Running a powerhouse BitTorrent tracker such as ThePirateBay is not a cheap affair. The enormous bandwidth consumption, server equipment, hosting costs, wages and time all equate to thousands of dollars per month. The price is mitigated by Google's ad sense, donations and other advertising; however the bottom line remains that adequate funding is imperative to ensure seamless daily operations.

As reported yesterday by Slyck, TPB recently upgraded their server farm at a cost of over $12,000. To help counter the cost of this investment as well as many of their other financial concerns, TPB initiated an eBay fund raising auction. The auction was more jovial in nature rather than practical, as its intention was to raise capital rather than sell or offer a tangible product.

"Since we have a lot of bandwidth usage and low salaries for working on our site, we've decided to go prostitutes on you and sell ourselves for money.

"Anyhow, if you win this auction you will receive the "honor" of paying your own fare to Stockholm, Sweden, and pay for all your own expenses (i.e. hotel, food, warez, whatever you're into). You will also get to buy a lot of beer, not for yourself but for us. We need it and we deserve it. So, for one whole evening you will be our sugar daddy (or sugar mama, preferably)."

Offering a unique insight into the P2P psyche, it’s evident that ensuring the longevity of TPB is more important to the file-sharing community than raising money for Patti Santangelo, as the effort raised over $15,000 in less than 14 hours. However, eBay was not appreciative of the auction’s language, as it removed the effort and delivered a take down notice to TPB.

“We appreciate that you chose eBay to list the following auction-style listing(s): 6031070369 - EXCLUSIVE: Burn money on swedish piracy morons, aka TPB

“However, your auction-style listing(s) violates eBay's Service Policy and has been removed. In accordance with our User Agreement, items prohibited by law or by eBay policy are not allowed on eBay. We have credited all associated fees to your account and notified eBay users associated with the transaction that it has been cancelled.”

Specific mentionings such as “we've decided to go prostitutes on you and sell ourselves for money,” in addition to other questionable references, likely spurred eBay’s execution of their service policy.

Not deterred by this setback, TPB is working on reestablishing their eBay fundraising campaign. A representative of TPB informed Slyck.com they will instead actually sell a product – a t-shirt to be specific – available by pickup in Sweden only. In addition to having to fly to Sweden to pick up the t-shirt and pay all associated costs, TPB crew will also throw in a local party – which the winner also has to pay for. A clever loophole indeed.

Update

This story is filed in these Slyck News categories
BitTorrent :: Trackers/Indexers

Update: Click here to see the new auction.

You can discuss this article here - 45 replies