BitTorrent

CannonBallGuy

BitTorrent is a peer-to-peer (P2P) file distribution tool written by programmer Bram Cohen and debuted at CodeCon 2002. The reference implementation is written in Python and is released under the BitTorrent Open Source License (a modified version of the Jabber Open Source License), as of version 4.0.

BitTorrent is, basically the same as Kazaa, Limewire, etc, but not exactly the same.
For one, there are no adverts or such, which I have noticed appearing in my LimeWire searches throughout the last year.
Secondly, it works differently. First you download a .torrent file and open this in your BitTorrent Client. Now the file(s) will download, from others who have downloaded - or are still downloading - it.

I find BitTorrent can take longer to download the same amount of data compared to LimeWire, for example, but I also find it's more secure and that you can tell more easily how likely it is that you'll download the whole file(s).
Often on LimeWire, I'll be half way through a download and find I need "more sources". With a torrent, you will see how "healthy" it is before you even download the .torrent file.

See the following pages for more information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitTorrent
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_BitTorrent_software
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_sharing_applications

Here is an article on the most popular BitTorrent Site(s):
http://torrentfreak.com/torrentspy-most-popular-bittorrent-site-2006/

Happy Downloading - Remember, don't download anything illegal!

DeluxeNames

Thanks! I needed to see this info to try to motivate me to try bit-torrent again CBG

I only tried Bit Torrent once and got half of the downloads and couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong.

I was a former Napster and Kazaa user before they became scarry to use.

danielneri

I've used BitTorrent a lot. Though I prefer Azureus, a Java BT client. Much faster in my opinion.

omoi

I try to avoid Bit Torrent because of the seed issue. The most infuriating thing to me was finding the perfect download with zero seeds. But Bit Torrent is very useful, though when it comes to popular downloads so I definitely wouldn't discourage others for using it on that.

I was also a Limewire user. That source message really ticked me off...