mrfalcon (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} mrfalcon) wrote,@ 2004-10-26 15:50:00 |
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I Heart BitTorrent
Ok I've finally jumped on the BitTorrent bus and I'm never getting off. Get a good BitTorrent client with an RSS plugin and you can pretty much cancel your cable service. You can just subscribe to the RSS feed of a Tracker that supplies Torrents of TV shows. Then you set up filters that say "I want shows with the words "Enterprise, Arcadia and Smallville in the title" and it searches the RSS field for those files and downloads them automatically. With the commercials cut out. In HDTV resolution. The way BitTorrent is set up, where partial files can be shared, means that shows get distributed through the network wicked fast.
I am drunk with power. I love this shit.
An interesting side effect of this is that it throws into sharp relief the effect that TV has on us. I'm living with my parents right now, so I download shows for my Dad. He also likes to download movies off Kazaa. So I walk into the living room and he's griping about how this movie on TV is being delayed by a Football game that won't end. Some Chris Rock vehicle where he dies and gets reincarnated as a white guy. You know, Oscar calibre must-see-TV. So I point out that there are much better shows piling up on his hard drive. And he says, "yeah, but they'll be there tommorow, this movie is on now". And that's really it, isn't it. Its the old sales trick: for a limited time only! I really don't think my Dad wanted to see the movie that badly. I mean, I don't think he would have rented it from Blockbuster if he had the choice. But he seemed to have this feeling that he'd be missing out on an opportunity if he didn't watch it. I could be wrong. I didn't press the matter.
I had a similar feeling at first. I would be in the process of downloading a show and realize that it was on TV right at that moment, and I would feel the urge to watch the show, not because I felt like watching TV at that moment, but because it was on right now as opposed to on my hard drive in an hour. But I would just slap myself and say "Bad Pavlovian dog!". After a week or so of watching what I want when I want instead of trying to organize my life around my favorite shows, and the feeling passed.
A few links for the interested-but-lost:
A BitTorrent client that can handle multiple files
RSS plug-in for aforementioned client
A site with lots of torrents of popular shows and NO ADS!
Ok I've finally jumped on the BitTorrent bus and I'm never getting off. Get a good BitTorrent client with an RSS plugin and you can pretty much cancel your cable service. You can just subscribe to the RSS feed of a Tracker that supplies Torrents of TV shows. Then you set up filters that say "I want shows with the words "Enterprise, Arcadia and Smallville in the title" and it searches the RSS field for those files and downloads them automatically. With the commercials cut out. In HDTV resolution. The way BitTorrent is set up, where partial files can be shared, means that shows get distributed through the network wicked fast.
I am drunk with power. I love this shit.
An interesting side effect of this is that it throws into sharp relief the effect that TV has on us. I'm living with my parents right now, so I download shows for my Dad. He also likes to download movies off Kazaa. So I walk into the living room and he's griping about how this movie on TV is being delayed by a Football game that won't end. Some Chris Rock vehicle where he dies and gets reincarnated as a white guy. You know, Oscar calibre must-see-TV. So I point out that there are much better shows piling up on his hard drive. And he says, "yeah, but they'll be there tommorow, this movie is on now". And that's really it, isn't it. Its the old sales trick: for a limited time only! I really don't think my Dad wanted to see the movie that badly. I mean, I don't think he would have rented it from Blockbuster if he had the choice. But he seemed to have this feeling that he'd be missing out on an opportunity if he didn't watch it. I could be wrong. I didn't press the matter.
I had a similar feeling at first. I would be in the process of downloading a show and realize that it was on TV right at that moment, and I would feel the urge to watch the show, not because I felt like watching TV at that moment, but because it was on right now as opposed to on my hard drive in an hour. But I would just slap myself and say "Bad Pavlovian dog!". After a week or so of watching what I want when I want instead of trying to organize my life around my favorite shows, and the feeling passed.
A few links for the interested-but-lost:
A BitTorrent client that can handle multiple files
RSS plug-in for aforementioned client
A site with lots of torrents of popular shows and NO ADS!
