The real reason why you should NOT download torrents.
The real deal.
Well, this days, many, many people are downloading torrents. They are downloading them mainly to get things for free, things like games (such as GTA 4 or Oblivion), movies (like incepting and other new movies that are often still in theaters), and for music, or even full albums.
Now, everyone knows downloading torrents is illegal, but that's not why I am writing this article, because theres no point in just repeating what everyone else has said about torrents being illegal. So instead I will least other reasons why you really shouldn't download torrents.
-Brief History
Well, incase you're wondering why the government dons't just take down all torrent sites, then I can help you out on that question. The main reason is that torrents can be used for a real, legal, reason. For example, say you are developing an app for the mac, and you want people to test it out. Well then you could post it on a torrent website for people to download and try it out for you. Also, torrents are the best way to share large files, especially if you don't have a flash drive to put it on.
-Reason 1- P2P
If you have done any research on torrents you will find out that most are P2P, otherwise known as peer to peer. So what does this mean? Well, p2p refers to the way that you download it, and here is how p2p works with torrents.
Person one uploads the file. Now person two downloads it off of person 1's computer. If all person two did was download it, then he would be considered a LEACHER, but most people download it and SEED it. What this means is now that person two has downloaded it, it is sitting on the computer "seeding". So now person one and two have it, and they are both seeding it, and person three comes along. Person three will now download 50% of the torrent from person one, and yup, you guessed it, 50% of the torrent from person two. So the process will go on and on, this is why files with more seeds download faster, because you can all download small pieces from a bunch of different computers, as oppose to 500 people downloading the same file from one guys computer.
So how is this bad? Well here is how. For one, it is just creepy, thinking that you are accessing all these people's computers, and that when you seed it, you can have tons of people accessing yours. Also, in most torrent clients, you can see the IP address of EVERYONE who is downloading the torrents, so that means if you download EVERYONE can see your IP address, and that is not a good thing.
-Viruses.
Well this one is obvious, so I will be very brief.
YES!! Macs CAN get viruses. It's just that no one wants to write viruses for Macs because they are harder to write, and because like 90% of the world owns PC's.
Not EVERY torrent is a virus, but there are some that are, so be carful what you download.
-IP "catchers".
You know how earlier I said that anyone can see your IP address if you download a torrent. Well that includes the government. Believe it or not, there are people working for the government who actually get all the IP's of people who download torrents. They will then tell your internet provider that you have been caught downloading illegal stuff, and then you will get an email from AT@T, or whoever gives you your internet, saying you have been caught and there won't be another warning.
I do not in any way encourage you to download torrents, so don't come back crying when you get an email from you internet people :)
