On the Mac I use xTorrent, very nice (yet beta). xtorrentp2p.com
I like the protocol, although it’s true that ADSL lines tend to discourage sharing due to the HUGE difference between the downstream and upstream (in my case 2MBytes vs 284Mbits)
Part of the problem with BitTorrent is the standard ‘two active torrents’ client distributed as a default. With the default client, even when someone wants to serve up fifteen or twenty torrents while downloading one, they can’t. Even extremely large torrents which should have tons of seeds like the Ubuntu CD ISO’s have a limited number. My guess is that noone cares about serving the Ubuntu CD’s as a torrent when they only have two slots for it. If the client and broader range of ‘good torrent karma’ was important in the grander scale of torrent distribution, it might be more effective.
I’m not saying that Azureus isn’t better, but a large number of the clients I see in the torrent peer list aren’t using Azureus. With proper settings, other clients fix the long tail and small file problems; the small file problem is really just the same problem as the long tail one.
BitTorrent is a terrible Long Tail client. The efficiency of BitTorrent is predicated on popularity.
That isn’t really true, the BitTorrent client itself is fine. It’s just that most hosts serve files via BitTorrent but do not keep a seed open at all times on their servers. Instead, they just let the clients “figure it out between themselves”, effectively giving their download a limited lifespan (when it’s popularity dies). This “problem” has nothing to do with BitTorrent, but only how people choose to use it.
Having the host keep a seed open is becoming a popular alternative to regular HTTP downloads for more robust/efficient downloads. Because essentially, clients will still download from the server (so the swarm never dies), but as other clients download, they add to the available bandwidth, on top of what a standard client-server link would provide. I believe this is how WoW handles patch updates.
For another example of this setup, try downloading the SICP lecture videos via BitTorrent at http://swiss.csail.mit.edu/classes/6.001/abelson-sussman-lectures/
Not many people are usually downloading those videos, but you will see that one of your peers will always be from swiss.csail.mit.edu, and uploading at the same speed as the regular HTTP download. It’s just the host permanently seeding the file.
Of course HTTP is still required for people who don’t have a BitTorrent client, not because of the popularity issue you bring up. That’s really just a side-effect of people posting torrents with no permanent seed.
The problem I have with BT is my ISP. I thought I would be generous and maintain a ratio of 5 but I didn’t realize that my ISP watches upload volumes and they throttled my upload speed for all traffic.
Now I keep my upload speed throttled to half of my ISP throttle speed and I kill my torrent as soon as I complete (I am now a complete leech). Hopefully after a month of low uploads I can convince my ISP that someone else was using my wireless router and get my throttle lifted.
Most ISPs appear to be very antagonistic towards BT.
some tips when using the bittorrent protocol to download:
-
if you are behind a router in a LAN, you might need to
activate port forwarding to your PC, and if you are firewalled
you might need to allow that traffic in.
Bittorrent performs poorly if you are not directly reachable. -
experiment a lot with your client configuration to gain
performance. The most configurable client is probably azureus. -
generally, offering more upload bandwith increases your download
speed, but only up to a certain point, where it starts to hurt
instead. Find the best download/upload ratio experimentally. -
if you are downloading material that might incur in legal problems
in some countries, be sure to filter out ip ranges of "bad"
trackers. Search “blocklist”.
4a) watch for fake torrents/malware. -
be a good citizen and seed.
“I’m actually somewhat surprised that Firefox hasn’t included it into the base OS. Perhaps I should check for plugins?”
Installing a plugin doesn’t really qualifies, in my opinion, as “don’t make me think”…
I’m actually somewhat surprised that Firefox hasn’t included it into the base OS. Perhaps I should check for plugins? That’d be a big thing for Firefox to have, a Bittorrent client built in… simply click the torrent and Firefox will take care of it for you.
That’s exactly what Opera 9 does actually (even though the bt client part of Opera is much slower than, say, uTorrent).
And there is a project for a Firefox Bittorent plugin, but it’s in very early alpha stages (http://moztorrent.mozdev.org/)
Followup on previous post: seems like there is also http://firepuddle.mozdev.org/, and from the Support Bittorent bugzilla page (https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=bittorrent), it seems that both projects are in fact MIA.
That animated GIF could have benefitted from BitTorrent at that size! 
I normally find your posts somewhat informative and interesting.
Gotta say, this one does not deliver. This is sooooo old news I have no idea why you only just now got around to posting it. If you’re starving for material, talk about the philosophy of science and how it relates to computer science… that’s a subject I’d LOVE to hear about.
Anybody familiar with Participatory Culture Foundation’s “Democracy?” It contains a generic Bittorrent client in addition to HTTP/FTP and is geared towards the “masses.” I believe that they are trying to take things in the direction that some here have suggested it really needs to be going. Easy seeding of content and easy access for most non-technical users.
“BitTorrent is a terrible Long Tail client”
Not really. As far as public trackers are concerned, I can see that. But if you apply a community layer over BitTorrent exchanges, the Long Tail thrives. That’s what happens in private trackers. Just take a look at OiNK or Karagarga, and you’ll notice a very, very long tail.
One other place torrents are useful is for distributing virtual machines. Similar to ISO, they tend to be large and are very useful.
Down here ADSL2 is only just taking off, so most people have upload rates under 512kb/s. Sucky. But at least very few ISPs cap uploads or even count them. For all it’s crapness, mine at least does the throttle if you download too much but never touches my upload rate… but at 512k, they don’t really need to.
Wow.I can’t believe people talk all the time about bittorrent
as the new incredibly intelligent idea.
REally, eMule was out there with same thing such as torrent
(digest file) decentralized and centralized network, integrated
search engine rewarning system and i don’t know how many other things.
Is scalable as well.But its kind of slow and if you are behind nat its pretty bad.But its only a matter of something else.
Hello Y’All
I am relatively new to serious use of computing- such as topics discussed here- Bt Micro torrent AZ, et al, and various uses of these for education of self, interests hobbies etc. I will check back regularly, because I feel with all the postings and links here, I may be able to : 1) get Democracy Player up and running properly on my Ubuntu Edgy OS, which seems a bit of a challenge- 2) get Myth TV running as well,- it’s a MYSQL issue- tutorial mysqlsetup needed- and- I am sure I had other software items- oh- I have 3) attempted to get bt set up properly as well but- apparently unless, like many here have stated, you have access to an open seeder, the cycle will crash when no data is available. So locating good available files for whatever one is looking for is critical.
I would like feedback at wkpickett0154atcomcastdotnet on the following- what torrent client is an overall “10” as far as user ratings? and any other comments ref my posting here as well is welcomed.
Thanks for all who post here - it- your post- helps educate the rest of us who may not be so tech savvy- and I hope that those who are, will be more explanatory going forward so everyone gets the benefit of your technical knowledge/application experience. In other words, spell out, describe more in detail, make it simple- MIS/KISS :-))
William Pickett
Albuquerque
@Matt Is there a legitimate use for these networks
VMware Virtual Appliances [1] are usually distributed via BitTorrent. They are by nature simply too big to be effectively downloadable by FTP if more than even a small number of people want to download one simultaneously.
@Masklinn Finally, about part 3 (especially on the subject of japanese animation), it should be noted that the “popularity” of series’ fansubs can be used as a market study on the potentials of an official distribution of the serie.
Exactly! They should be embracing this usage, not wanting to kill it. Why the MPAA and RIAA et. al. doesn’t get this speaks to their lack of ability to actually think. It must be that the brain rots once people start using lawyers instead of innovating…
@Rick O BT is great as a supplement to existing protocols…That is, don’t just provide an HTTP or FTP link, but provide an alternate torrent link.
I’m not used BT much, but in downloading some VMware appliances I found that BT would take about 2-3 days whereas if one was offered via FTP I could get in a few hours. I don’t understand the protocol at a technical level so this suggestion is really a question: wouldn’t it make sense if BT were evolved such that it would start seeding from an FTP(-like) protocol but then move to the Torrent automatically so that there would only need to be one link? I guess why I’m asking is having multiple download links seems to be an either/or situation.
@Rick O The most common argument is “but I can’t track it, and I can’t advertise with it”. This is totally untrue.
Ya just gotta those kinda people… ;-0
@Tom 10 minute tracker connections. P2P stuff like Kazaa and Bearshare are connected in 30 seconds…
I’ve seen Kazaa and Bearshare take an eternity… when the file isn’t available via them! 
@PL Maybe it’s been pointed out already but bittorrent was not first with this kind of “sharing your bandwith”, so he doesn’t deserv any reward for that.
Don’t know what kind of reward you are referring to, unless you just mean “kudos”, but what BT does deserve acknowlgment for was that it did so in a way that worked for enough people to get widespread adoption. In my book, that is what deserves kudos, and all else is secondary; great works in a vacuum are simply wasted.
Martin Marconcini I like the protocol, although it’s true that ADSL lines tend to discourage sharing due to the HUGE difference between the downstream and upstream
Damn those telecom providers!!! 
@Damien Having the host keep a seed open is becoming a popular alternative to regular HTTP downloads for more robust/efficient downloads.
As a follow up on my comment/questio to Rick O, it would seem that the best approach would be paired BT+HTTP/FTP links and then clients that would negotiate those protocols to switch to BT as soon as it was seeded. Or maybe you are just saying that having the server always seed solves the need for that?
@ed Bob Cringely has posted several articles claiming that P2P should actually be the bandwidth savior instead of the bandwidth demon that ISPs make it out to be. But unfortunately the ISPs have not learned that yet.
Well, ISPs are acting just like most people act (especially these days): “What in it for me, at this moment?” Sadly when people/companies need to be altruistic to achieve an eventual greater collective good, they are usually shorted and won’t go there. 
@Jeff Totally agree, but I think before that can happen, we need mass penetration of a “don’t make me think” torrent client. Perhaps something in the web browser, like Opera, or as a native part of the OS itself.
Here’s a thought: Can BitTorrent possible be implemented in JavaScript, or is that asking too much?
@Rafajafar I normally find your posts somewhat informative and interesting. Gotta say, this one does not deliver. This is sooooo old news I have no idea why you only just now got around to posting it.
Why would you post such a negative comment? Do you feel the world revolves around you? Clearly you are not familiar with the technology adoption lifecycle [2]; new technologies are not adopted all at once by all people, and obviously from the number of comments this is still a viable topic especially related to the misunderstand torrent publishers have about not seeding.
@Anon-withal Anybody familiar with Participatory Culture Foundation’s “Democracy?” It contains a generic Bittorrent client in addition to HTTP/FTP and is geared towards the “masses.”
Ah…sounds like what I was asking about above.
-Mike
[1] http://www.vmware.com/appliances
[2] http://ist-socrates.berkeley.edu/~fmb/articles/lifecycle/
Insanely detailed mathematical analysis of upload/download ratios.
A Mathematical Analysis of Why Ratios Are Bad, and a Better Solution to the Problem of Unwanted Leechers
http://thoughtyard.com/twiki/bin/view/Main/TheProblemWithRatios
Question: if trackers are so good at controlling this, then why is this analysis necessary? Answer: I stand by my original statement; BitTorrent largely relies on client altruism.
Most of the problems with the bandwith / availablity compromise can thankfully be avoided by running a tracker and forced seed on one of your own machines instead of a direct-download (HTTP/FTP) server. i.e. Your live copy guarantees a full file is available, while the brunt of the download is spread between the peers.
People should check out Metalink. It isn’t a new P2P network, but it lets you download at your full capacity usually, by using multiple sources.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metalink
http://www.geospatialsemanticweb.com/2007/02/25/metalink-unifies-internet-downloads
Bittorrent users SHOULD be alturistic because it’s only good karma.