Destigmatizing Torrents
If you offer direct download for a large file (> .5 GB), offer a torrent.
Direct download is slow, it’s unsafe, it’s all–or–nothing. Torrents are fast, redundant, and safe.
Torrents aren’t just for sharing stolen content. Torrent is a protocol for downloading things, and it’s a damn good one. So stop acting like everyone who torrents is evil. When I buy from the Humble Indie Bundle, I get my games as torrents. When I’m downloading files and a torrent is offered, I pick the torrent.
Torrents are better than direct downloads in every way, and yet because of their association with piracy are underutilized.
Let’s end that. Let’s use torrents.
In an effort to learn more about Ruby I’ve been working a little Ruby Gem. It’s called “isup”, and is a simple command line tool to see if a site is up or down. It currently follows redirects, handles most errors, and includes a basic verbose mode that prints whenever a redirect is followed.
It’s still a work in progress. The code is all available on Github if anyone wants to contribute.
When I was ten I started learning staff notation. I hated it, and it never stuck. If I’d had Hummingbird, I might’ve actually learned something.
What is code blue, and why did it have a phone?
Here I am. Sitting normalstyle. Staring deeply at your pixels.
