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Music Torrent Site What.CD Has Been Shut Down (theverge.com) 86

Posted by BeauHD from the so-long-and-thanks-for-all-the-fish dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: What.cd, an invite-only music torrent website first launched in 2007, has been shut down after a raid by French authorities. The private tracker offered free (and often illegal) access to a massive, deeply thorough collection of music and was popular among audiophiles for its strict rules around quality and file formats. The site was created after the shutdown of another well-known torrent website, Oink, which operated between 2004 and 2007. Though its primary focus was music sharing, What.cd also permitted torrents of computer software, ebooks, and other content. Zataz Magazine is reporting 12 servers that powered What.cd's infrastructure were seized by French cybercrime authorities. What.cd hasn't been taken offline completely, but torrents are unavailable and the homepage now displays a message confirming its demise: "Due to some recent events, What.CD is shutting down. We are not likely to return any time soon in our current form. All site and user data has been destroyed. So long, and thanks for all the fish."
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Music Torrent Site What.CD Has Been Shut Down More

Music Torrent Site What.CD Has Been Shut Down

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  • I hope so (Score:5, Interesting)

    by networkBoy ( 774728 ) on Thursday November 17, 2016 @06:28PM (#53310575) Journal

    All site and user data has been destroyed.

    I hope this statement is true (particularly the userdata part).

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      hope all you want, but that statement ain't true - it couldn't possibly be, unless they had *days* worth of advance notice during which to take 'precautions'.

      they had twelve servers and were raided. not only was the user data there and most likely confiscated for evidence, but also tons of source files for seed servers, server logs, and other data that was used to enforce the site's "rules".

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Cramer ( 69040 )

      It. Never. Is.

      (how can they ensure data has been destroyed on a server they no longer posses? It's not likely those machine have encrypted filesystems requiring human input at boot.)

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by allo ( 1728082 )

        Not every raid is: People with big weapons come in and take your servers, while you piss yourself.

        Some are more like "Shut down your stuff, unplug it and box it for us, we need to have a closer look later.

    • Your comment is simply insightful, but your sig is friggin' awesome!!!

  • So my 15 free leech tokens were for nought. :(

  • Dear music industry.. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by wbr1 ( 2538558 ) on Thursday November 17, 2016 @07:04PM (#53310783)
    I have no problem paying for music. I buy CDs sometimes still, i subscribe to a streaming service for casual listening.

    However, I lost my physical music collection. Please, please give me a complete option. One where I can download FLAC or WAV copies of the albums I love. Quality is important to me, and I can hear compression artifacts, especially below 256k MP3.

    Give me the ability to choose earlier releases. Where I can get copies of albums before crappy remasters (I am looking at you Megadeth/Dave Mustaine), where I can get copies from before the loudness wars [wikipedia.org]

    Where I can get more obscure items, like old DJ mix sets that were excellent, but available nowhere. Now all you can find is the individual tracks without the Djs influence. Not the same.

    In other words, open your vault for a fair price and I will pay. Stop attempting to create artificial scarcity, and I will stop going to find my music elsewhere.

    What.cd, you will be missed. Hopefully someone will fill the gap. Even someone legitimate that will take my money.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      rutracker.org is your friend comrade.. If you are a foreign comrade, please use a translator to sign up. You are welcome.

    • They don't care what you want, the business model is to create demand for a standardized product

    • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      It's hard to take you seriously when your entire post is one extended hipster gripe. If audiophiles hadn't convinced the world that quality was expensive in the 80's, you could have avoided all of this crap. Instead, people stopped caring about good sound because of self indulgent wieners like Mr. 'I hear Compression Artifacts below 256k...' This is why Apple can sell shit wireless headphones and dump the jack. This is why crappy sample-heavy DJ's dominate the charts, and why everything sounds the same in p

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by wbr1 ( 2538558 )
        Yes, it is a hipster gripe to have good ears and want decent quality. I do not think that monster cables, or tubes, or vinyl are better, but I have demonstrably sensitive ears. In a quiet environment I can notice a difference at this level. So can others.. at 320k its largely gone, but I do still notice one thing in long sessions.. ear fatigue. It at least seems more significant with compressed sources.

        Oh, I do not own a unicycle, sweaters, wear a moustache or funny hats. I am decidedly not a hipster

    • No. Now go buy the White Album again.

      Sincerely, The Music Industry.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • If you're a registered user you can redownload the music as many times as you like, to as many devices as you want. Don't know about unregistered users.

        Also, you can pay without PayPal at least for some albums (AFAIK physical items still can only be paid for through PayPal).
        I look forward to the day when Bandcamp ditches PayPal (or makes it possible to pay for everything without going through them) as PayPal doesn't work more often than it does.

        I completely agree with you on the search functionality, though

      • Just because they have it, they have no obligation to sell it.

        They wouldn't, but one might argue that the entire intent of copyright is to get them to provide it.

        And then if they chose to publish in a country which has copyright, then they become obligated, whereas prior to publishing, they were not obligated. They accepted the deal and have benefited from government-granted privilege. It's too late for backsies.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      However, I lost my physical music collection. Please, please give me a complete option. One where I can download FLAC or WAV copies of the albums I love. Quality is important to me, and I can hear compression artifacts, especially below 256k MP3.

      There are music stores that sell FLAC files. HDTracks does it, as did Pono (they lost their access to the collection when Apple bought the company behind the licensing I believe).

      And Pono's catalog was basically mostly ripped CDs. It was pricier - while you pay $10

  • invite-only (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fustakrakich ( 1673220 ) on Thursday November 17, 2016 @07:07PM (#53310803) Journal

    Who invited the cop?

    • They admitted non-invites in if they could demonstrate a keen understanding of compression and formats by passing a test, apparently. I think you could take it on IRC even...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by allo ( 1728082 )

      Why would the cop need an invite? Don't you think it's obvious what what.cd is? And if they don't find evidence, they can still return the server. A raid does not mean you have full evidence. If you had, you would not need to raid, but jail the owner right away.

      • Don't you think it's obvious what what.cd is?

        No! Why the hell should it be obvious? The name would be a seriously bullshit pretext for knocking the doors down. If they had enough 'evidence' to conduct a raid, it's because a little birdie sang. And lack of evidence is no guarantee you'll get your server back. Maybe France is more civilized in that regard, I wouldn't know, but in most places you can forget about seeing your computer ever again, even after the charges are dismissed.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by allo ( 1728082 )

          > Why the hell should it be obvious?
          Ask many non-members, who knew it.

          • Suspicion is not knowledge. They may have heard of it from a member.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by allo ( 1728082 )

              Which is no problem, as an charge is not a conviction. Being in court does not mean being guilty. But if there are some signs you may be guilty, it may be a reason to have a look on your server. You will get it back, if no guilt can be proven. Which may be proven with stuff on the server or on other ways.

              • Which is no problem, as an charge is not a conviction. Being in court does not mean being guilty.

                Great! How do I get my time and money back? You ever been dragged through the system on bogus charges? You make it sound so upright and civilized. I can assure you it isn't.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by allo ( 1728082 )

                  I do not say, i think it's good that way (i did not say the opposite, too). I just say, a plausible suspicition may be enough to raid the server, even when they never saw what the site really hosted. If the server uses good encryption, it may be hard to prove anything. But the owner may not want to continue the project later, anyway.

                  • plausible suspicition

                    Sorry, sets off too many alarms. We need to protect ourselves from that kind of crap. We are dealing with psychopathic authority, and the only proper solution is just not palatable to most people.

  • See (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    This wouldn't be an issue if they tried to improve the actual filesharing protocols for better sharing/privacy/distributeness instead of wasting resources on their little castle plus thuosands of seedbox idling while trying to get some ratio.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      why aren't you working to improve the filesharing protocols instead of posting on /.

  • Legalize noncommercial infringement (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    This is why we should legalize noncommercial copyright infringement [freepubliclibrary.org].

  • serves them right! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Gravis Zero ( 934156 ) on Thursday November 17, 2016 @08:48PM (#53311309)

    I've kept telling "What.CD" that they needed to correct their colossal grammar error and move to "Which.CD" but they just laughed at me. WHO'S LAUGHING NOW, YOU JERKS?! ;)

  • The media industry is a parasite. Bankrupt them by downloading their horrible music, movies and video games.

    Soon you, too, will realize that modern life and its mass-culture products are empty of meaning.

    • But please, while sticking it to the huge megacorporation labels, remember to support the independent musicians and labels that actually learned something from the Napster era, and started distributing their music online with no DRM at fair prices.

      • I was first a software pirate, and then a tape-trader. In the process, I became an advocate for (some) great software programs and musical artists, and by being involved with radio, zines and fans, spread them farther than they would have been if I had not done so. The same was true with software; I served as an evangelist for a number of really well-designed products, even if my own copy was more often than not cracked or pirated.

        Underground metal music spread through tape-trading. We would dub songs or al

  • Thanks Martin (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    https://torrentfreak.com/martin-shkreli-begs-for-private-torrent-site-invitation-161031/

    Dickhole.

  • Just wait until stuff can be broadcast from privately owned, low-Earth orbit satellites. Good luck raiding my orbital, weapons-laden space platform!

  • Try Bandcamp (Score:4, Insightful)

    by biscuitlover ( 1306893 ) on Friday November 18, 2016 @04:56AM (#53312777)

    Anyone remotely serious about their music - and, equally, their willingness to pay for a decent service and support the artists they like - could do a lot worse than checking out Bandcamp [bandcamp.com].

    Pay only for what you want, download FLACs (plus many other formats) and stream everything you've ever bought via their app if you'd rather not download any files. They're also far more artist-friendly than the likes of Spotify; I've got a fair amount of music on Spotify and have never seen a cent from them whereas Bandcamp give you a significant percentage of any sales.

    Admittedly, Bandcamp doesn't have the breadth of music on there that some other options do - many artists need to do a better job of uploading their libraries, myself included - but right now it's by far the best option for both listeners and artists out there (though I'd absolutely be interested to hear of others). It's unquestionably a better alternative to any option that either gives zero support to the artist, provides a poor service to listeners, or both.

  • One of the reasons I loved what.cd was the active, well moderated forums. I haven't torrented music in a long time, maybe years, but I did enjoy great discussions about music, technology and politics. I went to what.cd for music, before good streaming options existed. I stayed because of the relationships I built with people there. It was a great community that will be missed.
  • Amazing how they complain and say "You're stealing from the artists". Bull. Not true. That just tells me they don't understand how the business works. The artists are long paid in advance, and paid a LOT. Aw, those poor millionaires. Would those artists be concerned about YOUR financial situation? These are people who wouldn't even shake your hand if you met them on the street...
  • In 2016, very few people buy music. Everybody has to realize that and move on. Many clever artists have already realized that, that's why they are giving away their music for free. Even established artists are giving away their own music for free either via YouTube or via their own websites. One great example from my country is Sakis Gouzonis [sakisgouzonis.com].

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