What.cd Shuts Down Following Reported Raids in France

[anon]

With Waffles in a long-term coma, it's gonna be hard to beat Spotify!

Spotify costs more than $0 and cannot be installed on my Chinese MP3 player, so it has no appeal for this yeti

If Waffles had the good sense to return now, they would greatly benefit from this. But ever since the domain change, it's like their staff don't care anymore.

[molosse]

If Waffles ever comes back, our invites may be worth gold.
in forums of a couple of my private trackers, lots of people are already sending me private messages to get one of my waffles invites. a few months, nobody wanted them.

[techsupport]

Everything to know about nostream


My original post was removed for being supposedly hearsay, so I am resubmitting it in a more palatable form. I have removed several accusations which I cannot verify except by "hearsay" from reputable sources.

Nostream (nostream.co) is an upcoming tracker which is surrounded by controversy.
Staff

Sarek

• lead developer, designed the CSS and logo

• Left dev #vardev channel open for anyone to look at.

• Had a google survey passed around for potential developers. Many have refused in concern of their own security including myself. The survey asked for potentially identifying information such as a git portfolio.

• Copied the layout of WCD on the nostream homepage and forgot to scrub references from What.CD to nostream. I saved the html/css. Here's a screenshot of one of these references appearing http://i.imgur.com/E8wZ2ln.png

• Abandoned by several potential devs (who I will leave anonymous) who felt like their security concerns were not taken seriously.

AzzA

• Founded BTN

• Booted out of BTN for allegedly stealing donations.

His response

I'm still not sure why the hostile take over happened. I was told it's because i wasn't a very good manager and i jumpde the gun alot not thinking things through.

To be fair, i was only 18 and didn't have much experience managing things. That's why i got other SysOps on board, but they just back stabbed me. I managed everything else pretty well. One day while i was AFK, the upper staff just changed the passwords to everything to lock me out. I never stole donations, i did however move them to an alternative paypal account so i could close my one down.

• Wants to take on an advisory role.

• Doesn't believe server location matters - caused a big argument in IRC between other devs.

Emm (/u/ThisIsEmm)

• Former BTN moderator

• Self identified SJW

• Not a dev

• Will get a staff position

spaghetti (left the team) (/u/spaghetti2514)

• Oppaitime sysop

• Was going to be the temporary sysop of nostream until someone more passionate could takeover.

• left for a number of reasons, including poor opsec considerations and inability to trust sarek and his friends.

• banned from AnimeBytes for creating phishing site animebytes.me. Self-admitted.

Azathoth (left the team)

• Oppaitime sysop

• Bailed with spaghetii
IRC information

irc.varmag.com

#var (went invite-only after I submitted my original post, which was removed by the moderators. #var is now open)

#vardev (invite only, hidden)

#delta (invite only, hidden)
Site

Inside screens Imgur: The most awesome images on the Internet
Logs

azathoth talks with one of sareks interviewers (who himself is not a dev) debian Pastezone

Source

It's cool to see BTN people involved (maybe they'll make it ratioless) but seeing the name Azza worries me.... we will see.

[slikrapid]

karma is a bitch

actually, it is neutral, works all the time, gives to each his own, no more and no less - thus, you cannot get away with stuff or cheat your way out (which is why they call her a b*tch)

it affects only materialistic things/components (like the course of history), not our essence as spiritual beings

Its legacy will live on inside users' hard drives and archived "What.cd disabled me for no reason" threads.

not to mention as user's experience while using the tracker, local/global controversy and influence on users and non-users around the world and the related ripple effects

in other words, all results of the past continue to live in (or as) the future

I also can't believe the Goliath of music tracker closes because of French David.

wouldn't you say that (greedy) music industry and (outdated or corrupt) legislation play the goliath here and that the battle is still not over

who cares about the staff
the content was invaluable

it all matters: good staff takes good care of the tracker, contents, security,... as well as the users or their experience

the most valuable 'things' have no expiry date, they are eternal

[anon]

in forums of a couple of my private trackers, lots of people are already sending me private messages to get one of my waffles invites. a few months, nobody wanted them.

"I'm a what dot cd refugee, halp".

• Copied the layout of WCD on the nostream homepage and forgot to scrub references from What.CD to nostream. I saved the html/css. Here's a screenshot of one of these references appearing http://i.imgur.com/E8wZ2ln.png

The stock Gazelle source code comes with What.cd branding and you're supposed to change that to fit your site, so this is hardly such a sin.

[techsupport]

Ars has received a response from the operator of What.cd's Twitter account. The respondent would only identify him or herself as "an administrator" of the former site, but the person alleges that the torrent site's operation was shut down by its administrators, not a police or government force.

"The facts are pretty skimpy right now," What.cd's representative says. "We have no official confirmation that servers were seized, but all available evidence does support that, so we are operating as if it is true." That being said, What.cd's administrators are confident that its major database of user information was not seized by French authorities: "The site was operational until we shut it down."

That shutdown decision was made by What.cd's operators out of heightened precaution, as opposed to being forced by an authority to do so, the representative tells Ars. That person also noted that issues with the site's IRC server match up with information gleaned from today's Zataz report.

"I wouldn't be surprised to see some other site try to fill the void, but for now, we have no plans to try to return," the What.cd administrator says.

What.cd's representative declined to answer specific questions about the site's legality but offered a personal statement about his or her role as an administrator: "We've never profited at all from this; all the funds [donated by users] were used for servers or services. That might not be very ethically convincing to some, but it was personally important for me. You can find all kinds of torrent sites that are run for profit, and that's something none of us would be comfortable with. Collectively, we invested quite a lot of time in the site, and it's safe to say we all did that because we loved what What.cd was."

Full article here

[Blocker]

so sad what and waffles are gone

[anon]

The news was confirmed by the tracker's official Twitter account on Thursday via two posts: "We are not likely to return any time soon in our current form. All site and user data has been destroyed. So long, and thanks for all the fish."

French technology news site Zataz reported on Thursday that the nation's National Gendarmerie office nabbed the servers that hosted the site's database, IRC, and trackers.

That could mean that the official Twitter account's promise of "destroyed" data is inaccurate (although none of the official statements explain exactly how what.cd continues to exist as an accessible site).

The more I read this, the harder I find it to believe there isn't a backup anywhere from which they could reinstate the site on a safe host. Although it's possible that after this near-miss, none of them want to get involved anymore and don't trust anyone else with their database.

[DarkSaibot v.1.3.10]

it affects only materialistic things/components (like the course of history), not our essence as spiritual beings

sure thing....like what.cd servers ...materialistic things/components

it wasn't that style of trackers where you seed 2 and half years for 5kbs upload ? no mather that u have 1Gb connection and don't u dare to cheat them ...because nothing works outside "donation seeding ratio"

i don't know why people loved them so much...in the hip hop area...german rap expecially poor collection i quess,music we can find everywhere but mostly main stream ..is not like they invented the mp3 format

you cannot get away with stuff or cheat your way out (which is why they call her a b*tch)

hmm..i can give you some examples..of...do bad things ..become a millionaire or having a shit tone of luck...do good things....u're out of luck mothefucker....politicians vs taxpayers normal people ( for a light example)

[slikrapid]

i don't know why people loved them so much

huge music collection at one place?
lack of good music trackers in general?
other reasons applying to elite sites?
...

examples..of...do bad things ..become a millionaire or having a shit tone of luck...do good things....u're out of luck mothefucker....politicians vs taxpayers normal people ( for a light example)

someone who becomes a millionaire by exploiting others may expect to be exploited in a similar way at some point in his life, though not necessarily all at once or exactly the same way, but rather exactly the same amount (as in: action caused or given equals action received, or the meaning of: 'an eye for an eye', ie. equal amounts)

seemingly lucky people - could be the case of: 'king for a day, fool for lifetime' (just quoting an album title here)

taxpayers gather to elect politicians, those politicians are merely a reflection of the people that elected them (they deserve each other)

also, we did not consider reincarnation that continues the story which did not get completed the first time around, ie. continues these karmic relationships until they're resolved

to live in the materialistic world means to be bound by karma - the only way out is spiritual ascendance, which is what is meant by the word 'freedom'

[anon]

From SCC:

RIP What.CD

What.CD was an enormous resource for the music community and it is with a broken heart we saw it close. Many people have gone into hiding the days after the closure, but we hope someone will take its place.

For those of you looking for a new home, we recommend our friends at https://xanax.rip. The people running the site have multiple years of experience of running a large site and have been a help in our fight for security. There are currently open signups, so let's help them get the ball rolling. https://xanax.rip.

In the wake of what can only be described as a tragedy, where the world lost an extraordinary tracker to corporate greed, we bring you XANAX to ease the pain. First we lost OiNK and now we've lost What.CD... We can't just stand by and watch this happen again.

We open our doors to thousands of heartbroken music lovers and we are confident that our community will build itself back up, piece by piece.

I'd like to quote What.CD staff: "What happens next is in your hands." Let us show the world they can't bring down the love for music.

[Snitlev]

Open: XANAX | Music (Potential WCD Replacement pls join ,cheat and share ur experience)

Sign-up Link: Register :: XANAX

[update] 2016.11.25 / 23:30 Uhr

Maximum users: 20,000
Enabled users: 14,916 Details
Users active today: 12,909 (86.54%)
Users active this week: 12,909 (86.54%)
Users active this month: 12,909 (86.54%)
Torrents: 14,529
Releases: 10,434
Artists: 9,905
"Perfect" FLACs: 2,441
Requests: 0 (0.00% filled)
Peers: 88,624
Seeders: 86,565
Leechers: 2,059
Seeder/leecher ratio: 42.04

Quelle: XANAX

[update]

2016.11.26 (11:00 Uhr)

Maximum users: 20,000
Enabled users: 21,157 Details
Users active today: 17,668 (83.51%)
Users active this week: 18,832 (89.01%)
Users active this month: 18,832 (89.01%)
Torrents: 30,918
Releases: 26,157
Artists: 16,750
"Perfect" FLACs: 2,441
Requests: 0 (0.00% filled)
Snatches: 30,590
Peers: 66,305
Seeders: 63,673
Leechers: 2,632
Seeder/leecher ratio: 24.19

signups closed!

We're speechless, the past 24 hours have been an extraordinary experience. Only 16 hours ago we had 3.500 members and over 1.000 torrents, now we're shuffling 13.000 new members and over 12.000 torrents in less than 24 hours! That must be some kind of a record!

Some of you had concerns about the site being "open signups", every great site started this way and we plan on being one of them with you by our side. You'll be pleased to hear that once we hit 20.000 members, signups will be closed and the invite system will kick in.

Thank you for your support, we won't let you down.

Quelle: XANAX


regards

[anon]

nostream.co database compromised - 2016-11-26

Recently we learned about a (partial) database leak from the newly created and aspiring What.CD replacement site and tracker nostream.co. In addition, everyone was promoted to sysop. To what extent and degree data has in fact been compromised, we do not know, but most prudent course of action is to assume a full db leak.

We also got our hands on a list of emails that were published; affected users have already been informed via a notification, but obviously we do not know who else joined nostream with a different email address. Given the large number of security related incidents and the ostrich-like behaviour from some staffers, I do not have the confidence that the situation will improve any time soon. Therefore we do not recommend you register on and/or use this site (anymore). We understand people are looking to fill the big gap that the departure of WhatCD left, but we advise caution in jumping in on a random new site.

In general, this is once again a good time to point out the value of keeping your account secure, by not reusing passwords and by enabling 2-step verification (with a 5BP/h bonus!). This will limit the impact that such incidents have, to the affected site.

This is why you have to be careful with any new site that promises to be the next big thing

[Codec]

I feel sad for the top uploaders. People who can't prevent these attacks should start trackers and waste everyone's time :(

[anon]

The contenders for becoming the next What.cd so far, and the information I've got:

• nostream.co: shady staff, database was leaked. Not recommended.
• Xanax: decent and growing fast, although reportedly there's not a lot of quality control on uploads or site documentation. Open signups, at least until two days ago.
• PTH (PassTheHeadphones.me): invite-only already; they're playing the security card, just like Waffles did when it was What.cd vs. Waffles (and guess who won). Requests and collages working already, though.
• Waffles: may return soon after they solve their debts and find a new host.