July 04, 2008 by sharky
If you didn’t already know, 3 months ago ImageShack launched a new "seedbox" service (and we use the term ’seedbox’ very loosely - Leechbox would be a more apt description). Our initial thoughts were, "Wow, this may be a great stepping stone to get new users into the world of seedboxes". After some trial runs and a closer inspection, we regrettably conclude that this service will: 1. Make current seedbox users laugh hysterically at the inferiority (assuming you’ve gotten over the fact that your private tracker ratios are now worsened); and, 2. Make first-time seedbox users erroneously think that all seedboxes operate in this manner, causing them to head for the hills at the thought of obtaining a real seedbox.
So… what is RIGHT with it?
The only positive conclusion to how this service could be applied would be to public tracker BitTorrent users who are hopelessly throttled / traffic shaped by their ISP - and nothing else works (as a free option). In most cases, running a BT client on your home computer will still be faster.
What is WRONG with it?
Don’t use it on a private tracker. Under normal circumstances, you won’t be able to seed a torrent to 1:1, not ever. The upload rate cannot be changed, so once a torrent finishes downloading, that’s all folks - and it cannot be restarted. Private tracker members everywhere are complaining that their ratios have been hurt by using this service - and they’re right.
Worse yet, you may just get tracker-banned for using a bad BitTorrent client. Many people have complained about being banned from trackers for using a "banned client". Don’t take that chance with any private tracker you really care about!
Because the torrents automatically stop, ImageShack turns everyone into a hit-and-runner, regardless of public or private torrent. You may find yourself on the receiving end of a nasty warning from your private tracker - or in a worst-case scenario, get yourself banned from the site. The only possible workaround to this would be to de-select at least one file in the not-yet finished torrent.
It even hurts public trackers. Again, we take you back to the fact that ImageShack kills the torrent once it finishes downloading, regardless of how much you’ve put back into the upload. At least some public tracker users will keep torrents running in their home client after it’s finished downloading, to help other users. Expect public torrents from sites such as mininova to get even slower, if you haven’t already noticed. Great; all mininova needs is even more users complaining about the speeds of those aXXo torrents.
It doesn’t always work, and directs you to a "premium" pay link "for instant priority". This smacks of the same RapidShare ploy to separate you from your dollar.
ImageShack enforces any DMCA violations, and that means anything deemed as copyright infringement. There goes just about every torrent, then! Whee!
- • Files that are illegal and/or are in violation of any United States laws.
- • Files that infringe on the copyrights of any entity excluding the user.
ImageShack "Premium" service is outlandishly expensive, for what you get. 100 GB disk space and 200 GB monthly bandwidth for $75 USD a month? There are many seedbox services (even with TorrentFlux) that offer unlimited access for much less than this.
Want to read more? See this lengthy thread on Whirlpool Forums.
Our Tests
It seems like ImageShack may have figured out a rudimentary way to block "illegal" torrents (either that, or it was just lucky). We downloaded two different torrents from mininova.org - the first one was from the Movies section:
Forgetting.Sarah.Marshall.R5.READNFO.XVID-JDT1 [mininova].torrent — No matter how many times we tried to load this one, it kept saying "Please try your download later". So we moved on to one of mininova’s "featured" torrents (the ‘legal’ variety):
Xzibit - Paparazzi Madman the Greatest Refix 2008 BLINGBLUNG [mininova].torrent — And it started right away! Note below that we achieved a miniscule 1.9% sharing ratio on it (i.e. 1 : 0.019 ).
The bottom line: This ImageShack seedbox leechbox service is a part of a larger ploy to generate revenue out of hapless users, without a care in the world to the health of P2P or BitTorrent, or you and your tracker. Evidently a small percentage of users will likely end up being swayed into subscribing to the premium version - which is what they’re counting on. But any BitTorrent user who possesses even one iota of common sense will avoid this misery.
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