Hello all,

I’m a huge amateur when it comes to this stuff (I had a guy hold my hand on the phone and walk me through this) but I use Newsgroupdirect and buy blocks when they go on sale.

Is there a better group to do this from (or cheaper). I’m happy here but I saw an article that had some different places listed and it got me thinking.

Which group do you use?

  • Zedstrian@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    9 months ago

    While the cheapest reliable option is probably Frugal Usenet, I switched to Eweka while their Black Friday sale was active since its retention goes further back. I also use a Newsdemon block plan as a secondary usenet provider for releases that Eweka is missing portions of.

  • thagoat@lemmy.sdf.org
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    9 months ago

    Yes, frugal usenet. Buy a year for 40 or 50 bucks, get a free block. US servers, EU servers and a backup server too. All for less the 5 smackers a month.

        • thisusernameistaken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          9 months ago

          if you just want the popular stuff they will be fine since they keep that since many download it but if you veer off that path they have poor completion since their system does not keep everything. but even then with other services at similar prices you can get better for the same price.

  • willya@lemmyf.uk
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    9 months ago

    Frugal Usenet and their free block news block. Never any problems.

  • thisusernameistaken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    9 months ago

    blocks could be a bit restrictive unless you reliably download the same each month so you have predictable usage. if you ever deviate or find yourself having to hold back so you dont burn up your block, an unlimited account may be better and then you dont have to worry. unlimited is cheap enough now.

    • LoganNineFingers@lemmy.caOP
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      9 months ago

      Thank you. I am seriously considering this instead as I think I minimum spend around $40usd buying 4tb blocks on sale. If I forget to grab during a sale, that bumps to $45 per tb

  • retrieval4558@mander.xyz
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    9 months ago

    I mainly use torrents but do have Usenet as a backup. I solely have a 4tb block also from NewsGroupDirect. I got it for like 7$ a couple years ago and am still working through it. It’ll last a while. I’ve been pretty satisfied with availability and retention, although YMMV. if I could give advice it’s that a lot of places do really good holiday/black Friday deals.

  • TCB13@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Paying for piracy is pointless and stupid. Piracy means free and solid access to content and paying for it means the complete subversion of that. 👎 👎

    For that I would be better by just paying for some stupid streaming service and having something more convenient / not having to deal with anything.

    Long live torrents.

        • Vendetta9076@sh.itjust.works
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          9 months ago

          Nope. I’m asking because your writing pattern and general stance is extremely juvenile. So I’m wonderimg if you’re a child or not.

          • TCB13@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            Nope, not a child. I just don’t care specially when it comes to certain topics, or my English is actually bad.

            But seriously, why would we pay for piracy by financing greedy VPN companies when you can get 98% of the security for free by using a good private tracker + requiring encryption?

            • Mr. Forager@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              For many of us, paying for these services are more convenient that putting up with the bullshit of services like Netflix and Amazon etc… There are so many streaming sites now that it really isn’t convenient anymore.

              But yes; Just like there are greedy streaming services there are greedy VPN providers. So folks should keep up-to-date on who to choose. (If you ask me, stick with either Mullvad, IVPN or Proton VPN. I’ve done a lot of research and still am on the landscape of VPNs for my master thesis, and it’s a pretty nasty corner of the internt…)

              Piracy isn’t purely about getting things for free, it’s about convince and preserving digital media too.

              • TCB13@lemmy.world
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                9 months ago

                Piracy isn’t purely about getting things for free, it’s about convince and preserving digital media too.

                I agree with you when when it comes to preservation and sometimes even quality. But when it comes to convince nothing beats Netflix.

                • Grass@sh.itjust.works
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                  9 months ago

                  They certainly convinced me to stop using the account I was password sharing off of and dusting off the old hat and peg leg.

    • LoganNineFingers@lemmy.caOP
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      9 months ago

      I used to pay for a VPN and torrent everything but I’ll be honest, $ for $ it costs the same or less AND there is way more selection. I’m ok to pay a little for a better service. I don’t have to figure out what’s streaming on what and I get high quality tv and movies for pennies on the dollar. Even if I went the “free” route I still have to pay for a vpn

      • TCB13@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I won’t pay for piracy and that includes a pointless piece of shit VPN that won’t protect you anyways if things get serious.

        • LoganNineFingers@lemmy.caOP
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          9 months ago

          I imagine it must be nice living in a place where your government doesn’t care. Enjoy your free torrents. I’m ok with a few bucks here and there

          • TCB13@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            C’mon you’ve plenty of private trackers you can join with an invite from someone else and nobody will easily track you like they can do in public torrents.

            • LoganNineFingers@lemmy.caOP
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              9 months ago

              I’m kinda over this conversation. I posted asking for input, not someone being argumentative. If you had a stronger argument, maybe I’d change my ways and look into what you’re saying. I politely tried to say I hear you, but I’m good with what I do and you keep digging. At no point have you said anything that makes a strong case, helpful to what I asked or isn’t dismissive. Have a good night

              • TCB13@lemmy.world
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                9 months ago

                I do have an argument: https://lemmy.world/comment/7648533

                Any free private tracker worth your time has DHT/PEX disabled thus making their torrents invisible for your typical govt / private entity searching for pirates. If those torrents aren’t public and can’t be searched indexed via DHT then the ISP or whatever knows you’re using the bittorrent protocol but they don’t know for what content. This particularly correct if you use sane settings in your torrent clients such as a blocklist + requiring encryption for all connections.

                If you do those simple things and a use a private tracker you trust then your ISP/Govt can’t point fingers at you, they’ve no way of knowing what you’re downloading.

                • MigratingtoLemmy@lemmy.world
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                  9 months ago

                  Are you saying that you haven’t heard of media company affiliates prowling in such groups from invites given to them?

              • TCB13@lemmy.world
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                9 months ago

                https://iknowwhatyoudownload.com/en/peer/ – Plug your IP into that. Private tracker torrents are still visible to the public.

                What you’re saying isn’t correct, at least for properly configured private trackers and clients.

                I did try that website and that’s the thing, the only torrents that show up are public ones. Torrents from private trackers like iptorrents are not showing on that list as expected. They don’t show, because they can’t access them, just read their about page and you’ll understand why:

                Our system collects torrent files in two ways: parsing torrent sites and listening DHT network

                Any private tracker worth your time has DHT/PEX disabled for their torrents because if they didn’t then the torrents were essentially public.

                • thantik@lemmy.world
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                  9 months ago

                  What you’re saying isn’t correct, at least for properly configured private trackers and clients.

                  That’s exactly what I said it’s for “to check and make sure your configuration is correct”. (here: https://old.lemmy.world/comment/7654711) I used it in the past and found out my split tunnel was leaking info on the DHT. It can help others make sure they aren’t leaking data too.

              • BaroqueInMind@kbin.social
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                9 months ago

                That is a shady sketchy as fuck Russian site. Please, if anyone is reading this, DO NOT access it or put your fucking IP in there.

                • thantik@lemmy.world
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                  9 months ago

                  You’re a fucking moron my man. It’s a site for checking if your IP can be seen by the public for torrenting. If you don’t torrent, or if you’re properly setup through your VPN, nothing shows up. If you are leaking torrenting data to the public, this guy catalogs it and if it sees any of that public data it’ll show you what you’ve been torrenting – this same data is available to hollywood and they use it to issue C&Ds, warnings through your ISP, etc.

        • linearchaos@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          Your ISP is logging you. And everybody’s just sitting around waiting for the day that the feds decide to do something about piracy beyond icing a few domains there’s a difference between them knowing what you’re doing, and then being the handle the hand over exactly what you’re doing.

          • TCB13@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            If “feds decide to do something about piracy” I’m sure as shit your cheapo VPN isn’t going to protect you against them. People bought into all the marketing from VPN providers, that’s what’s really going on.

    • Chozo@kbin.social
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      9 months ago

      Besides solid access to content piracy is also about a message, a statement about sovereignty, rights and freedoms and paying for it means the complete subversion of the ideal.

      Bruh, it’s just stealing movies. You’re not taking down The Man with your sick seed ratios. This line of thinking is how people become radicalized lmao

      • TCB13@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        But man, paying for pirated content? Even if you ignore everything else, it’s over the line.

        • MigratingtoLemmy@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          You’re not paying for the content, you’re paying for the server upkeep. I assume you don’t donate to people who rip your favourite albums/films either or to people who seed a lot.

          You could just physical if you wanted to not pay a few dollars to piracy services, but those will be more expensive

          • TCB13@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            You’re not paying for the content, you’re paying for the server upkeep.

            This is a very, very questionable statement, we all know that people do profit from selling access to piracy.

    • cerulean_blue@lemmy.ml
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      9 months ago

      Don’t know why everyone is shitting on you. You raise a good point. When did piracy become something you pay for?

        • cerulean_blue@lemmy.ml
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          9 months ago

          Lol, No and No.

          Why would you pay for a ‘beefier’ internet connection AND pay for Usenet and then pay even more for a NAS.
          I pay for Usenet so precisely so I don’t need those things.