Power Seeding and its repercussions

raphjd

As in the post of mine you quoted, the issue is a serious one that needs honest and serious discussion.

To me, this all boils down to "BT traffic management" {see my sort of guide in the Guides - How To section} and fairness, for everyone.

How can a person who has just over seeded a torrent by 50 times, complain that other seeders on that same torrent aren't pulling their weight?! As an example, when I first became a moderator here, I got 2 PMs from users complaining that others on the torrent weren't seeding enough. When I looked at the torrent I found that both of the complainers seeded 80+% of the torrent's total traffic. This wasn't due to lack of trying on other members' part, as most were still trying to seed, but their upload speeds couldn't compete.

This kind of over seeding needs to stop in order for things to be fair for everyone.

If the power seeders want to seed more, they should go to the torrents that need the help.

Now don't get me wrong, I love power seeders. I just think they need to be more conscious of how their seeding will affect others.

thangcuoi

Interesting topic.

Perhaps the solution would be for the system to auto notify these power seeder a "reminder" to stop seeding when they have reach the ratio of 4+ while there are other 5 more people also seeding.

Halfang

I think that it should be made more clearly that you ONLY get bonus points for 1 single torrent you're seeding TOTAL, meaning that if you seed 20+ torrents at the same time you won't get 20xbonus.

I have seen people seeding like… 200 torrents at the same time, which, obviously, doesn't help to make the figures round. The average upload speed on those was about... 2bits per second. bits, not bytes, nor megabytes.

raphjd

I have seen people seeding like… 200 torrents at the same time, which, obviously, doesn't help to make the figures round. The average upload speed on those was about... 2bits per second. bits, not bytes, nor megabytes.

My client is set to run 10 torrents at a time, but often times the tracker reads the torrents in queued mode as active. Last night it listed me as having 129 torrents seeding, but only 10 were actually active.

geekguy

@thangcuoi:

Perhaps the solution would be for the system to auto notify these power seeder a "reminder" to stop seeding when they have reach the ratio of 4+ while there are other 5 more people also seeding.

I like that. Is it possible? ???

Part of the issue there may be it is not just seeding that comes into play. I have noticed myself become a power-UL on some torrents while I am downloading. Usually this is with an initial seed running slow, or a torrent with only a few seeds and more leechers. That is what happened in my example #2 at the start of this thread. My upload speed wasn't great while initially seeding, and the torrent had a lot of leechers wanting it from the very start. Maybe the 14 and 9 ratios had no options?

If I slow my upload while downloading it slows my download because I seem stingy. Maybe there are settings I am too ignorant to adjust? I have become more aware of the problem, and if I am downloading a slow initial seed and my ratio starts to get high, I pause the DL, giving others a "turn at the hose" so to speak.

geekguy

On a separate note;

I have been reading some of my posts on this and other threads, and notice I go on more than most. Am I writing too much? I don't know the etiquette in this, but I don't want to seem pushy or overbearing. I just enjoy the opportunity to discuss things I could not with the people around me. Please advise.

raphjd

Keep posting. More debate/discussion is always a good thing.

thangcuoi

Don't worry, you might happen to be "the guy" who writes lengthly post on this forum. As long as you are writing positive contribution to the community, keep it coming. People who don't like reading long post can skip over them.

jack020

Am new to this discussion, have a ratio of 0.47.
The last couple of months I downloaded 4 or 5 of the older posted DVDS.
Kept them on seeding, but nobody wants em.
My ratio was slowly dropping.
Now I got a week to up my ratio, that is impossible which means I am forced to leave this site?

geekguy

@jack020:

Am new to this discussion, have a ratio of 0.47.
The last couple of months I downloaded 4 or 5 of the older posted DVDS.
Kept them on seeding, but nobody wants em.
My ratio was slowly dropping.
Now I got a week to up my ratio, that is impossible which means I am forced to leave this site?

No, not forced to leave. Just won't be able to download, only upload. If you are downloading, stop, and just seed seed seed.

There are several threads in Support and the original Rationator thread that would be better for this line of question. This thread is about the other end of the ratio, power seeding.

geekguy

@raphjd:

My client is set to run 10 torrents at a time, but often times the tracker reads the torrents in queued mode as active. Last night it listed me as having 129 torrents seeding, but only 10 were actually active.

Does that mean that people can get seeding bonus even thought they are not actually seeding, just paused/queued? sounds like a cheat in the system. Not accusing you, but some of those whiners out there with low ratios could cheat.

leeward

Lets take another approach, using the simplest three-peer example :
UL - who has received approval to upload the complete 1 GB file and has an upload capacity of 100 kb/s
PS - who has power seeder capability of an uploading rate of 1Mb/s
AJ- who has the average joe uploading rate of 25 kb/s

A. caveat: This example assumes that UL seeds linearly in time, starting with the beginning file data and ending with the last of the 1 GB file data.

For the sake of convenience, lets assume that both PS and AJ download at the same rate, although usually PS can also download faster than AJ.
PS and AJ start leeching at the same time.
UL now seeds at 100 kb/s to both PS and AJ.
Immediately, UL starts seeding and continues to seed the entire 1 GB file for at least 1GB /100 kb/s = 10,000 seconds or 2.78 hours.
Both PS and AJ download at the rate of 50 kb/s each.

At no point does AJ have any downloaded data that PS could want or need and vice versa and both complete the leeching for 5.54 hours.

Lets now assume, as is usually the case, that PS can download faster than AJ.
If the system permits PS to download faster than 50 kb/s, then :
1. At all points in time, PS now has the upload advantage over AJ. At all times both UL and PS have file data that AJ needs to download.
2. At all points in time, AJ has no file data that either UL or PS could want or need.
In this scenario, AJ has performed 0 seeding, while PS has seeded to AJ.

In the real world of GT with multiple seeders and leechers, PS very much has seeding advantage to the detriment of the AJs, if PS can download faster than the AJs or if PS has commenced leeching earlier than the AJs.

leeward

B. Lets now break the caveat and assume that UL seeds the beginning of the file to PS and the ending of the file to AJ. Both PS and AJ have the same download rate.

PS now has the choice of downloading from either UL or AJ or both.
AJ now has the choice of downloading from either UL or PS or both.

If PS has a seeding rate of 1MB/s over AJs rate of 25 kb/s, then potentially AJ will have downloaded from PS for a 1MB/s / 100 kb/s = a 10:1 ratio from PS:UL, all other things being equal, by the end of the download.
PS will have downloaded from AJ for a 25 kb/s / 100 kb/s = a 1:4 ratio from AJ:UL.

In this scenario, the bottom line very much depends on the download rate of PS, the ability of PS to acquire as much file data as possible in the quickest time possible, in order to realize the potential of his seeding rate.

In the GT real world, so long as there are leechers and enough of them, PS will eventually reach his seeding potential.

The conclusion would be that PS can add fairness to the AJs by reducing his downloading speed as well as by reducing his seeding speed.

geekguy

@leeward:

B. Lets now break the caveat and assume that UL seeds the beginning of the file to PS and the ending of the file to AJ. Both PS and AJ have the same download rate.

PS now has the choice of downloading from either UL or AJ or both.
AJ now has the choice of downloading from either UL or PS or both.

If PS has a seeding rate of 1MB/s over AJs rate of 25 kb/s, then potentially AJ will have downloaded from PS for a 1MB/s / 100 kb/s = a 10:1 ratio from PS:UL, all other things being equal, by the end of the download.
PS will have downloaded from AJ for a 25 kb/s / 100 kb/s = a 1:4 ratio from AJ:UL.

In this scenario, the bottom line very much depends on the download rate of PS, the ability of PS to acquire as much file data as possible in the quickest time possible, in order to realize the potential of his seeding rate.

In the GT real world, so long as there are leechers and enough of them, PS will eventually reach his seeding potential.

The conclusion would be that PS can add fairness to the AJs by reducing his downloading speed as well as by reducing his seeding speed.

Whew! Welcome to the thread.

I will leave it to others more knowledgeable about torrents to confirm the stuff in your post.

My own observation/question regarding all you wrote:
At the beginning of B you assumed that PS got the first half and AJ got the second half of the file from UL. Since they both are dependent on UL's speed, they get equal amounts. At that point, when each has half, PS and AJ each make choices about who to get the remaining half of file from. Then your 10:1 and 1:4 proportions apply. So reducing download speed becomes factor only once a full copy of the original file has been seeded. correct?

leeward

@geekguy:

I will leave it to others more knowledgeable about torrents to confirm the stuff in your post.

So reducing download speed becomes factor only once a full copy of the original file has been seeded. correct?

No, reducing the download speed is important, if the downloading does not take place linearly - for example, I download parts of the beginning of the file from one seeder and the last parts of the file from someone else, both taking place simultaneously.

When I started this thread, I thought it would be simple, but the more I thought about it and wrote, the more I realized how complicated it is, because we need to know how the system of leeching and seeding works.

This is where Administration steps in, to tell us how the seeding and leeching processes actually work, or point us in the right direction where we can find out.

Thanks for the welcome.