Is there something like the pirate bay but for direct downloads? (lemmy.fmhy.ml)

submitted 1 year ago by QuietStorm@lemmy.fmhy.ml to c/freemediaheckyeah@lemmy.fmhy.ml

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Im honestly scared to get into pirating but some things are just way too overpriced. i know theres the piract bay and such sites but it requires torrecting and a vpn but i cant afford a vpn so is there like a direct downloads version of the pirete bay or a safer alternative? im looking to get a few peices of media by the way.

also how do you all store so much media without issues or getting into trouble? also am i aksing the wrong place by chance?

i know there is internet archive but i find it hard to find what you are looking for and kinda clunky.

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[-] TootSweet@latte.isnot.coffee 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Closest thing I've found was /r/OpenDirectories on the site that shall not be named. Which is to say, no there's not really any such thing as "Pirate Bay but for direct downloads." At least not that I've found.

Pirate Bay but for direct downloads does seem like something that might be able to thrive on the dark web, though, doesn't it? I wonder why something like that hasn't become a thing and gotten big.

I suppose some site that just acts like a searchable directory of links to IPFS could be used in combination with IPFS web adapter sites. But I haven't found anything like that.

[-] ggt@lemmy.fmhy.ml 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I wonder why something like that hasn't become a thing and gotten big.

Not only is tor not used by the majority of pirates, it also limits speeds by a lot. Not to mention you can't index onion links in search engines. But I mean, you wouldn't need a VPN with it, so...

[-] TootSweet@latte.isnot.coffee 1 points 1 year ago

I guess I must not mind whatever speed limits there are, because I use yt-dlp over Tor frequently.

I'm not sure what you mean by "you can't index onion links in search engines", though.

[-] ggt@lemmy.fmhy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

As in tor links don't show up on regular search engines (like Google, DDG, etc.) It's how most people find piracy sites.

Also, aren't downloads incredibly slow? I know regular browsing is so I'd imagine downloads would be slower.

[-] TootSweet@latte.isnot.coffee 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Oh I'm with you. There used to be (though I haven't been able to find any lately) Tor web gateways that would let you visit a tor site without having to run Tor or Tor Browser yourself. They don't protect your identity when you use them the way using Tor Browser protects your identity, but they could be used. And some onion sites still come up as results when you search DDG for something like "Hidden Wiki site:onion.pet". The result doesn't link you to the .onion address, but to a .onion.pet address that takes you to the same page/site.

As far as Tor and speeds, I think Tor imposes very large latencies (that is, it takes a few seconds to get a download started), which is more what you're experiencing when you notice sites "being slow" when browsing through Tor. But bandwidth isn't affected all that much.

One caveat, though. When downloading through Tor, your request is being proxied through a chain of proxies. If any one of those is slow or purposefully limits speeds, that will limit your bandwidth. That's a problem, maybe 30% of the time or so. But there are commands you can use to tell Tor to "please select a different route." After doing that once or twice, you'll generally get a decently fast "circuit."

Just as a test, I downloaded the latest Arch Linux ISO (which is 853MB in size) from here both via Tor and directly. Direct took 7 minutes 36.324 seconds for an average speed of 1.869MB/s. Tor took 9 minutes 26.627 seconds for an average speed of 1.505MB/s. In short, a pretty moderate difference in speed.

And, yes, this is a highly unscientific, n=1 test, but I think it's pretty well in line with what I've seen in the past.

[-] ggt@lemmy.fmhy.ml 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Those two seem pretty slow regardless, but you're right, that's not a big difference, so it could work... really, though, the main hurdle is popularity. Unless you're operating like a private tracker (which is no fun), it's going to be very hard to get both uploaders and users to it. You'll have to somehow get a lot of people interested, starting without any content (or if you're an uploader yourself, not a lot of content), not a lot of recognition, on a relatively new platform. With the added bonus of it being harder to access.