TorrentLeech and Donations

[anon]

What happened at PTP?

Don't remember the exact details, but Pham (site coder/owner?) was kicked from the tracker, and donation theft was involved.

[SealLion]

I suppose that the current drive to recruit new members to their site using open sign-up (invitation code is BITGAMER--Hint. Hint---Unless of course you know all of this already. ) as it currently stands is perhaps not just a drive to recruit new members but new members with the potential to also donate money.

[Jordan]

new members with the potential to also donate money.

I don't know how new members without a seedbox can survive on TL without cheating. For new members they have a wait time so you cannot download the latest torrent with lots of leechers. By the time the wait time is over, there are very less leechers left and you won't be able to upload. Donation seems to be the only option (barring the smart guys who know how to cheat ;-) )

[anon]

Waiting times and inactivity rules... they're both leftovers from a time where trackers had open signups and actual user limits. We're in 2013, they should be abolished.

[Algarius]

TL is a massive site, and servers aren't free. As of November 2008, they had 14 servers which cost 6000 euro to keep alive. Now it's probably even more. But then again, What.cd is huge as well, and doesn't do that sort of stuff. So either bills are huge, they're keeping extra money for a sort of reserve fund, or someone's getting a nice slice of the pie.

Geez... 6000 Euros? That's more than what I earn... hopefully that statement does not remain true for long.

[THC]

6000 euros?! I call that bullshit.

[Jordan]

Why do they need so many servers for a torrent site that doesn't even host content?

[anon]

Load balancing. Every page view and tracker announce implies database queries, and they do have lots of users (off topic: when I was a noob I thought 2000+ seeders on new torrents should be the norm, TL having been one of my very first tracker accounts). Don't know if you actually need 14 of them though.