Today I visited and used as many of the dumpsites listed by my fellow uploaers above. Some are old, some are new, so I thought I'd write a mini review! (pardon the lame rhyme) As an uploader, picking which sites to focus your precious time and energy on can be an important choice for uploaders. To help I've written a tille about my experiences with the sites. My comments are on the basis of speed, restrictions, login requirements, upload options, torrent editing. I've also included some tricks of the trade for getting individuals to notices our conspiracy research in amoungst all the "Air America" and "Charmed Season 1-3". This is a trade and it takes time to learn it!
Dumpsite MinireviewsMininova - seems to get the most distribution of the sites I've used, but I don't use pirate bay and thats be big too. Mininova allows you to create an account, but its basically only for customizing the daily list. There's not profile page, no ability to delete or edit your torrents, at least I can find. The torrent catagories or so so, I usualy put conspracy stuff "books", "other/radio" or "movies/documentary". the important thing to remeber for mininova uploaders... if you want it to stand out, you'll have to figure our the best way to format and represent your torrent to grab peoples attention. Because of the
Todays Torrents structure, which I like, mininova which swithes the whole list at precisely 3:00PM Pacific everyday. if you upload at 2:59PM-3:01PM, and chances are you can get your torrent into the first slot of the days category section. (Movies, Other, Books), where it will remain highly visible for the next two days... new downloads decreas after two days becuase of this. there are other tricks liek this you can do, so figure out the system and use it... our stuff will never be as popular as the mainstream titles, so we have to stand out! Also, be sure to upload files back to back if you want them to appear together and increase visability.
TorrentSpy - always good as a backup, not very high traffic though, at least for the stuff I upload. It does allow you to upload with no account, but If you sign up you get a torrent profile page where you can add,delete and edit your torrents like a mod. Very Nice... Although there is no file description box, the uploading categories are decent, they even have one specifically for conspiracy torrents.
Torrent Matrix - the first one I tried from Og's list. Pretty cool features here, although you must sign up for an account. The upload page and options are the most well rounded of all the sites I've tried. This includes a file description field, nfo upload, image upload, and a "My torrents Profile" page. Torrents stats seemed to be updated quickly as well, much faster than mininova, which will only update stats once every few hours if that.. more like twice a day or less. Boosted stats will encourage people to download, so I often wait to gain some footing on the orinial tracker before dumping. These sites bring hit and run downloaders so it helps if the torrent is healthy before uploading. This was my favorite of the new sites.
MegaNova - this one is more like a low-budget mininova, no login, no profiles, no frills, just an upload page for anonymous users. Also, catagories were the worst of all, had to put it in a generic Other, or a generic Unsorted. gain, I'll have to do some independant testing to find the best time and way to upload to help encourage poeple who go to the site to see conspiracy material and download it. Also, I think it limit torrent descriptions to 1000 characters or less... it chops em off.
TorrentBox - I used to be a big fan of this site. It has logins with My Torrent profile page and some editing abilities if I recall. It allows torrent description fields and has decent upload caterogories.. they seem to change them all the time. I stopped using it because after about 24 hours, they would edit the tracker info ( I checked by redownloading the files) and then the torrents would die. I don't know if they are still doing this.
The Pirate Bay - the pirate bay is a great site, but it requires a sign up for uploading. Then you get a profile page of active torrents and a ratio of how much you've upped/downed. I had technical problems loading a torrent, so I don't know if you can edit torrents ounce uploaded. This is obviously a major site with lots of exposure, so I'd use it if it was working.
Demonoid - a good site, for sure, but they place some strict requirements on uploads, a ban on "hate" material, which I suppose some "Con"spiracycentral stuff could be rejected for, and they ask you to include a stupid "tracked by demonoid" text file with every upload. They claim to check for these and reject then if they don't have it, but I'm not sure if thats %100 true. I have an account, but it took months of recheking reregistration page to get it. Their membership is almost always closed, and its been hat way for at least a couple years. If you want to get in, just keep checking the registration page, sometimes they open it up to the "general public". Maybe there's a way to give referals or invites...
BTChat - I think that is the one that bitlord/bitcomet and some of the other clients give you as a free tracker, but you still need to sign up and login to upload torrents. The file description options are limited to a name and a tiny little box fo text, but its doesn't chop it off. Very basic catagories as well. It does have a "MyTorrents" profile page and basic add remove functions. When uploaded, a torrent appear immediatly at the top of a simple list on the front page. Pretty basic , seems reliable and has been around for over a years. There is an option to upload by and search by "group".. maybe the uploaders guild could get together and publish that way...
Torrentreactor - a pop-up laden, spyware installing den of porn and stuff you can get on other sites. I stopped using it last year, maybe its changed, but I would have trouble recommending it. I will try it again later, maybe things have changed, it was certinaly a popular site that could generate exposure.
Mononova - almost identical to mininova, but it has less adds and seems to work very quickly. Its categories match mininova, but they include no description field, only an external link like "Con"spiracycentral used to have (oh, the good old days...) which, in some ways, is just as good or better than a description field.
Sprnova.tv - an anonyous dumpsite with very simple catagories and a style simialr to the old suprnova. Personally I hate it when they have no radio or educational categories, cuz I can usualy slip it in there and people will find it and not dissmiss it as conspiracy. Oh well. This site has an optional sign up, but all it does is put your name next to the file, no adding or deleting information. Still a decent dump site.
Chevynova - these are what I call the crappy mininova immitations.
Bitenova is another simple, no registration required dumpsite similar to meganova. Too many adds, very slow, limited description options, no decent catagories... and I had trouble uploading. I wouldn't bother with this one personally.
Rokanova seems to be the same page as bitenoave or identical to it.
Newnova wouldn't even load. Maybe they aren't that bad, I just dont' think I can handle "anothernova" right now...
NewTorrents.info - has five categories, movies, tv, music, appz and ebooks. I find that very lame. Required login for upload, worked fine. A search revealed some cool torrents on the site though, the word "conspiracy" generated over 100 results. Not too shabby...
Torrent Portal - has alot of adverts, but it still loads reasonably well. It requires a sign up to post, but when I tried to post the days torrents, it gave me an error saying that they might already be uploaded... I guess they got em from a friend
User Profile section had some options, not sure how extensive. Have to try a fresh torrent with this one later.
Tricks of The TradeWhen and how you post your torrent is a delicate balance and can heavily infleuce its reception, description and health. So uploaders, choose wisely before posting, you don't have to use every site out there, they all get spread around anyway. Be careful ahd delibrate with your uploading stategy and you will reach more of the right people. This brings me to a good point about dumpsites... in my experince, if you don't dump it, someone else will, especially if its popular. So, if you want to excersise any control over how your torrent is named, described, catagorized, and possibly edited, sometimes you must act quickly.
Usefull information to incldue in the torrent name is a title, author/speaker, length, file format and date. People make decisions based on key words and terms, and if they can't recognize something (our stuff tends to look obscure) then they just move on. Study what gets a responce, whether its date formats or certain names. Watch what gets a consistent responces and then try to formulate titles based on your perosnal experince and observatiions abotu what peopel respond to, rather than what you think it shold be. It's all about first impressions.
As for file descriptions, if available, I use them. They generate more downloads and further research. I just paste the same one from my torrent if the site allows it, so its pretty easy once you get the initial blurb written. And it shoudl be a blurb, short and precise as possible. This is important, becuase getting someone to clickon the torrent is only the first step. I suggest writing somethign which will get their attention rather than just technical file descriptions (although thats important too!). You should also try and make your description as brief as possible and refer to external links for more info. If peope perceive the description as too long they often they won't read it at all..
Don't feel pressured. Find the the right sites and do post with intent. When I've jumped the gun and dumped too quickly, I make mistakes which hurt the orverall distribution of the file. Even if you don't use every site or someone posts your stuff, eventually it will get around, and around. Everyone has their own path to the "perfect curve" as I lie eto call it; when a wave of uploaders rises and crests perfectly at the end of the initial upload, carrying one healthyly forver or until it dies naturally... I like to achieve that when I can, but in the end, if people are getting the information we put out, in any form, I think thats a good thing.
That's it. Hope this information helps, and remember this is only one persons oppinion. Other uploaders publishing strategies are needed as well, so please participate by contributing your own experiences. (As you may have notices, I will continue editing this post to improve it and add more information...)
Thanks to Cypher and Ognir for compiling the links. Publish and concel not!
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