Just wondering what a rough split is of people using either Usenet, torrents, or both?
I’ve only just discovered Usenet and while it is paid, it is very cheap and much more convenient than torrents.
Using torrents as well with the *arr suite set up for my various Linux ISOs.
Wait, you have to pay for using Usenet?
Well since someone has to host the data, someone needs to pay for it :P
It’s funny you put it that way, because torrents are based fundamentally on the idea of freely hosting the data so nobody has to pay for it.
Torrents are based on the idea that everyone using them pays for it with their bandwidth and hardware cost. Except for those leechers who don’t share.
I’m paying more for my seedbox than for my usenet subscription. If I used my own hardware I’d pay with stress on my hardware, e.g. the disks aging and failing earlier because of seeding. The power consumption is also not negligeble, altough the server is also used for other purposes.
With private trackers this idea of an equal exchange is more obvious because of ratio requirements.
Edit: I’d say it’s similar to open source in that no single individual has to pay for it, but someone does have to, for it to exist. Most often with their (valuable) time and knowledge. If no one helps out and does their part (through money or time+knowledge), a project won’t survive for long. Same is true for torrents.
You pay for traffic. There are some free versions out there, but they limit you to 10-25 GB or something. Might be an option for the 1% you can’t find on public trackers.
You can get free accounts from sites like Eternal September, but you only get access to text groups, which are mostly full of spam anymore. If you don’t download much, it’s best to just get a block account.
Yes just like paying for vpn and/or seedbox to safely torrent.