this post was submitted on 14 Jul 2023
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Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ
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What exactly is the appeal of Usenet when almost everything is available through torrents for free? I also never really understood trusting giving out your payment information.
Do people use Usenet as forums besides the ability to share files?
The main feature is that you’ll never have problem with too few or no seeders again, and everything will be fast always, and no one will ask or expect you to seed. Some have retention period on the content for like a decade.
But if the uploader stops hosting the file everyone loses the ability to download?
No, if the server you use stops hosting the file, then you can't download it. Other people might still be able to, if their server still has the file. Most servers seem to do at least 3000 days retention, and others I've seen do 5000 days, so anything recent is probably gonna be there.
Its the same with torrents though, with the exception that hardly any torrent still has seeders after 5000 days. Usenet is more reliable in that regard, because you dont have to worry that older files won't have enough seeders for you to grab the whole thing.
It's also why most people suggest multiple server providers on different backbones that solves that issue most of the time.
Idk about 5000 days since ive never downloded such an old file but ive never come across a torrent that no longer had seeders unless it was a very obscure torrent with only a seeder or two to begin with. Seems like most torrents are on a couple seedboxes
I used to come across it all the time when downloading anime years ago. But now I don't worry about that because I can download entire seasons of any anime in a minute or two without doing any searching myself. I just give Sonarr a name and start watching.
You ever not find something on usenet but found it on some tracker though?
No. I stopped using torrents a couple days after I started using Usenet, and nowadays I download anything new that I'm interested in as soon as somebody uploads it, which is usually an hour or two after it airs/releases. Anything upcoming I see that interests me I pop into the relevant *arr app, and then I get notified when it's downloaded later. I'm sure there are people who have experienced the situation in your example, but since I only search for new and upcoming media, I'm not a good person to ask. I don't peruse anything really obscure either, mostly mainstream fantasy and sci-fi. Things like Star Wars, Wheel of Time, The Expanse, and stuff like that. I know, I'm boring, but I can't help what makes me happy.
Hour or two? Thats unacceptable. If theres a new episode or season of some show coming out I need it within few minutes which is what (private) torrents give you
You have your way to get content, and I have mine. The only difference is, my way doesn't rely on other people to get what I want. I just get it, with no other considerations beyond what to pick to watch. And I'm immensely fine with that level of sheer effortlessness.
Kudos to you on finding a cool internet club though. Best of luck to your ratio, or whatever you folks are keeping track of these days!
Depends on the tracker.
usenet is almost always faster, there's never an issue with torrent lacking seeds and it's theoretically safer as you do not upload any content when downloading which if you do download a lot using torrents will put you in a certain legal grey area about distributing files.
but aside from all of that the integration with the arr stack and the automation makes it just so much more god damned convenient.
I prefer it since I can max out my connection so it is much faster. I can download a 10GB movie in a matter of minutes. Also much easier to integrate with sonarr and radarr imo. And you don't have the hassle of having to need a good download/upload ratio.
I didn’t realize Usenet was so fast compared to a torrent with many seeders. What makes Usenet so much faster?
It's a direct download, with no speed throttling, and no searching for peers. Depending on how busy the server is and if you configure your download client right, you can max out your internet connection. It's basically like downloading a finished torrent from a seedbox.
I would bet that the people who are saying that it's faster are probably not downloading from private trackers to a seedbox. I have heavily used private trackers and Usenet. Using both methods, the limitation is the speed of the hard drive on my seedbox. I could upgrade to a solid state drive but I prioritize storage space over speed. I can already grab pretty much every thing I want in a matter of seconds.
As for retention, torrenting beats out hands down. 5000 days is a big retention for usenet. I'm on several trackers with hundreds of torrents that have active seeders that were uploaded over 10 years ago... If you're using public trackers, then Usenet wins.
In my opinion the benefit to Usenet is not having to seed. I have a killer ratio on every private tracker I use. But sometimes I want to download something and I want to delete it right after. The real GOAT is to use them simultaneously. Pay for a couple of cheap Usenet providers (on different backbones) and get an affordable seedbox and put both torrent trackers and Usenet providers in Sonarr and Radar and you're gonna have a good time.
If you don't want to pay for a seedbox, Usenet is better since torrenting is slower through a VPN. You don't need a VPN on Usenet because, the servers you download from are the same that you gave your credit card info from.