Private Torrent Sites Overemphasize Share Ratios According to Bram Cohen
Written by Ernesto on October 12, 2006Bram Cohen, inventor of the BitTorrent protocol believes that private torrent sites should stop tracking the ratios of their users the way they do now. He argues that the sites are overemphasizing the importance of the upload / download ratio, which fosters the creation of ratio cheating software, and calls it “extremely destructive”.
Bram Cohen told Zeropaid:
“[Leechers are] engaging in perfectly reasonable and non-destructive behavior and the site is trying to punish him for it, thus fostering the creation of clients which lie about their statistics. This is the site’s fault, and the result could do serious damage to the value of BitTorrent statistics generally. Sites which do this are being extremely destructive, and the way they grandstand about how they’re fostering sharing really ticks me off.”
According to Bram the nature of the BitTorrent protocol is built to prevent freeriding. Its Tit-for-Tat algorithm makes sure that you only upload pieces of the file to people who offer something to you. The more you upload to others, the more you receive. By overestimating the importance of the share ratio, it becomes almost impossible for some to actually reach a decent share ratio.
He continues:
“Just a little bit of threatening to ban people can get the overall balance to be very heavily weighted on the side of uploading, making it difficult for people to accomplish a reasonable amount of upload even if they try.”
To prevent overseeded torrents from “messing up” peoples ratio Bram suggest an alternative method to calculate the share ratio:
“When a client reports new downloads to the tracker, the tracker can multiply the amount by (number of current peers total - number of current seeds) / (number of current peers total) and add that to the ‘total downloaded’. This results in most people having a ‘ratio’ of more than 1, but that isn’t actually a problem unless you’re more interested in mathematical purity than practical behavior.”
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[quote comment="15145"]It’s really sad to see the ratio thing come back. I remember back in the BBS days, if I connected to a BBS that had a share ratio (or worse still, where you had to upload before it would let you download anything) I’d immediately disconnect. [/quote]
On the subject of ratios encouraging people to game the system, back when I was a kid on such BBSs, I’d write really cheesy little programs in QB and compile them to a bloated 100K or so to improve my upload ratio. Programs like “stobe light” which would flash your screen white and black and such.
I had no other way to get files before downloading them. If you came in late to the system and there were no new files on the scene for you to get first and then redistribute, you were stuck.
I just wanted to point out that ratios on most private FTPs and BBSs are 1:3!
So this is way better than the wanted >1.0:1 on private Trackers…
Ratios are NEEDED !!
Example ….
You seed a Season torrent on a public tracker where people don’t care about ratios and the torrent dies quickly … or would you rather get that same torrent ALIVE at a Private site where members actually share ???!!! Private sites keep torrents alive ALOT longer than public sites because members have to seed those torrents to keep ratios. Now if they were public, they would just stop seeding and the torrent dies.
There are people around with ADSL connections, for which the upstream bandwith is typically the 1/4 of the upstream, or worse.
Maintaning a ratio of 0.4 - 0.6 is doable, but anything over it is a real pain, more so on a shared connection, or for those who can’t keep their computers running bittorrent all day and night.
Rules are rules, though, but they do keep some people out just because they can’t technically keep up with the 1:1 ratio.
biggest problem in all this is NAT
router problems cause people to appear to be leeching. Because these ports are used but by default blocked means uneducated users who just know real basics say 80% don’t share like they should be thus leaving it to people with open ports. The site encourage open ports but also go too far. if everyone had the ratio of 1:1 then there would be no NEW torrent to download would there as everyone would have all the files.
A ratio of 0.5:1 is fine and nothing bad. if these private sites were right in thinking leeching was a problem why are the public sites better than they are??? this is not including the quality of content however which is always far better on private sites and far more up-to-date for rare and specialist files
I beleive Bram Cohen’s view of the people on this world is a bit too optimistic. This is a good thing, because I think it’s one of the reasons he actually developed the bittorrent protocol and made it open source.
However, this optimistic view leads him to believe that abuse of the protocol is due to private torrent sites requiring good ratios from users to continue using those sites. I am not so optimistic, and think this development merely led to the rise of the particular abuse that has been implemented in several clients. Other unexplored ways are surely possible, but haven’t been uncovered yet since they aren’t a priority considering the way things are now.
Now i agree with him that ratio shouldn’t be the emphasis in the file sharing community, if only for the obvious reason that there are only few initial suppliers and many leechers that eventually seed (or not), or else because some people just have the kind of connection that allows them to seed well over a gigabyte an hour while others can only manage a couple of dozen megabytes. But he fails to recognize the importance for private trackers, especially smaller ones, to secure the seeding of torrents so people actually want to join and stay, maybe even help paying the server costs.
His proposal for a new way to calculate ratios is an interesting one btw. But maybe an easier solution is for private trackers that require 1.0 ratios to set their standards a bit lower than that, as that would accomplish the same thing.
It’s unfortunate that the 1st long comment on here (from Snapphane) misses ALL the subtleties of Bram’s arguments.
It’s as if the article he/she read simply said “hey, ratios aren’t necessary”, and she’s replying to THAT, rather that to what has *actually* been written.
Please people: have a THINK before arguing with well-thought-out opinions.
Bram knows best. Leave it to Bram.
lutherblissett.net
Bah. I could get my nice 350MB file from torrentspy, and take around 2+ hours on a GREAT day…or I could get it from a nice private site and have it a couple of hours earlier, and within 20mins of when i start to get it, regardless of how long it has been out. W.o ratios, the pirvate site would also take 2+ hours on a great day… I will take the 20mins every day.
I havent been bothered Port Forwarding, (’unconnectable’) yet I am a member of a torrent site and doing very well, using crappy Australian broadband with a d.l speed of 5* my upload speed… and I have uploaded very very few of my own files. Just leave your torrent program up for a while and everyone is happy…
I am yet to see how people who want others to get to atleast a 0.5:1 ratio are greedier than those that don’t want to get to a 0.5:1 ratio!?!
[quote comment="15383"]I just wanted to point out that ratios on most private FTPs and BBSs are 1:3!
So this is way better than the wanted >1.0:1 on private Trackers…[/quote]
Exactly. bittorrent is an extremely inefficient protocol. bbs/ftp with 1:3 (and sometimes 1:5) ratio were far better. 1:1 indeed - huge waste of electricity.
I do not see why all these people are fussing about maintaining a 1:1 ratio. I have only had a problem with getting at least a 2:1 ratio on two torrents, and I have downloaded hundreds of large torrents. My ratio is always 2.3:1 - infinity. I can see why this may happen on a public, non-member site, but on a memebr site, it is not difficult to achieve. Even if there is no possible way to upload to a 1:1 ratio, after several weeks/months the torrent is removed from the directory anyway, so there is no need to worry about it. Just leave a completed torrent active in you client. How hard is that? You do not even have to break a sweat doing it.
I find it hilarious how people STILL don’t get it.
Bram has said on NUMEROUS occasions that the protocol is designed with the idea that NO CLIENT OR TRACKER TRUSTS ANYBODY. It’s expected that every client is out for it’s own best interest. The protocol handles THAT environment (where nobody trusts anybody) quite well.
It starts to break when you try to modify the environment (private trackers) to control behavior.
Private trackers have problems keeping torrents alive BECAUSE THEY ARE PRIVATE! Public trackers have more seeds and people downloading. Why shouldn’t you let more people join your swarms? The WHOLE THEORY is that more people downloading is BETTER. If your torrents suck because of leechers it’s because you have itty bitty swarms of a size that bittorrent was NOT designed to handle.
Welcome back, Mindless [logout]
Ratio: 79.539 Uploaded: 1.22 TB Downloaded: 15.66 GB
I am completely brand new to this whole torrent thing and I have no problem maintaining a 4:1 ratio on demonoid.
Great blog,love the information you share with your viewers.Simple and to the point!Keep up the Great Work you are doing here!
Well.. Check this out. No more ratio enforcing..
Good for ADSL users like me who can never seed 1:1 because of the damn quarter speed upload.
http://www.greedytorrent.com
You have to be joined to the top rated sites in order to keep a good ratio. The new sites only have a couple thousand and thats not enough peeps to keep a good ratio.
And if you have a bad ratio they ban you, thus makes them look like creeps, because its not your fault you have a bad ratio cause you’ve seeded it for days and days, but they still make you out to be a leecher.. Which comes down to “Labelizing” people based on thier internet connection, its like a war. Cable vs DSL vs T1 vs 56k vs 128k ectt…
I like the ratio “thing” it makes it more addicting, but if you have a bad connection its not fun at all, exspecially when you have dorks making you feel bad in forums cause your connection sucks.
People get so addicted to joining torrent sites, They turn into major assholes. If their ratio is better then yours then they feel they have the right to put you down, or make you feel lower class. It not right to take it that far, but kids will. Kids dont know any better, but to be better then everyone else, thus proves another point… WHY ISNT THE PARENTS SPENDING TIME WITH THEIR KIDS!!!!!!
I could go on and on about this shit, but its just my opinion. Does it matter that kids stay inside 24/7 creating what we call agoraphobia? They stay inside so much that they fear to go outside, because of the addiction of torrent sites.. It could happen…
GO OUTSIDE AND BE APART OF THE WORLD!
Hi! How r u?
nice site!
hey guys i think a ratio is a good idea because of all newbies and greedy people that are out there they dont even no what sharing is with a ratio they have to share or pay the consequences ITS ONLY FAIR bugger_mcfly
[quote]It’s actually very easy to maintain 1:1 ratio on “that music site we all like” with normal usage of downloading what you want and then keep seeding as long as there are peers who want it.[/quote]
Fixed.
What a pile of poo. It helps the community survive. Its hard work sometimes, but always worth it in the end.
Useless suggestion…
The thing people needs to understand on private trackers is that its OK to have a ratio under 1. The minimum demand on private trackers is usually somewhere between 0,3-0,5 and there is no reason for people to panic if they have a ratio around 0,6. Som people have ratios above 1 and some have below, isnt harder than so.
If the ratio system is going to do any good it NEEDS to be a pure mathematical ratio (without freeleeching and bonuses) that shows how much people contribute to the site.
I don’t understand people complaining about ratio. Most of you are downloading free sh*t… It’s not some kind of democracy. If you can’t give back what you take, then don’t take. simple as that. slow line? limited connection quota? too bad. It’s not a charity case either. Go to another site to leech, or go buy the content then.
Leecher purposely choking upload speed, regardless of public or private. So the tit-for-tat is just worthless to reduce leeching. DON’T BLAME THE PRIVATE SITES… In fact, if it weren’t for cost of servers, I like the invite only method.
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