| Raf 16.11.2007 07:57 |
Hey everybody. I haven't been checking this section too often. I used to love downloading mp3 from Rapidshare, as that's pretty much all I could download due to some limitations (First, slow connection... Once I got that sorted out, I had a monthly download limit for some time). But lately, as I've got enough Queen stuff, I had been checking out other bands. The first site I began to download lots was U2torrents.com, and then Dime and The Trader's Den. I'm really impressed by those sites... I love Queenzone. But... a) there are lots of repeated concerts on Queenzone. If you look for Hammersmith'75, for example, you'll find several versions, and you won't know which is the best. b) a torrent here doesn't last much. After the first big group of downloaders finish their downloads, the speed drops a lot, and after a couple of months, most torrents are already dead. c) where are the quality standards? People post whatever they want. If I want, I can delete half the tracks from a gig, save it in whatever format I want and post it here without even giving telling the venue, date, etc On other big torrent sites, I noticed that there's some good control of what is posted, so that there'll always be the best version of each gig, instead of 50 different versions. The gigs always have complete info (date, venue, lineage, full tracklist) plus some bonus such as artwork, screenshot from softwares that show information about the file (video format, bitrate, etc). And, maybe what I most appreciate... As the website displays everybody who has downloaded the file, everybody who is downloading, everybody who's uploading and put share ratios (that show to everybody how much each person has contributed and stop people from downloading if their ratio is too low), we always get good speed on new torrents, and it takes long for a torrent to die. Those "torrents needing seeders" lists are very useful too. ----------------------------------- Okay, my point is... I am NOT for "mp3 ban" on Queenzone. I used to have my own issues to download big lossless files and share them, so I know better how useful mp3 can be. I think the best idea would be to split the announce forum into two... One for lossy, one for lossless, and people who were caught downloading from one of the forums and uploading the file to the other (encoding one of Bob's FLAC shares, for example, and converting to mp3, or even worse, downloading an mp3 gig, encoding it to FLAC and uploading it) should get banned immediatly. But as I know it would be hard work for Richard and Barbara, I doubt it would happen and be successful. So here's my idea: The experienced collectors and webmasters (Bob? Scully? Barbara?) could try to get together and make a tracker with all those nice features. A Queen version of Dimeadozen/U2torrents.com/The Trader's Den. They could also invite a bigger group of traders to put together the best versions of well known gigs to share. We all know Bob nowadays makes the best versions of some gigs to share them. So, what if we get a big gang of collectors to help? So, with a group of experts to make sure the concerts shared are the best possible, share ratios and strict rules to ensure nobody's gonna ruin it, I think the website would be a small paradise for collectors. So FLAC collectors would have their place to share concerts the way they like, and people with slow collections who just want some new Queen stuff to put on their iPods and listen on their way to work could stay on Queenzone. It would also be a good idea if this site was somehow linked to Queenzone, so that if a Queenzoner downloaded a "release" from the new "QueenTorrens", reencoded it and posted it here would get punished (thread deletion? ban?). Let me know what you all think. |
| josedequeso 16.11.2007 08:07 |
I agree with almost every single word. There needs to be some standards here which include posting lineage and making sure that the best possible version is shared. It is laughable when checking the DVD shares on this forum and reading descriptions like "Houston DVD," it should be pretty simple to understand that just a "little" more effort could be spent on matters such as these, yet for some reason the moderators don't want that. |
| Mr. Scully 16.11.2007 08:14 |
Good post. I think what we really need is a comprehensive list of all available shared recordings (and a couple of admins who would add/edit/delete these links), together with info about the format (flac/mp3), quality rating, lineage. (Yes, there's a thread for this purpose in this forum but that's not the best way how to do it). The list can include both MP3 and FLAC versions. Everybody can download what he wants. If people want MP3, they will convert FLAC to MP3 anyway. So what's the point in censorship? |
| Nummer2 16.11.2007 08:29 |
Exactly. Perfect would be a new section at QZ, but a new site would do as well. |
| Cygnus X-1 16.11.2007 12:10 |
You perfectly nailed it! |
| onevsion 16.11.2007 13:09 |
Couldn't agree more. Good topic. |
| Mr. Scully 16.11.2007 14:35 |
So... I can do this (create two separate lists of shared recordings, one for mp3 and one for flac)... but somebody (or more people) would have to be admin(s). Who would add/edit/check/delete links. Any volunteers? |
| pittrek 16.11.2007 14:47 |
Mr. Scully wrote: So... I can do this (create two separate lists of shared recordings, one for mp3 and one for flac)... but somebody (or more people) would have to be admin(s). Who would add/edit/check/delete links. Any volunteers?Are you talking about a queenconcerts upgrade ? Because I lost all ilusions that this site will do something like this |
| Mr. Scully 16.11.2007 15:00 |
pittrek wrote:Richard hasn't touched this site for years.Mr. Scully wrote: So... I can do this (create two separate lists of shared recordings, one for mp3 and one for flac)... but somebody (or more people) would have to be admin(s). Who would add/edit/check/delete links. Any volunteers?Are you talking about a queenconcerts upgrade ? Because I lost all ilusions that this site will do something like this Actually I meant a separate page (although on the queenconcerts.com domain). Not a forum, just a list of shared gigs with all the info about them. Plus administration, of course. Keeping such a list updated is the most important part. |
| Raf 16.11.2007 15:07 |
Mr. Scully wrote: So... I can do this (create two separate lists of shared recordings, one for mp3 and one for flac)... but somebody (or more people) would have to be admin(s). Who would add/edit/check/delete links. Any volunteers?Your idea sounds very nice... But links expire everyday, torrents die everyday... A list of torrents would be really handy, as it could work kinda like Dime, U2T, TTD and others' list of torrents, and the dead ones could be easily brought up and reseeded. But what about Rapidshare/Mediafire/similars? The list would be constantly full of dead links. *EDIT* Besides that, how can we find the lineage for all the gigs as you suggested, if most of them don't have any info? |
| Mr. Scully 16.11.2007 15:16 |
<font color="lime">Raf840 wrote:It would be torrents, rapidshare, everything. Yes, links die every day so there should be a "report a dead link" option and such dead links would have to be removed by admins. It's a lot of work but I don't think there's any other way how to have everything on one site. Searching on QueenZone doesn't work and most concerts are offered in several versions so if a newbie wants to download something, how likely is it that he finds and downloads the best available version?Mr. Scully wrote: So... I can do this (create two separate lists of shared recordings, one for mp3 and one for flac)... but somebody (or more people) would have to be admin(s). Who would add/edit/check/delete links. Any volunteers?Your idea sounds very nice... But links expire everyday, torrents die everyday... A list of torrents would be really handy, as it could work kinda like Dime, U2T, TTD and others' list of torrents, and the dead ones could be easily brought up and reseeded. But what about Rapidshare/Mediafire/similars? The list would be constantly full of dead links. *EDIT* Besides that, how can we find the lineage for all the gigs as you suggested, if most of them don't have any info? |
| The Loser In The End 16.11.2007 17:42 |
I'll vote in favour...great idea...! |
| deleted user 16.11.2007 17:52 |
I think is a good idea, but we must stop sharing lossy recordings, maybe a tracker for LOSSLESS recordings. That would be perfect. Queenzone torrent never survive because nobody seeds, so maybe we must have a GOOD ratio, so people that don't share/seed may be banned. Sorry for my english Cheers |
| Raf 17.11.2007 06:16 |
Mr. Scully wrote:It is a good idea, but I think it would be better to start a new site with a new tracker, and then "control" what's gonna be shared, so that everything shared there would be the best version available, so newbies wouldn't need to look for the best version, they'd simply download the only version in the site knowing it's the best. :)<font color="lime">Raf840 wrote:It would be torrents, rapidshare, everything. Yes, links die every day so there should be a "report a dead link" option and such dead links would have to be removed by admins. It's a lot of work but I don't think there's any other way how to have everything on one site. Searching on QueenZone doesn't work and most concerts are offered in several versions so if a newbie wants to download something, how likely is it that he finds and downloads the best available version?Mr. Scully wrote: So... I can do this (create two separate lists of shared recordings, one for mp3 and one for flac)... but somebody (or more people) would have to be admin(s). Who would add/edit/check/delete links. Any volunteers?Your idea sounds very nice... But links expire everyday, torrents die everyday... A list of torrents would be really handy, as it could work kinda like Dime, U2T, TTD and others' list of torrents, and the dead ones could be easily brought up and reseeded. But what about Rapidshare/Mediafire/similars? The list would be constantly full of dead links. *EDIT* Besides that, how can we find the lineage for all the gigs as you suggested, if most of them don't have any info? |
| Ginger01 18.11.2007 13:08 |
Excellent topic, raising very worthwhile ideas. I’d like to add a few comments on some of the points raised in various posts. 1. Torrent seeding – There are lots of torrents on QZ that have been going for over three years, and lots of people - not just me! - seed upon request. The real problem is that there are lots more people that just leech and run, and nothing is done to stop this beyond the mild moral-suasion above the torrent box. In sites like TTD and Dime you can see who is seeding/leeching at any given moment, and share ratios are posted. This needs to be taken more seriously here. 2. Info on shares – if you read Richard’s sticky on How to post a torrent on Queenzone he specifically says “The title should state what the file is… The body should provide additional material such as tracklisting, orginal source,etc.” I doubt anybody bothers reading it; in any case, the mods do not make any visible effort to make sure that it is respected. 3. This brings me to the point about admin – from what I’ve seen, interventions by moderators are extremely rare, and not systematic. “Official” shares are generally pointed out by other QZers, not the moderators, and once highlighted are not always removed (only the mods can do that, particularly for torrents). Peer pressure has its limits! Moderators’ presence needs to be felt. I understand that they have a life outside Queenzone, and this is not intended to be a personal criticism since I know that Barbara in particular contributes a lot to this site. Perhaps the solution is to have more moderators? 4. List of existing shares – an excellent idea. I’d be glad to help out wherever possible, if you’re looking for volunteers. Although there already is a “show all torrents” function, it is difficult to navigate, and there are perfectly valid torrents that “fall off” the end once the 17 pages of posts are filled. Not only that, of course, it only contains torrents, so mediafire-type shares fade away unnoticed. We need to find the right format so it will be easy to use and update. However, at this point I would suggest that the person posting fileshares (as opposed to torrents) should be responsible for periodically checking that the links are still valid, since the only way to find out is to download. 5. There are lots of little improvements that could be made to the sharing forum. For instance, it would be great to have a little box to tick to thank the uploader, and another to request seeds. There are lots of other possibilities… 6. Lossless vs lossy – Raf’s suggestion of splitting the announce forum into two will only work if there are active moderators ensuring that the rules are respected. If this cannot be done for whatever reason, a new site/tracker may be the only answer, in my opinion, if we want to be taken seriously, even for those of us who are not necessarily "traders" but still think that Quality is important. |
| fernandosales 19.11.2007 14:21 |
1. Torrent seeding – There are lots of torrents on QZ that have been going for over three years, and lots of people - not just me! - seed upon request. The real problem is that there are lots more people that just leech and run, and nothing is done to stop this beyond the mild moral-suasion above the torrent box. In sites like TTD and Dime you can see who is seeding/leeching at any given moment, and share ratios are posted. This needs to be taken more seriously here. I agreed! |
| Raf 22.11.2007 03:12 |
Ginger01 wrote: 2. Info on shares – if you read Richard’s sticky on How to post a torrent on Queenzone he specifically says “The title should state what the file is… The body should provide additional material such as tracklisting, orginal source,etc.” I doubt anybody bothers reading it; in any case, the mods do not make any visible effort to make sure that it is respected.That's an excellent point. Some people get a bit frustrated when "serious" collectors ask about the lineage or other kind of information, as if there was absolutely no obligation of posting it, as if they're being too kind by offering the files to have the moral obligation of giving us precise info to help us know whether it's worth downloading, or if it's the same (or worse) recording we've already got. |