Official Ares Free Download

The filesharing website QuebecTorrent.com was shut down recently in the latest of a series of filesharing shutdowns around the world. The lockdown Quebec-based filesharing service is generally being viewed as a victory for the music and movie industries.

This news has a number of other filesharing websites worried that they could be next. Sebastien Brûlotte, the guy behind QuebecTorrent.com, said that while he will respect the ruling, he is concerned about the outdated approach to dealing with filesharing websites.

And so the ongoing debate between the music and movie industries and the filesharing communities rolls on. QuebecTorrent.com will no longer be allowed to facilitate the downloading of copyrighted music and films. It’s always sad to see another filesharing soldier go down, but there are so many more out there that from a consumer point of view, it doesn’t make all that much difference.

There’s an interesting article by Lucas Gonze this week that questions whether ad-supported music websites can survive. The basic premise is that streaming-audio music services such as iMeem can’t stay afloat given record labels current pricing demands.

The major record labels apparently demand one cent every time a song is played. To break even, the streaming-audio websites need to sell one ad for one penny per song played — something that is near impossible for any music website.

So that leaves a gaping hole where money is concerned and streaming-audio websites cannot even cover their bases and will certainly struggle to make a profit. A more feasible fee is one tenth of what major record labels are demanding, a fee that labels call unreasonable.

It seems as if streaming-audio websites have some way to go before they can be deemed as having successful business models and it doesn’t look as if record labels are going to give any slack.

The machinations of the RIAA continue. I love following this stuff; it’s better than any fiction novel that I’ve read recently. Stories of Grandmothers and toddlers getting charged by the RIAA and its minions simply defies belief. Yet there it is, in black and white on my computer screen. OfficialAres.com is my favorite site for this kind of news: it always has its finger on the pulse and the writers don’t take themselves (or their subject matter) too seriously. It often seems like they’re as surprised as I am by the stories they find themselves writing about.

OfficialAres is without doubt the best place to read if you’re going to download Ares, and that goes for those of us that have been in the game for a while as well as those looking to download Ares for the first time.

The reviews on the site are going to be of particular interest to anyone looking to download Ares as they are impartial and honest. If you’re going to put a version of Ares on your computer then my advice is to come here for first. This should be your first and last port of call if you intend to download Ares.

Definitely a site worth visiting.

Students are taking the filesharing bull by the horns, no doubt fed up with being sued by the RIAA for using filesharing networks to download free music.

Matt Earp and Andrew McDiarmid from the UC Berkeley School of Information have written their master’s thesis on filesharing, investigating how a monthly fee could work for a legal filesharing service.

The students have developed a model for how such a filesharing service would work. Amazing that it took students to really put forward some ideas that would solve the filesharing standoff with the RIAA.

The premises of the thesis are that 64% of students would be willing to use a paid filesharing service and that 75% of people who have used filesharing services would consider a paid service. Why didn’t the RIAA use these stats to come up with something?

It will be interesting to see what happens next, but legal filesharing is a hot topic at the moment.

Limewire, one of the most popular services for free music downloads, has launched the latest section of its Limewire store, Live at Lime, which will give users access to live-music recordings by various indie artists.

The sets have been recorded exclusively for the Limewire store and are being produced as EPs that users can then download. The EPs are being sold to inspire sales of full releases. Some of the bands include Sloan, Tigers and Monkeys, and The Morning Benders. No, we hadn’t heard of them either.

Limewire should be commended for bringing new music to the table. It seems as if this music is more the favourite bands of the guys at Limewire than anything else, but that’s fine by us, so long as there is more music available.

These Limewire sessions are kind of like Peel sessions for the Internet (John Peel, remember him?). Interesting stuff from the Limewire camp as always.

Ares users have been reporting the return of the problems getting Ares connecting to the network. The problem is in the servers used for the initial connection to the Ares network, making it difficult for users to connect the first time they start Ares.

Once Ares starts and connects to its network, it has a list of ‘reliable’ IP addresses and keeps them for the next time you fire Ares up, so it’s really just the initial connection that is a problem.

Ares Vista has solved the problem with an advanced technique for pushing an updated list of host servers out to users to connect to, so is not dependent on the initial list of cnodes like the older versions such as Ares Galaxy are.

It might be a hassle changing over but the 15 minutes it takes to download and install the new version of Ares vista will save you much frustration.

Virgin made headlines recently when it announced that it will send letters advising of legal ways to get music to people who are suspected of using filesharing networks to share copyrighted material.

Well, Virgin has come under fire this week for its broadband speeds. The complaint isn’t quite as serious as the ones launched against Comcast, as Virgin is only really accused of failing to tell users that its advertised speeds are only achievable at off-peak times.

Virgin will have to clarify the speed of its services for users now. Though not directly related to filesharing, part of the issue here is, ironically, how fast people can download TV shows (and music) through filesharing networks.

Meanwhile, ISPs in the US are banning access to filesharing services such as BitTorrent, while British Telecom is planning to cut off the Internet connections of people who sue filesharing networks to download copyrighted material.

While students have been consistently targeted by the RIAA for filesharing violations, it has usually been related to illegal free music downloads. The whole filesharing debacle has taken a turn as the makers of text books have started voicing concerns that students are using filesharing services to get copyrighted study books.

It’s a tough call. The students are presumably using the books to aid their education, but they are effectively stealing them. How do you approach such a situation? Sue the students for all the money they have?

Sites such as Textbook Torrents call on students to scan their text books and upload them. This is perhaps crossing the line. It’s one thing that filesharing is used to obtain material, but asking students to actively violate laws and upload data is a whole different matter.

A number of links to text books have been taken down recently and there will likely be more to follow. Where do you stand on this?