So I saw this post here a couple days ago about music piracy and got interested in soulseek. I’ve installed nicotine in a docker container and started searching for some music. I’ve found some pretty hard to find music and this album my father used to have in vynil when I was a kid. Cool. But the files had PRIVATE written on them… Tried to download but the user did not share them with me. My question is: what’s the point of sharing folders in a p2p program and denying access to these folders? I mean…just don’t share it if you won’t let anybody download it. Am I missing something in order to download this album?

Edit: hey guys I sent a message to the user asking if he could share the folder with me and he answered that he’d added me and I could download whatever I wanted! Great! Thanks for the help!

  • Snot Flickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    31·
    5 months ago

    People like this are jerks who only share their library with people who already have ultra rare shit. They want to trade rare for rare.

    They think they are special for their collections and their actions are anti-thetical to the entire piracy ethos.

    I would ignore them and keep searching for another source because its unlikely you have anything they will willingly trade for.

    It’s dumb and I can’t stand those people.

    But it makes me laugh when they have their collections locked up but other people are freely sharing what they have locked up.

    The stuff I don’t want to share… I just don’t share at all. No reason to make it frustrating.

    • fernandu00@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
      3·
      5 months ago

      Yeah I don’t even have a large collection but I’ve seen some jazz albums locked that are pretty easy to get by torrenting. If I don’t wanna share something I’d just keep it in a different folder…anyway, I found nicotine awesome and plan to spend some time looking for new unlocked stuff…thanks

  • bestusername@aussie.zoneEnglish
    18·
    5 months ago

    Message the user and ask to share it with you.

    Personally I think they do it because they like the power of having something rare.

    • skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
      7·
      5 months ago

      i think that it’s mostly because they don’t want somebody with 0 shared files to download - and i sorta understand that, would be lot cooler if people weren’t leeches only, sure, but i can’t be bothered to check or enforce. if you have something shared and message them they’ll usually allow to download

      • fernandu00@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
        5·
        5 months ago

        Cool…gonna ask them to see if I can download this 60s album from a Brazilian musician

    • fernandu00@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
      2·
      5 months ago

      I was surprised that they really do have rare things like some niche Brazilian musicians and they’re not even Brazilian

  • maxprime@lemmy.mlEnglish
    13·
    5 months ago

    Do you have a folder that’s being shared? Some users only share with others who share.

    You can also message the person and ask if they would be willing to make that folder public.

    • MalReynolds@slrpnk.netEnglish
      91·
      5 months ago

      Yeah, some dickheads apparently want to monetize and should die in a fire, but it doesn’t hurt to ask. Patience usually does the trick, but I need to work out how to filter Private out of search results.

    • Doranwen@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      81·
      5 months ago

      Precisely. Too many people get on and just want to leech (a few just don’t know how to share, but those usually figure it out pretty quickly when asked). What’s wrong with not wanting leechers to hog slots for hours upon hours grabbing large files they don’t have any intention of sharing back to the community? I’m sure some people are jerks about hoarding their special folders (though I honestly don’t know how anyone can possibly monetize it and I’ve never heard of that happening, that sounds more like paranoia to me), but some people are just tired of those entitled folks who think sharers are there only to provide them with what they want when they want it (and who will curse you out if you dare ask them to actually have a list even if you don’t want anything from it).

      And it might have absolutely nothing to do with rare vs. not-rare, despite what some people think (some people share small files with everyone but reserve large files for those who’ve proven they’re actually interested in sharing and not just downloading what they can without giving back). No one has an obligation to dump all their bandwidth at hit-and-run downloaders.

      My formative years in P2P were spent in a community where everyone helped each other out, were very kind and generous - but one cardinal rule was that You Did Not Leech. You shared something, even if you only had a handful of files, you shared what you could and tried to build a decent list.

      • fernandu00@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
        3·
        5 months ago

        Yeah I can understand that about leechers…that’s why I tried to run a docker container to have my files accessible 24/7 in my home server. The same thing with torrent… I let the files a long time seeding to give back what I took. I hope I slowly find some cool music from people that let me download…gonna try asking them to share the folder to see if I get luck…thanks

    • fernandu00@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
      1·
      5 months ago

      Yeah I’m sharing my music library… It’s not much but I have around 15Gb of music I’ve been downloading since kazaa and linewire era. I have a couple of flacs too now that I have lidarr running. I’m gonna try asking for the files thanks.

  • Tregetour@lemdro.idEnglish
    5·
    5 months ago

    My question is: what’s the point of sharing folders in a p2p program and denying access to these folders?

    I’ve asked many of them, including one who wanted not only a vinyl for a vinyl but one with an equivalent number of tracks. They never answer me, because they never arrived at their absurd position using reason to begin with. They fundamentally misunderstand p2p filesharing, in that they believe it’s a zero-sum game.

    Your best attack: polite annoyance. Ping them when you see them. Hi x. I want to download from you. My files are available - Soulseek is for sharing. Please give me access, even if it’s temporary/capped transfer. It would be great to see more people use private chat to wear them down and call out poor behavior. Even if they block you, that’s still a bit of overhead they’re having to contend with.

    Your best defense: modeling the behavior you want to see. Traders are still very much a minority. Keep online over the long term, keep your shares available, and they’ll stay that way.