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Elfwreck · 12-10-2008, 07:06 PM

At home, I have dialup internet.

Torrents are a godsend. I have torrented 5mb creative commons works, and 95mb videos freely shared by the creator. 5mb takes me about 30 minutes of download time, normally--if it doesn't crash. And in the meantime, I can't do browsing or it slows the download. I can torrent it, which takes much longer, but frees up my online activity.

95mb? I can't download direct at all. Whole install CDs, music by Radiohead, packs of public-domain works... I can download them, a few mb per night, for as long as it takes to get them done.

While I'm on dialup because I'm a luddite freak (I don't have the hardware to switch & have been to lazy/confused to figure it out), there are parts of the US and the rest of the world where high-speed internet is just not available. Torrents, even very small torrents, are very useful things.

Torrents of packs of books--labeled something like "20 Classics From Mobileread" or "Mobileread Mystery And Horror Collection"--selected sets, not "everything available in the sci-fi topic" (but perhaps "Mobileread's most downloaded sci-fi books") might be a good thing

--> Allow new ebook readers to grab a selection of books on a topic of interest, instead of grabbing one, deciding they don't like it, and deciding it's too much hassle to wade through a forum to try to find one they'd like.

--> Allow collectors to get a whole set at once. (Yes, they miss out on updates. However, they do that if they grab the set here, too, and don't check back for later versions.) Especially useful for experienced ebook readers who love the formatting people use here, but already have several versions of many public-domain classics. They may not bother collecting "the good version" if it's a one-at-a-time, search-and-download process.

--> Putting "mobileread" in the name of the torrent, and including a txt file inside describing the forums and policies, allows people who'd otherwise never notice the place existed to find it. (Not that mobileread is hard to find... IF you are looking for ebook reader information. If you're looking for "sherlock holmes stories," not so much.)

--> Having an "official" (or at least sanctioned) forum collection cuts down on the chances of unofficial, unsanctioned sets popping up. There's no geek cred points for making the new, ripoff version of something that's already available in another form--but there are points for taking single-download, one-at-a-time files and collecting them into useful sets.

12-10-2008, 07:06 PM	#72
Elfwreck Grand Sorcerer Posts: 5,187 Karma: 25133758 Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: SF Bay Area, California, USA Device: Pocketbook Touch HD3 (Past: Kobo Mini, PEZ, PRS-505, Clié)	At home, I have dialup internet. Torrents are a godsend. I have torrented 5mb creative commons works, and 95mb videos freely shared by the creator. 5mb takes me about 30 minutes of download time, normally--if it doesn't crash. And in the meantime, I can't do browsing or it slows the download. I can torrent it, which takes much longer, but frees up my online activity. 95mb? I can't download direct at all. Whole install CDs, music by Radiohead, packs of public-domain works... I can download them, a few mb per night, for as long as it takes to get them done. While I'm on dialup because I'm a luddite freak (I don't have the hardware to switch & have been to lazy/confused to figure it out), there are parts of the US and the rest of the world where high-speed internet is just not available. Torrents, even very small torrents, are very useful things. Torrents of packs of books--labeled something like "20 Classics From Mobileread" or "Mobileread Mystery And Horror Collection"--selected sets, not "everything available in the sci-fi topic" (but perhaps "Mobileread's most downloaded sci-fi books") might be a good thing --> Allow new ebook readers to grab a selection of books on a topic of interest, instead of grabbing one, deciding they don't like it, and deciding it's too much hassle to wade through a forum to try to find one they'd like. --> Allow collectors to get a whole set at once. (Yes, they miss out on updates. However, they do that if they grab the set here, too, and don't check back for later versions.) Especially useful for experienced ebook readers who love the formatting people use here, but already have several versions of many public-domain classics. They may not bother collecting "the good version" if it's a one-at-a-time, search-and-download process. --> Putting "mobileread" in the name of the torrent, and including a txt file inside describing the forums and policies, allows people who'd otherwise never notice the place existed to find it. (Not that mobileread is hard to find... IF you are looking for ebook reader information. If you're looking for "sherlock holmes stories," not so much.) --> Having an "official" (or at least sanctioned) forum collection cuts down on the chances of unofficial, unsanctioned sets popping up. There's no geek cred points for making the new, ripoff version of something that's already available in another form--but there are points for taking single-download, one-at-a-time files and collecting them into useful sets.