How To Share Torrents With BitTorrent Illiterates
Written by Ernesto on January 06, 2008Every now and then I want to share a torrent with colleagues or family members who have never even heard of BitTorrent. For them even the easiest tutorials look like advanced algebra. That leaves me with two options, BitComet Lite and Bitlet. For the complete novice, sharing on BitTorrent doesn’t come any easier than this.
Both methods work quite well and are pretty much idiot proof. It should be fairly easy to share a torrent with anyone who knows how to doubleclick or launch a web browser.
BitComet Lite
Most people know BitComet as a standalone BitTorrent client, but the BitComet team also offers other tools. BitComet Lite is one of them, it’s basically a small BitTorrent client with a .torrent file included. With the BitComet Lite maker you can select a torrent file to include with the application and customize it with your own graphics. The application then compiles an .exe file that you can send to your BitTorrent illiterate friends. When they open the file you shared with them they can select the download location and the file will start downloading.
It is possible to resume downloads with BitComet Lite, which is ideal for larger files that can’t be downloaded at once. The user doesn’t have to configure anything and the download speeds are pretty decent. The only limitation is that the application is for windows users only.
BitLet
BitLet is a very neat web-based Java applet that allows you to download .torrent files without having BitTorrent client installed. The web based BitTorrent client is ideal to share a torrent with less tech-savvy friends. It works pretty simple, just append the link to the torrent to this url http://www.bitlet.org/?torrent= and send it to your friends, here’s an example. If people click on the link a popup window will appear, and the download starts immediately.
It is possible to resume downloads, just click on the link again and safe the file in the same location. BitLet also has a very useful code generator so you can offer BitTorrent downloads on your blog or website so that people can easily download, even when they don’t have a BitTorrent client installed.
Personally I prefer BitLet over BitComet Lite because it is costs less time and it is platform independent. The advantage of BitComet Lite to some might be that you can brand the application with your own images, which may look more professional.
Do you know of any other ways to share torrents with BitTorrent novices? Let us know and leave a comment!
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[quote comment="256910"]@ logos: clearly you’ve never made an attempt to explain it to anyone who doesn’t know.
[/quote]
actualy i thought both my older sisters + my younger brother how bt works (though admittingly only one of my sisters could be counted as computer illiterate)
Hi;
Five minutes to learn bitTorrent… I think its a lot faster than that, so I must be missing something. Please help fill in the parts that I’m missing.
1. Download the client.
2. Install the client:
a) Where to install the actual binary,
b) Where to store the incomplete files,
c) Where to store the complete files.
Then you can set up the goodie-extras in the options menu when you actually run the program, like
a) use protocol obfuscation
b) use encryption
c) use “unlimited” upload bandwidth
d) use “unlimited” download bandwidth
Then you search a popular indexing site (ie. Pirate Bay) for the torrent, click the link, and tell the prompt to open it with your bitTorrent client.
Its really not that difficult I think; therefore I am missing something.
Will some more experienced users please help fill me in on what I am missing?
[quote comment="256896"]Bad article all around. The whole point of Bittorrent is to keep seeding once you finish downloading.. if people start using those apps ratio’s would be almost null.
To tell you the truth, most bittorrent clients are pretty straight forward, people who can’t learn how to use them don’t need them in the first place.[/quote]
Actually, the whole point of bittorrent from the start was to offload some of the bandwidth onto clients downloading big files to make it possible to use a small server to support big download volumes. In that kind of environment ratio doesn’t play as big a role, because you have a dedicated seed and therefore don’t get dead torrents.
Btw, if bittorrent works optimally (won’t happen, but it is pretty efficent with its tit-for-tat algorithm), the download speed for each client could be calculated with approximatly the following formula:
TSUS = Total Seed Upload Speed
TUSOC = Total Upload Speed of Other Leechers
DS=Client Download Speed
US = Client Upload Speed
NL = Number of Leechers
DS = Min(TSUS,TUSOL,US+TSUS/NL)
As long as you have a dedicated seed to prevent dead torrents, leeching clients really aren’t a problem. They will just download at a much slower rate than other clients. Sure, specifically built leeching clients that work specifically to fool other clients can still cause a problem by reducing the efficency of the distribution, but that isn’t what we are talking about here.
Still, it is of course best to upload as much as you download as a token of appriciation to the original distributor. Especially, when dealing with distributors that don’t have a dedicated server.
I use GigaTribe with my torrent illiterate long distance girlfriend. Its as easy as browsing my files and downloading. This is also way better than bit torrent because she doesn’t have to upload anything and its a secure direct connection… in other words, she’s far less likely to attract the wrong kind of attention.
@ Paco420: actually we haven’t heard of the MPAA so far, but we are ready to deal with it when the time comes.
Note that we market Podmailing as a supersize e-mail service, not a hosting service. Concretely we keep the files on our server for a limited duration (currently a few days, very soon we will up this to 30 days) so that the recipient can download it (after that there is still P2P delivery)
So it is a private communications service, no one is alowed to look into it. Legally it is just like Gmail or Outlook: these services and software can be used to transfer anything, legal or not, but it’s private. The only difference is that we don’t limit the attachments to 10MB or 20MB. Currently it’s unlimited and has been tested above 10GB but we will probably cap it at 5GB (yes 5 gigabytes).
That said, we might also propose a time-unlimited hosting service someday…
Just tell them to use Opera - it’s built-in ;)
@Curious: for real illiterates, the process you describe is 10 times too complicated. Some people will actually drop out when you explain how to install the software.
Several commentators have stressed that they don’t care about these people. But hey that’s the point of this article and debate: How is it possible to get these people to share files with BitTorrent?
My approach with Podmailing is pretty successful in that sense. It wasn’t trivial though: we made many changes and modified the software in many ways to get there. And now many illiterates use Podmailing to send and receive files and folders using torrents without even knowing what a torrent is - and they could’nt care less.
I’ll go with Opera too.
I use AllPeers
I prefer to actually take the time to instruct newcomers how to properly use bittorrent instead of using half-assed bittorrent clients that won’t give them an accurate insight how it actually works.
[quote comment="257022"]@Curious: for real illiterates, the process you describe is 10 times too complicated. Some people will actually drop out when you explain how to install the software.[/quote]
And how big is this market demographic, really? Millions of people managed to install Kazaa, Morpheus, and more recently Limewire. Where is the big leap to using torrents? No, they just don’t want it bad enough… I think the answer is to make a client as easy to use as the first single network filesharing utilities were (think AudioGalaxy) but somehow still offer all the functionality of a full client.
Wouldn’t be at all surprised to see utorrent 2.0 turn out just like that. But as has been said, if you want to send a file to a less-than-savvy friend, set up your own ftp server, send it to them through your IM/IRC client, use gmail & a multi-part self-extracting RAR (everyone knows how to point and click and run something, we wouldn’t have so many trojans and virii if they didn’t), or use one of the many free hosting options (rapidshare, etc, there must be over a hundred of these services by now). And if it’s worth sending you probably already have it right? Point A to B or A to C to B seems easy enough to me… so why bring BT back into it? I just don’t understand the need expressed here.
P.S. When properly instructed for a few hours even the most “n00b”ish of my friends have been able to sucessfully find the media they’re interested in and were minding their ratios and talking about giving back to “the community” with all the zeal only the newest of converts can display. [i]“I believe the children are the future, teach them right and show them the waaaaaayyyyyy…”[/i]
Staying online and continuing to seed a torrent is never mentioned here. That’s what makes torrenting so successful.
just let them learn themselves. if they want the benefits of the knowledge of file sharing technology, they should have to learn like we all did.
Foxtorrent for the BT illiterates
There is limitation, the application is for windows users only. I think all what you need to do is to set up an ftp server and make things less complicated.
http://www.postonfire.com
Burn them a CD or a DVD.
Blizzard announced they would be releasing StarCraft II soon. Looks like they used Bitcomet Lite to distribute all the huge video files. Some people don’t know what a torrent is and don’t care. They just want to get the file.
I’m currently working on a “invisible” version of bitcomet light.
For our “malicious” friends ;)
For my less savvy friends/family, I use publicftp.com to send them files.
I up once to the server via ftp, they download as many times as they want via http link. Doesn’t get any easier to share than that.
Yeah. Free. No size limits. No usage limits. No ads.
The bible is the most pervasive thing, it is written by corrupt men who sought to corrupt the mindsofmany and they have done a splendid job
I’m the savior you guysorgals have been looking for since ancient time
I’m a virgin, i am aloner, i am in touch with nature, and have done much to help everyone since my birth.
I know all, see all, hear all, and a perfectionist. I am never satisfied until perfect.
believing is seeing
I am here to offer my help to humanity who are on the path to destruction
I am the the solution to world peace
I will bring world peace through love, co-operation, and understanding of the world we live in.
This kinda defeats the point of bittorrent. Your “Friends and colleagues” who are computer illiterate are just going to close the window anyways (at the end of the download) and not seed. So 1 peer connected with 1 seed isn’t going to be faster than FTP unless you have something such as a seedbox set up.
[quote comment="256750"]well, why is it that people need to make less tech savy people use bittorent??? I mean if you really want to send them a 600mb+ file why not set up an ftp server or apach web server on your computer for that purpose? There is no need to mak it more complicated than it already is…[/quote]
hahhahaha… you don’t get the point, do you?
why go all the trouble of setting up a web server+and FTP server when you can send a link. Besides, downloading a file through torrent or through an FTP server with only your upload bandwidth limit cannot be compared(this is true for most of the ISPs in the world).
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