Once upon a time there was a popular TV show eD2K link site called The Real World. Of course, it wasn’t long before the site’s popularity caused it have legal problems, and in August 2005 it all came crashing down.

However, just as people recently copied The Pirate Bay when waters started to get choppy, the same thing also happened with The Real World, with the site’s database being shared around on eD2K. Soon after The Free World was born, run by an Austrian national, but that site didn’t last long either and was shut down following MPAA action.

On October 23rd 2005, exactly four years ago today, yet another site came out of the ashes. That site, TV Underground (TVU), remains to this today and claims to be the biggest site for eD2K link TV shows. TVU has a unique feature – it is believed to be the only site to run its very own eD2K server.

“We take pride in running the only P2P server sponsored by the P2P community
and not by some shady porn site,” TVU admin CheGuevara told TorrentFreak. For those interested, stats for the server (currently indexing 8.6million files) can be found here.

While eD2K remains popular, BitTorrent is the current darling of the P2P file-sharing world and is particularly popular with fans of TV shows. This is clearly something the TV Underground team wish to exploit.

“We have launched a new version of our site today to allow users to submit torrents,” CheGuevara told us. “At first we will allow users to submit torrents to seasons that already have eD2K links, but we are planning to expand to torrent-only seasons and per show torrents after the launch.”

So what motivated this development at TVU?

“We love ed2k, but we acknowledge that BitTorrent has it’s own advantages and some users prefer to use that,” they explained.

“Our mission is to spread quality TV Shows to every corner of the world. We think the current system of how the rest of the world has to wait months and years to see a show that has been shown in the US or elsewhere as totally unfair,” CheGuevara notes. “I myself am a big fan of House. It is on Season 6 right now, but where I live they are just only showing Season 4… Fair? No. You get the point.”

TV Underground will have to go a long way in the torrent world to catch up with the likes of EZTV, but with the site currently down because of maintenance, many will be grateful for an alternative.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Compared to the next largest eD2k site ‘Filenexus’, ShareReactor was twice the size, with millions of pageviews pushed through its servers before The Pirate Bay and Suprnova had even registered their domains.

On March 10th 2004, the site was shut down by Swiss police, who seized the servers and detained the site owner, Christian Riesen, aka Simon Moon, for a day for questioning. Almost immediately the ShareReactor forum reappeared but without the popular eD2k links, and it took until September 2006 for the site to make a full return under new management. However, it wasn’t to last, and within a month the site was closed again.

Of course, there are few things that the file-sharing community love more than a big comeback, and today they aren’t going to be disappointed. ShareReactor, one of the original file-sharing giants, is to return, this time with completely new management team and some serious backing in the form of The Pirate Bay, who will assist with hosting and PR.

Episode 19, in a network far, far away a lone technician plugs in the final cable into an almost forgotten big machine complex, identified by a faded green label as ‘ShareReactor’. Everything hums and comes alive. The first input from the technician is ‘But what does it all mean?’, to which the machines in unison reply: 42!

For eDonkey fans – particularly those who used the site back in 2004 – the site will immediately provide some nostalgia. Although the site has been redesigned, the team has decided to keep the original spirit of 2004 alive with a familiar theme and graphics. Additionally, all of the eD2k links the site had in its database will return, making a truly impressive library, and these are being complemented with fresh links across the whole content spectrum.

Some will argue that BitTorrent is a crucial requirement for a successful P2P site in 2008, and this fact hasn’t eluded the new ShareReactor team. The site will now index both eD2k and .torrent links, offering the very best that the world’s major networks have to offer. Indeed, some 500 new releases have been added already, with some releases on the site offered in dual format – both BitTorrent and eD2k.

‘Utopat’, who leads the four man admin team consisting of ‘chaykin’, ‘DCJoeDog’ and ‘O-MEGA, told TorrentFreak that the site will be keeping up to date with the latest TV series, with links to these being posted promptly to the site. Furthermore, each release – no matter if it relates to a TV show, movie, software or game – will not have multiple versions.

“If it’s not a private torrent site, you see the same TV show episode 20 times, the same game 50 times and with applications you might see hundreds of copies of the same thing,” he told TorrentFreak. On ShareReactor there will be just one .torrent and eD2k link for each release and these will be moderated, ensuring an easy choice for the user and guaranteeing quality.

“There are so many viruses, fake torrents or simply not-working torrents, it’s hard for many users to find what they want. Sure, the seasoned users know how to spot the bad apples, but let’s face it, that’s not the majority,” Utopat told us. These problems won’t be appearing on ShareReactor.

The core of many file-sharing sites lies in the strength of its forum community, and ShareReactor will be no different. The site will have a dedicated standalone forum and for ex-members looking for immediate membership, all they have to do is enter their previous username and password, since they have all been retained. Anyone with a shorter memory or simply new to the site can create a new login with ease.

For those looking to make a few friends and maybe meet up with some faces from the past, ShareReactor has an IRC channel – #ShareReactor on EFNet.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

According to a report from Xinhuanet, China’s State Administration of Radio Film and Television has taken action against 17 sites it claims violated various regulations, including the publishing of horrific, violent or pornographic content, and operating a video site without proper approval. None of the sites appeared to have been warned or shuttered due to piracy issues.

One of the sites that has been warned, VeryCD, is China’s largest eDonkey indexing site. In operation for around 5 years, it claims to link to more than 30 terabytes of data. VeryCD also operates a service known as MP3! which aims to be the world’s largest index of MP3 files, which would understandably attract some copyright action.

However, a visit to VeryCD appears to show the site pretty much intact and packed with links to the latest movies, music, games and software. So, it appears the site was warned, rather than banned. Details are scarce, what might it have been warned about if it is not related to copyright infringement?

Of course, pornographic content is available on eDonkey, that is one option. Another possibility lies in the list of complaints about the various sites – there is one which reads “spreading video programs that violate national regulations”. VeryCD actually created their own version of eMule, which has been downloaded more than 30 million times. Could that be the cause of the warning?

Whatever the problem, unusually for a file-sharing site, it wasn’t piracy.

Via SHD

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The fact that the site didn’t host any copyrighted material didn’t stop the Swiss Anti-Piracy Federation (SAFE) – backed up by major movie studios – from complaining to the police. On March 10th 2004, the site was shut down by Swiss police, who seized all of the servers and detained the site owner, Christian Riesen, aka Simon Moon.

According to an earlier interview, Riesen was initially tricked into going to Police.

“They sent me a letter requesting my presence ‘regarding finances in general’ from the ‘fraud division’ of the police here,” he said. “Since I am self employed I thought someone made some accusation. So nothing bad in mind with my documents all in order, I went there. It wasn’t about the finances, it was all about ShareReactor.”

The police detained Riesen for around 9 hours while they quizzed him about the site. He explains: “[The police] Asked about ShareReactor. Asked me where money came in and where it went to. The whole thing lost steam pretty fast as they saw how big a loss ShareReactor produced every month, and how little money in total was flowing at all. SAFE told them something about 15.000 Euros income a month, while they told newspapers that is was 76.000 Euros.”

After the police questioning Riesen recalls: “At the end of the day, the investigation judge said ‘and now we go and raid your house’ and so we drove there.” Riesen said the police took a lot of stuff from his house: “two ShareReactor servers, my private machine, my girlfriend’s private machine and my folder with all bank files, although i gave them a copy of all my bank activities of the last 4 years already. Also all my backups went with them. At the end ShareReactor was down and I had none of my data left, personal and otherwise.”

In June 2004 the ShareReactor forum reappeared (minus the eD2K links) and in September 2006 the site made a full return, albeit under new ownership. However, the return was short-lived and just a month later the site closed again.

Now, some 4 years later, the District Court of Frauenfeld, Switzerland has decided that as the ShareReactor site was the main source of income for 28 years old Riesen (through on-site advertising and donations), he is guilty of ‘commercially’ assisting others to commit copyright infringement by ‘simplifying’ access to illegal content.

After 4 years of investigations the court decided that for running the world’s biggest eDonkey link site, Riesen – who now lives in Canada – should be fined 4,700 Swiss Francs – roughly $4,200.

Waste of money, anyone?

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Initially, ShareConnector’s host had refused to shut down the site stating correctly that offering links is not a crime. However December 2004 saw ShareConnector and another site, Releases4U, raided by the FIOD-ECD, resulting in the seizure of equipment and the arrest of 8 people. At the time, BREIN director Tim Kuik explained they were done waiting: “Our patience was up, after which we went to the authorities” he said.

According to P2PNet, Kuik, going for the jugular, asserted that the ShareConnector admin, Adi, should get up to 4 years in jail as he hid behind ‘false reasoning that illegal files are actually hosted on different servers and that the actual exchange doesn’t take place on their own servers’, which is, of course, a completely and utterly false assertion on Kuik’s part.

Eventually, after taking nearly 2 years to come to court, the result for BREIN and the FIOD-ECD was a disaster. The admin of ShareConnector was found completely innocent and just a couple of small fines of approximately $350 were handed out to the admins of Releases4U for uploading copyright material. The FIOD-ECD failed to provide any evidence to prove ShareConnector was involved in copyright infringement nor enough to prove that either organization was criminal in nature.

December 19th 2006 saw the triumphant return of ShareConnector, around 2 years after it was shuttered by the police but the return was not to be permanent. Not content with accepting that a criminal trial had taken place at which Adi and ShareConnector were found to be completely legal, BREIN resorted to the tactics it knows best and has had most success with – common bullying.

On Monday November 5th 2007, representatives from BREIN knocked on Adi’s door and threatened him face to face with potentially financially punishing civil action. On November 12th 2007, ShareConnector shut down for good.

The sad message on the site’s homepage now reads:

Last Monday the guys from BREIN visited me at home to convince me to close ShareConnector or else they will start a civil proceeding with a claim. Of course, this does not mean I agree with their point of view, it’s just that I can’t afford taking any risks.

As of today, November 12, 2007 I decided to close down. If there is anything new to report, you will be informed.

Thank you for all your support and understanding.

Next on the FIOD-ECD hitlist are OiNK’s seized servers. They’re likely to find that the situation is exactly the same as it was with ShareConnector, i.e no copyright materials were stored on it, so it’s not easy to see where they will succeed against OiNK where they previously failed. There is no offense of ‘facilitation’ under UK copyright law.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Bitlord is now developing alongside Iphant which is also a BitTorrent / eDonkey client. The addition of eDonkey support makes it possible to use both networks to download a file which might speed up BitTorrent swarms that have only a few seeders. If the .torrent includes ed2k hash it is downloaded via BitTorrent and eDonkey, if not, it can be joined with the wizard you can find in the file context menu.

The fact that Bitlord is no longer based on BitComet 0.56 which by itself is a great improvement. The client is spyware free but it does contain adware. Currently is has a banner on the bottom of the application, and some advertisement for the Bitlord pro version, which is basically the UseNeXT client that is advertised on many BitTorrent sites.

Throughout its existence Bitlord has always been a controversial client. Like BitComet, Bitlord is banned from quite a few private trackers because it allegedly disobeys the BitTorrent etiquette, and bullies other clients. However, Bitlord is now moving in the right direction and according to the Bitlord developer it should absolutely be accepted by private trackers. We’ll see what the future brings.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

the entire concept of the show is for fans to share with all of their friends using any means they wanted, so DRM would be counterproductive.

This is not the first time CocaCola is involved in a free TV-show. They’re also sponsoring the comedy “marcus hates his job“, created by the makers of the popular “the scene” show.

Stageside

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.