“We use torrents ourselves, and we know that most NIN fans are tech-savvy and familiar with file-sharing, so we want to experiment with ways to use that to our advantage, instead of making the mistake of trying to fight or ignore it, as so many artists and labels do.” NIN’s Art Director Rob Sheridan explained to TorrentFreak last year.

In fact, when they released the album ‘Ghosts‘ for free last year their server couldn’t handle the high traffic numbers and downloads, so the linked to the torrents they had uploaded to The Pirate Bay instead. Thanks to The Pirate Bay, many fans didn’t have to wait till the server recovered, and the torrent quickly became one of the most downloaded files on the tracker.

With the release of their tour promo NIN/JA today, NIN decided to prevent similar server troubles, and the band now offers .torrent downloads for the higher quality (and size) downloads. The tracker used for the torrents is hosted by the band itself on the tracker.nin.com subdomain. The tracker is already being used by thousands of fans just hours after it went up.

Self-hosted BitTorrent trackers may become a new hype. Two weeks ago, the government-owned Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) had set up its very own BitTorrent tracker to distribute some of their TV-shows.

Thus far, we haven’t spotted NIN’s tour sampler on any of the public torrent sites, but it won’t take long before it spreads. The official website requires people to submit their email address in order to get the links to the DRM-free downloads. It’s well worth it though.

Update: Apparently the tracker at nin.com was also used for some of the previous releases, we were not aware of this.

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

Fans of the Nails will be delighted to hear that the free music vibe is going to get a fresh boost today. According to a report, a brand new track from the band entitled “Echoplex”, is now available for free download to millions of Facebook users.

Trent Reznor, the frontman of Nine Inch Nails has always been pro-filesharing and admits to downloading music using BitTorrent and was a member and supporter of the shuttered OiNK tracker.

For those without a Facebook account, no doubt there will be a copy of ‘Echoplex’ on your nearest BitTorrent tracker soon but make sure you check out the information included with the release. Apparently, those visiting www.nin.com, on May 5 are in for a surprise…..

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

Uploads to torrent sites, claiming to be from the owners of the material are not unheard of, but are also not common. When it has happened, it’s been to public sites, and generally a hoax, which makes people all the more wary when accounts appear, claiming to be ‘official’ or from the people behind it.

However, TorrentFreak has verified that the accounts in question, ‘NIN’ on both waffles and what, and ‘NINOfficial’ on The Pirate Bay, are indeed accounts belonging to the band’s representatives.

“last night our website had to go down for maintenance for a little while due to the incredible amount of traffic and downloads, and we linked directly to our Pirate Bay torrent as a way for people to get the music while we were offline.” Rob Sheridan, Art Director for NIN told TorrentFreak, adding “I noticed our official torrent of Ghosts I was in the top 10 of all torrents on The Pirate Bay last night.”

“We use torrents ourselves, and we know that most NIN fans are tech-savvy and familiar with file-sharing, so we want to experiment with ways to use that to our advantage, instead of making the mistake of trying to fight or ignore it, as so many artists and labels do.” NIN’s Rob Sheridan added. Many sites, too are willing to work with artists with programs such as Mininova’s content distribution platform and What.cd’s ‘Vanity House’.

It is not sure how NIN got invited to both OiNK replacements what.cd and waffles.fm, however, since Trent Reznor himself admitted to be a frequent user of OiNK, he probably signed up at the trackers from the start, and invited the official NIN user.

Of course, not everyone gets this, some news sites have been reporting that the accounts are bogus, or that the torrents, including the official ones, are stealing. An admin of one of the private tracker did have a sobering comment though “It doesn’t help that the full version is available as well on music torrent sites in general.”

screenshot of the official NIN profile at what.cd

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

In the release notes the band writes: “Now that we’re no longer constrained by a record label, we’ve decided to personally upload Ghosts I, the first of the four volumes, to various torrent sites, because we believe BitTorrent is a revolutionary digital distribution method, and we believe in finding ways to utilize new technologies instead of fighting them.”

This sounds is music to our ears, in more ways than one. For now, only the first volume has been uploaded onto BitTorrent sites, but the entire collection is available for download on the official website for only $5

“Ghosts I is the first part of the 36 track collection Ghosts I-IV. Undoubtedly you’ll be able to find the complete collection on the same torrent network you found this file”. They further write in the release notes “But if you’re interested in the release, we encourage you to check it out at ghosts.nin.com, where the complete Ghosts I-IV is available directly from us in a variety of DRM-free digital formats, including FLAC lossless, for only $5.”

Trent Reznor, the frontman of Nine Inch Nails has always been a supporter of sharing music via BitTorrent, even when it’s copyrighted. He isn’t frightened of talking about file-sharing. Back in May 2007 he admitted to sharing himself: “I steal music too, I’m not gonna say I don’t” he said. Later that year, when OiNK was pulled offline he admitted that he was a member there ,and said , : “If OiNK cost anything, I would certainly have paid, but there isn’t the equivalent of that in the retail space right now.”

The new Nine Inch Nails album including artwork is available for download on the official site, as well as on The Pirate Bay and other BitTorrent sites.

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