Usenet is 32 years old. You’d be forgiven for thinking that it’s a near-dead, cobweb-covered discussion forum platform, but actually it’s more popular today than ever before, and it’s thriving as an alternative to Bittorrent. Yes, people are using it for piracy, which in itself is not particularly remarkable. What is interesting, though, is the software that has sprung up around it. Do a little digging and you’ll find loads of slick UIs and services that are on a par with their commercial counterparts.
- Usenet itself: anyone can post anything to a usenet group (provided it’s configured to accept binaries) and the servers then sync with each other around the globe. It’s decentralised by design – invented in an environment where business models and copyright were not a concern.
- Sabnzbd: this little app manages the downloading process similar to a Bittorrent client. What’s different is that you can send it jobs remotely via RSS. So, if a friend tells you about a new show you haven’t heard of, you can whip out your iPhone and bookmark the show using a usenet search engine. The search engine then puts your bookmark into an RSS feed that sabnzbd will pick up and start downloading onto your home computer. Since it’s RSS you can give that feed URL to other people and they’ll end up with the same files as you, so you can share the same experiences. An amazingly simple way to ‘do’ social. Apparently, with a bit of tinkering Sabnzbd can run on the $25 Rasberry Pi along with XBMC which you can see here has an impressively polished UI.
- CouchPotato: so far what I’ve described is sort of similar to Netflix but a lot more illegal. CouchPotato is where it gets interesting. Once installed along with a Userscript, CouchPotato adds a “want” button to any page on IMDB, even if the movie is not yet released. When a user hits the button, CouchPotato patiently scans usenet for a matching file at the user’s specified quality level (e.g. Blu-ray). Again, this UI is also pretty impressive.
- Sickbeard & Headphones: these apps do pretty much the same thing as CouchPotato but for TV shows and music.
So why am I writing about this? Pirates will go to any lengths to get something for free, right? Well, actually, No. That’s the most fascinating thing. It costs about $20-35 US Dollars a month for Giganews usenet subscription, and they claim to have over 10 million subscribers worldwide (they’re just one of many different providers). Seriously.
So let’s just break that down. It’s expensive. It’s illegal. It’s a crazy hassle to set up. You’re at risk of being sued for a lot of money and maybe even losing your home internet connection. Once you’ve got it all up and running, you’ve got something that’s basically as slick as Netflix. So what does it give you that Netflix doesn’t offer? You get one thing – the ability to watch stuff on very same day it’s released, regardless of the publisher or region.
Does this tell us people will do anything to save a bit of cash? No. It’s telling us that people will do almost anything to get same-day releases – and that they’re willing to both pay wads of cash and break the law at the same time to get them. Sure, they’re not paying enough and the money is going to the wrong people, but that’s not the point. This is blazingly clear evidence that Usenet piracy is a response to an availability problem – something that the studios could easily solve if they put their minds to it.
Studio business models aside, it’s amazing that people have managed to cobble together such a well crafted, seamless user-experience on top of a 1980s technology. On the other hand, maybe we should shed a tear for the loss of everything that Usenet used to stand for – a democratic, open discussion forum that was the heart and soul of the internet for many years before the web even existed.
Sure, but if you run the numbers I’m sure that the amount that HBO et al receive from cable subscriptions completely dwarfs the amount of money that people are directly paying for any kind of streaming or download service. It doesn’t matter if 10% of the people are pirating willy nilly if the majority continues to pay through the nose for cable. Big content is not going to risk killing the golden goose by increasing availability until they are sure there is a market there. And if people scream bloody murder over Netflix raising their prices by a couple dollars a month while cable customers are happily paying 10-20x that, well, that’s not confidence inspiring to the rightsholders.
Around 2004-2007 our society perfected the infrastructure for entertainment distribution. We’re still working to modify our socioeconomic legal framework to accomodate that advancement.
Looks like a healthy discussion is brewing over at Hacker news.
Good point, but you overestimate how much it costs and therefore put too much weight on availability.
Follow Up
they could solve it but it’s already been solved from one perspective… the time delay is a business model that works and is profitable. the question is whether same-day on-demand can be as profitable if not more. it would have to be the latter (in a huge X factor) for anyone to do anything about it.
gawd, i haven’t used usenet in forever…
Thank you sir. I haven’t touched usenet since the days of dreamcast, but it looks like I should come back.
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“On the other hand, maybe we should shed a tear for the loss of everything that Usenet used to stand for – a democratic, open discussion forum that was the heart and soul of the internet for many years before the web even existed.”
Well said! I really miss those days.
Yeah yeah netflix & everithing.
Did you realised that the world is a *little bite* wider than THE usa.
I’m french and the average french guy down in the street of Paris I cn see through my window would answer “net what?” to the question “do you know anything about netflix”.
“Sorry, Netflix is not available in your country yet.” this what netflix is in most part avec the globe.
Here VOD is expensive, TV show are broadcast like shit on TV with a year of two behind the US mostly in poor french version, and they sell this stuff for 40-50€ PER SEASON.
Sick Beard is close to the Holy Grail trust me (it will be when it would grab subtitles).
Quick summary : offer is poor in most countries, when the offer is bearable it is crazy expensive and usenet is safe from anti-piracy measures (thanks SSL).
I pay US$10 for SSL usenet service through one that is not giganews and US$10 for torguard, monthly, each. US cable providers provide the fastest internet locally as FIOS is not yet available in my neighborhood. What I don’t understand is how cable providers boast higher and higher speeds (and provide them, I have a reliable 30Mbps connection) but aggressively pursue piracy. Even more bizarre is that they seem indignant towards people who would use their blazing high speed internet for the unlawful procurement of …. stuff. I mean seriously, is the premium price worth the imperceptible difference between 3 and 30 Mbps for the casual user who checks the weather and puts stuff on facebook?
NZBDrone is a new Sickbeard alternative that has actually become better than SB, I believe. It’s simpler overall, and the UI is much more appealing. I also find the backlog management to be superior.
I’ve never gotten Headphones to do anything useful for me, it’s pretty useless IMHO. I’m checking out an alternative program called Lovely Tunes. It’s still in very early Beta but already it’s done a hell of a lot more for me than Headphones ever has.
As for usenet providers, this video I found has some interesting things to say: [url]http://youtu.be/jQ5spKm6-gw[url]