Recommended Bittorrent/µTorrent Settings

As I've shown already, Oftentimes people do REALLY stupid things with their client settings. I mean beyond ordinary 'stupid'. Private tracker sites are one of the main reasons for this. The all-fired obsession with seeding as much as possible, because of the power of the intangible and all-powerful 'ratio' that must be obeyed, and adhered to at all costs.

Thus I felt that I should reprint this, as first developed by a friend of mine, a µTorrent forum moderator that goes by the name of Switeck. This was first publshed on the µTorrent forum, but in the spirit of getting it out there, and easily found, he agreed to this reprint. These settings work for pubic AND private trackers (and work better for private trackers than the ones suggested by those trackers in most cases)

'Super' Seeder's Stupid Settings

The  last µTorrent support post I made was quite popular. over 600 hits in one day (the usual is 20-30/day). However, life goes on and so another day, another stupid support problem, but unlike last time, this guy thinks he's smart and knows what he's doing. Like last time, it's the µTorrenet support channel, and this happened December 16th (yesterday)

Magnet Links in Operation

This was a segment I originally filmed for TorrentFreak.tv but my voice isn't exactly the best, and neither is my microphone. However, it's still important to get it out there

There is a lot of misconceptions about magnet links, and how well they work. A lot of people say they're slow, which is rubbish. So, I decided to make this little video. For obvious reasons, I used a torrent of TorrentFreak.tv, from mininova.

P2P Hurts UK Music Sales?

... or so we're told.

There is a belief, that music sales are being harmed by the internet. MP3's and peer-to-peer (p2p) networks have made swapping music easy, ever since Napster burst onto the scene in 1999. There is even a section on the BPI's website that deals with it (strangely titled "File-sharing FAQ's"

Why is it a problem; does filesharing damage music sales?
Aside from the fact that filesharing infringes and undermines the rights of the creators and investors in music, it’s enormously damaging to music sales.

Is is true though?

Well, according to figures from the UK music industry themselves, the answer is No.

A Strange µTorrent Support Question

I've been doing support for the µTorrent client, in their IRC channel, for a few years now. I don't get paid, and I don't have any official position, but I've been doing it a while, and I know my way around things.

Today, I had perhaps one of the most bizzare support questions ever.

[16:48.00] * BB_ ([email protected]) has joined #utorrent

[16:48.30] <BB_> Is something wrong with utorrent. Every time I search I am coming up with no searches.

3 Strikes for Corruption?

Lord Mandelson's Digital Economy Bill has in it the proposal to terminate the internet connections of people repeatedly accused of copyright infringement. It's claims that because this is such a big loss maker, and so time consuming and costly to enforce, justice should be circumvented and punishment be made to deter the actions from being committed.

There is, however, a bigger crime out there, that is harder to prove, and more costly to the country as a whole. It's name? CORRUPTION

BIS Discriminates Against the Disabled

Today, we had the release of the Digital Economy Bill, which is basically a way of taking the Digital world, and forcing it to try and confirm to the 'Old Economy'.

There is one sure sign though, that this is because they don't understand technology. Are you ready? It's the pdfs of the consultation responses.

The Times Backs Me Up

Wow, mainstream media, or more specifically The Times, did you happen to read my consultation response to the UK Government? I did point out in it how much of an increase in sales there has been since P2P came about (pages 10 and 11), with a roughly 25% gain in both album and singles sales in 2008 compared with 1997.

Pirate Party Gets Second MEP

Yes, you read that right. Today saw the final ratification in the Czech Republic for the Lisbon treaty. It came after the Czech Constitutional Court ruled that it was in accordance with their laws. This was the final step needed, and now all 27 countries have ratified it. So, as of December 1st (the first of the month after the final ratification), it becomes law.

For the Pirate Party, this is a good thing. It means that the number of MEPs Sweden can send is increased from 18 to 20, and one of the recipients is the Piratpartiet, in the shape of Amelia Andersdotter.

ACTA Must be Public!

Many of you will have heard about ACTA. For those that haven't, ACTA (or in long form the “Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement”) is an agreement between countries that purports to reduce counterfeiting to benefit the consumer. What it actually will do, we don't know. See, the treaty hasn't been made public. In two years of negotiations, it's been kept quiet.

The Truth in Reporting

There's a big brouhaha going on right now about conflicts between The White House, and the Fox News Channel (FNC). The spat is because the White House feels Fox news is overly biased towards the Republican party, while Fox news points out that the segments the White House points to are Opinion shows, not News.

Auto-repair Safety Warning!

I'm an engineer by training. I also grew up with a father who was an engineer, and did his own car work when possible, so I always do my own car work when possible. In the past three years I've rebuilt heads, replaced valves, drive-shafts, and bodywork. Car repairs can be dangerous though, even with simple jobs, and every now and then, That danger aspect needs to be reinforced.

Ben Bradshaw's Number10 "FACT"s

Two weeks ago, Culture Secretary Ben Bradshaw took part in a webchat on number10.gov.uk

Put simply, it was a farce. The questions were so soft you could use them to swaddle babies. The one strong, serious question posed, got a response filled with unproven claims and appeals to emotion. Not a single hard fact.

My 9 3/4 year fling with Mirc

There are some funny things, odd coincidences in life.
I use Irc a lot. Mostly I use an old PC for my IRC and email, but it's not been working, so I've been using a version of MIRC on my main desktop. It's unregistered, as I'm unsure when I can get my preexisting desktop running with it's funny customised IRC setup (5 networks, 27 channels, and all the nickservs handled automatically, logging enabled in the appropriate channels, and blowfish+SSL support for the paranoids)

Imagine my surprise yesterday when the nag screen shows I've been using mirc, for around 9 years, 9 months and 20 days; since January 31st, 2000.

British in Need of Pity

There was a piece by the BBC the other day, where they interviewed two supporters of the BNP. I've put off commenting on this for a few days, as I didn't want to go off half-cocked, and say something I didn't mean, but there's no other way to say this.

The two BNP supporters in this article are clearly of negligible intelligence, and a clear victim of the current blame culture in the UK, where it's best to blame everyone else, and take no responsibility for yourself.

An Old Statement on Politics That is Still Valid

Watching Brewsters Millions for the first time in years, a line in it exemplified perfectly what is wrong with "democracy" in the US, or rather why elected officials ignore common sense and the good of the people.

Heller and Salvino are both just a couple of overgrown Wharf Rats. Why else would anybody spend $10Million to get a $60,000/year job, unless he planned to steal it back with interest.

Clueless MP in Charge of Filesharing Crackdown

The MP apparantly in charge of UK government's policy on p2p, hasn't got a clue what he's talking about. In today's Birmingham Post, Siôn Simon, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Creative Industries at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, is quoted as saying the following at the Labour Party conference in Brighton.

UK P2P Consultation Response

The UK P2P consultation closed yesterday. I submitted mine 10 minutes after the deadline, which was to quote Mike Klym in response to a question from my longtime friend and co-worker Ben Jones, "One second to midnight tonight!"

War on Terror? Why not a War on Weather?

As we come up on the 8th anniversary of the 9/11 attack, there is a clear need to reflect on those past 8 years, and the effect that one event has had on not just the US, but on the greater world.

Certainly, as an attack, it was devastating. 3000 dead in a single multi-faceted attack (19 hijackers, 2,974 killed, and 24 still missing). However, those 3000 have shaped foreign policy around the world, has spawned several wars, shaped governments, and in many cases massively changed countries.