned into a virtual police state immediately.
Let’s highlight some of the RIAA’s suggestions regarding online copyright infringement, mostly targeted at ISPs. You can read the document in full at Keionline.
Require internet service providers and other intermediaries to employ readily available measures to inhibit infringement in instances where both legitimate and illegitimate uses were facilitated by their services, including filtering out infringing materials…
The RIAA wants Internet providers to spy on the files that are transferred by their customers and check them against a reference database of “fingerprints” to check whether the files are infringing copyright. The IFPI, RIAA’s international counterpart tried to convince European lawmakers to do the same a few months ago.
Require Internet service providers or other intermediaries to restrict or terminate access to their systems with respect to repeat infringers.
Many countries have looked into the possibility of disconnecting file-sharers from the Internet, often gently pushed by anti-piracy lobbyists. France was the first to present their idiotic “3-strikes” law earlier this year, allowing anti-piracy outfits to police the Internet. The RIAA wants to see such legislation implemented worldwide of course.
“Establish, adequately fund and provide training for a computer crimes investigatory unit.”
A crime unit to track down and bust pirates, sounds like a great idea. The RIAA is vague about what such a unit is supposed to do as they already send thousands of takedown notices a year themselves, even to network printers. Perhaps they will use the funding and education to come up with harvesting techniques that actually work?
Establish liability against internet service providers who, upon receiving notices of infringement from content provides via email, or by telephone in cases of pre-release materials or in other exigent circumstances, fail to remove the infringing content…
It gets even worse for ISPs. The RIAA wants to hold them responsible for the alleged copyright infringements of their customers. They even came up with a 24hour deadline. It’s interesting to see that they focus on pre-release material, the same strategy the IFPI and BPI used to take down OiNK.
…in the absence of proof to the contrary, an Internet service provider shall be considered as knowing that the content it stores is infringing or illegal, and thus subject to liability for copyright infringement…
Guilty until proven innocent, that makes sense. Of course, ISPs should know what files their customers store. The RIAA wants to ditch the “safe harbor” the DCMA created, making them responsible for the copyright infringement of their customers.
There is much more, but we suggest everyone reads the entire list of suggestions, it is entertaining and scary at the same time. Let’s hope that the politicians who are drafting the agreement will use their brains, instead of blindly accepting such proposals.
This is an article from: TorrentFreak
RIAA’s Anti-Piracy Trade Agreement Wishlist
26.Aug.08 TorrentFreak Comments Off
