TorrentSpy Ordered By Judge to Become MPAA Spy


Recommended Posts

Here in the U.S. if you see a torrent that has the name of Gone.In.60.Seconds.torrent and you think because of the name that it is in fact the movie and you download it, you can be busted for it even though it wasn't the movie. A friend of mine was busted over the very same thing. The judge ruled that he thought he was getting the legit movie so that makes him guilty.

That's why there's such a thing as 'attempted murder'. That's also why you can go to jail for trying to rob a convenience store with a fake gun. It doesn't matter what you actually do, it's what you're trying to do that counts.

I "sample" 3 or 4 songs and if I like it enough to think the rest of the album is just as good, I buy the CD and remove the downloads. If I don't like it, I don't buy the CD, and I remove the downloads.

May I humbly suggest that you are in the tiniest of minorities in that regard. People don't download 30-40GB of torrents just to sample material they will end up buying. Most online music stores allow you to sample music at low bit rates, or portions at high bit rate, absolutely free of charge. You don't need to download a full high bit rate song to sample it.

As Occam's Razor says, "All things being equal, the simplest solution tends to be the best one." In other words it seems quite likely and most logical that people who use torrent sites are by and large copying copious amounts of material they do not have a right to get for free, precisely so they don't have to ever pay for it.

I don't know about you, but how I was raised, I was never taught to believe I have the right to get something for nothing. Obviously an entirely new generation of thieves believe otherwise...

I don't know about you, but how I was raised, I was never taught to believe I have the right to get something for nothing. Obviously an entirely new generation of thieves believe otherwise...

I was also raised in the same manner. But I'm also not one who's happy to be stolen from, and the prices demanded for new albums or even old ones tbh are a total joke. It doesn't even make any sense. They charge huge amounts for what is essentially an extremely cheap piece of material, the CD. And when they start trying the guilt trip about the artists? Coming from publishers is unbelievable, being that if I recall correctly the majority of bands signed by these large publishers (upwards of 90%) are failed horribly and left to rot by these publishers. In what other industry would a company be allowed to get away with a 90% failure rate? The only thing they are looking out for is their wealth. As far as they are concerned, it's a case of 'screw the artists, screw the customer, so long as we can fleece people for as much as possible we will'. And they do. It's a massive insult.

If some supermarket started charging ?100 for a bunch of bananas and then told you it was stealing if you grew your own or bought some from some black market style thing, you wouldn't just accept it. The only reason people accept it in the case of music CDs is because it's been slowly drip fed into culture that these prices are 'normal' for music.

The real thieves are the huge corporate publishers.

That's why there's such a thing as 'attempted murder'. That's also why you can go to jail for trying to rob a convenience store with a fake gun. It doesn't matter what you actually do, it's what you're trying to do that counts.

May I humbly suggest that you are in the tiniest of minorities in that regard. People don't download 30-40GB of torrents just to sample material they will end up buying. Most online music stores allow you to sample music at low bit rates, or portions at high bit rate, absolutely free of charge. You don't need to download a full high bit rate song to sample it.

As Occam's Razor says, "All things being equal, the simplest solution tends to be the best one." In other words it seems quite likely and most logical that people who use torrent sites are by and large copying copious amounts of material they do not have a right to get for free, precisely so they don't have to ever pay for it.

I don't know about you, but how I was raised, I was never taught to believe I have the right to get something for nothing. Obviously an entirely new generation of thieves believe otherwise...

Yes there is something called attempted murder.. When you open that pandora's box you also have a judge and a jury. You have to prove something is or isn't and beyond a reasonable doubt.

Then there is that little thing called intent.

Pretty easy to figure out intent when somebody tries to rob a convenience store right.

Why is that?

ca

Eye witnesses, Video tapes, cams etc.

I'm sure you know the steps after that....

The difference is gone in 60 seconds could be the Major Motion Picture with Mr. Cage... or it could be me blowing the doors off a random car, me smoking a blunt as fast as i can to see how gone i can get in 60 seconds.

Yes all those things could be what somebody is downloading.... But i guess the only people who know what they are intending to do or not to do would be the said person. Why because NOBODY actually witnessess this alleged crime.

It's a bunch of 1 and 0's that say somebody tried to do something. Doesn't say who or what exactly, and it's not a bulletproof case either.

Then there is that little thing called intent.

Pretty easy to figure out intent when somebody tries to rob a convenience store right.

Why is that?

ca

Eye witnesses, Video tapes, cams etc.

I'm sure you know the steps after that....

The difference is gone in 60 seconds could be the Major Motion Picture with Mr. Cage... or it could be me blowing the doors off a random car, me smoking a blunt as fast as i can to see how gone i can get in 60 seconds.

Seems pretty straight forward to me. Your friend was trying to download a file called 'Gone.in.60.seconds' from a torrent link, and unless he is the habit of randomly downloading files he has no idea of the contents of, it's pretty clear he was trying to download and hence obtain a movie without paying for it. Do we really need a judge and jury for something so obvious?

I was also raised in the same manner. But I'm also not one who's happy to be stolen from, and the prices demanded for new albums or even old ones tbh are a total joke.

Simple solution - don't buy them. Music, movies and games are not necessities, they are luxuries. The major record companies are not 'stealing' anything from you, you are willingly getting into a purchasing arrangement with them. If you really want to make an impact and still retain your morals, then don't buy and don't listen to these 'overpriced' albums. Downloading them and hence getting them for free makes you the thief and them the victims.

Two wrongs don't make a right. None of this is rocket science, none of it really requires the law to get involved. If you're getting entertainment without giving any compensation to the people who create and provide that entertainment, you are stealing. You're not doing it to keep yourself from starving, or to feed small children in Africa. You're doing it because it's easy and it's free, and all the nonsense arguments in the world don't make it right.

Simple solution - don't buy them. Music, movies and games are not necessities, they are luxuries. The major record companies are not 'stealing' anything from you, you are willingly getting into a purchasing arrangement with them. If you really want to make an impact and still retain your morals, then don't buy and don't listen to these 'overpriced' albums. Downloading them and hence getting them for free makes you the thief and them the victims.

Two wrongs don't make a right. None of this is rocket science, none of it really requires the law to get involved. If you're getting entertainment without giving any compensation to the people who create and provide that entertainment, you are stealing. You're not doing it to keep yourself from starving, or to feed small children in Africa. You're doing it because it's easy and it's free, and all the nonsense arguments in the world don't make it right.

Sorry but that doesnt seem like a very straight forward argument. IF you simply dont like the way a company is doing business or its practices, you dont just stop buying what is being sold just because they are the ones doing it wrong. You find other alternatives, in this case the other alternative is or could be if the artists themselves sold their own music or to buy it from itunes where the music is kind of priced fair. THe only problem with this scenario is that the company (MPAA and RIAA) are the only ones in business that do this kind of work. Entertainment is a necessity, i don't know about you, but listening to music is very necessary to me, and watching the ocassional movie. You can't go your days without listening to music or wanting to watch a brand new movie. This is how it works, they have what you want, and they will overprice it because you know you want it, is pretty dumb to say, well i will not buy it because they are overpricing it. Speak out about it somehow, so that they know that this shiet that they call music and want to charge an arm and a leg for is not worth it. Some movies are worth it, as well as some songs.

Thats just the way i see it. the MPAA and RIAA are in fact crooks, crooks that are way out of most of our league, because of the fact that they have so much money they have been piling up in the last years. Us as a single person can't do anything about it, but hopefully sites like TorrentSpy and other torrent sites, will make these greedy ****ers know that some of the **** they want to sell it just plain sucks and is not worth $20 or whatever currency you pay for it.

if I recall correctly the majority of bands signed by these large publishers (upwards of 90%) are failed horribly and left to rot by these publishers.

Of course, that's why the record industry pays comparatively little to artists... the record labels have to finance a huge number of artists that fail and get nowhere in order to find the decent acts. It's great that they do, otherwise musicians like myself wouldn't have much of a chance.

the MPAA and RIAA are in fact crooks, crooks that are way out of most of our league, because of the fact that they have so much money they have been piling up in the last years.

The damages they seek from individuals are excessive but they have the right legally to do so because the people they sue (with few exceptions) have infringed upon copyrighted works - the biggest issue is that courts won't stand up to them and demand the amounts they seek are reasonable and fair. I disagree with their business model but calling the MPAA/RIAA crooks is just an excuse to pirate content. I don't claim to be squeaky clean but I accept that downloading music I don't own is illegal. I hate whingers. Pirate music but don't try to excuse yourself for it. At the end of the day you have no entitlement to music and if you can't afford it (whether due to excessive pricing or not) you shouldn't have it.

Of course, that's why the record industry pays comparatively little to artists... the record labels have to finance a huge number of artists that fail and get nowhere in order to find the decent acts. It's great that they do, otherwise musicians like myself wouldn't have much of a chance.

The damages they seek from individuals are excessive but they have the right legally to do so because the people they sue (with few exceptions) have infringed upon copyrighted works - the biggest issue is that courts won't stand up to them and demand the amounts they seek are reasonable and fair. I disagree with their business model but calling the MPAA/RIAA crooks is just an excuse to pirate content. I don't claim to be squeaky clean but I accept that downloading music I don't own is illegal. I hate whingers. Pirate music but don't try to excuse yourself for it. At the end of the day you have no entitlement to music and if you can't afford it (whether due to excessive pricing or not) you shouldn't have it.

YOu are definitely right about the part that if i cant afford it then i cant have it, and also the part about calling them crooks. But the only reasoning behind me calling them crooks is because by them overpricing the content and them not wanting other alternatives to people acquiring the music, makes them crooks. They want to be the only fish in town, they want to be Number 1 and case closed. Itunes is doing very well in selling music, but what exactly do they want to do, overprice it even at that level, so they can enrich themselves filthy even more. Now that, in my opinion deserves them to be called crooks. They already make enough money when albums sell around a million or more copies, which till this day are plenty of good albums done by good artists. I myself download music, and if i like it then i buy it, because sometimes is nice to have an album before other people, and once is available then i purchase it. By being a consumer and knowing how much i have to spend to watch a movie, or listen to a song or an album, is not fair. But like i said you are definitely right about the part that if i can't afford it then i can't have it...

Even if TorrentSpy lose the appeal, they won't comply or they'll get branded with the same bend-over-part-the-cheeks label applied to Yahoo for giving private information to the Chinese government under "threat" of restriction of commercial opportunities. I would hope they have sufficient personal integrity to never agree to what amounts to a fishing exercise, move their servers to anywhere but the US and tell the judge / MPAA to get stuffed.

If sueing dead people, those without internet access and those who have downloaded legally isn't crooked (look up extortion) I don't know what is. It's just a shame sheeple believe the propaganda and continue to spout the corporate line which is in place to screw everybody apart from themselves and to lobby to have sentencing greater than that for killing someone for copying a file.

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • Weekend PC Game Deals: Steam Summer Sale 2026 Edition by Pulasthi Ariyasinghe Weekend PC Game Deals is where the hottest gaming deals from all over the internet are gathered into one place every week for your consumption. So kick back, relax, and hold on to your wallets. The Epic Games Store's freebie offer brought two more games to keep this week too. What you can grab this time are copies of RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 Complete Edition and Voidwrought. Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 is an enhanced version of the classic title that comes with enhancements like widescreen and 1080p resolution support. Its two expansion packs are included here too. Meanwhile, Voidwrought is a 2D action-platformer with tight platforming and high-speed combat against cosmic horrors. The double giveaway is slated to last until July 2. On the same day, I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream and River City Girls 2 will take the same freebie spot. The Humble Store introduced a couple of new game bundles earlier this week. The Going Rogue collection begins with Rogue Legacy, UnderMine, and None Shall Intrude in the starting tier for $5. If you pay the $10 it's asking to complete the bundle, you also get copies of Brutal Orchestra, Moros Protocol, Nightmare Reaper, Home Behind 2, and Lynked: Banner of the Spark. If it's fighting games you're looking for, the new Arc System Works Evo bundle is carrying plenty. The three tiers of this bundle that go up to $20 carry games like Melty Blood Actress Again Current Code, GUILTY GEAR Xrd REV 2, KILL la KILL - IF, Blazblue Cross Tag Battle, Guilty Gear -STRIVE-, Blazblue CentralFiction, and more. Big Deals One of the biggest sale events of the year, the Steam Summer Sale, has just kicked off, and that means almost every PC game available is now featuring discounts. We have plenty of games for you to look over in our special hand-picked big deals list for the weekend below: Baldur's Gate 3 – $44.99 on Steam Anno 117: Pax Romana – $41.99 on Steam S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl – $41.99 on Steam Indiana Jones and the Great Circle – $41.99 on Steam NINJA GAIDEN 4 – $41.99 on Steam Dying Light: The Beast – $39.59 on Steam Ghost of Tsushima DIRECTOR'S CUT – $35.99 on Steam Battlefield 6 – $34.99 on Steam Cities: Skylines II – $34.99 on Steam The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered – $34.99 on Steam The Outer Worlds 2 – $34.99 on Steam Borderlands 4 – $34.99 on Steam Sid Meier's Civilization VII – $34.99 on Steam Mafia: The Old Country – $34.99 on Steam Split Fiction – $32.49 on Steam Assassin’s Creed Shadows – $31.49 on Steam HELLDIVERS 2 – $29.99 on Steam Diablo IV – $29.99 on Steam ARC Raiders – $29.99 on Steam Forza Horizon 5 – $29.99 on Steam Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice - GOTY Edition – $29.99 on Steam No Rest for the Wicked – $27.99 on Steam Metaphor: ReFantazio – $27.99 on Steam Ready or Not – $24.99 on Steam Kingdom Come: Deliverance II – $23.99 on Steam No Man's Sky – $23.99 on Steam Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered – $23.99 on Steam DOOM: The Dark Ages – $23.09 on Steam Mewgenics – $22.49 on Steam Persona 3 Reload – $20.99 on Steam Hades II – $20.99 on Steam Two Point Museum – $20.09 on Steam Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord – $19.99 on Steam God of War – $19.99 on Steam Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader – $19.99 on Steam Returnal – $19.79 on Steam Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 – $17.99 on Steam Cyberpunk 2077 – $17.99 on Steam Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora – $17.99 on Steam Star Wars Outlaws – $17.49 on Steam REPLACED – $15.99 on Steam Days Gone – $15.99 on Steam Age of Mythology: Retold – $14.99 on Steam Crusader Kings III – $14.99 on Steam Red Dead Redemption 2 – $14.99 on Steam Half-Life: Alyx – $14.99 on Steam Grand Theft Auto V Enhanced – $14.99 on Steam EA SPORTS FC 26 – $13.99 on Steam The Crew Motorfest – $13.99 on Steam Sea of Thieves: 2026 Edition – $13.99 on Steam Age of Empires IV: Anniversary Edition – $13.99 on Steam Dead Cells – $12.49 on Steam Schedule I – $11.99 on Steam BioShock: The Collection – $11.99 on Steam Fable Anniversary – $11.54 on Steam Hearts of Iron IV – $9.99 on Steam Kerbal Space Program – $9.99 on Steam Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Wildlands – $9.99 on Steam The Riftbreaker – $8.99 on Steam Stardew Valley – $8.99 on Steam Total War: WARHAMMER III – $8.99 on Steam Sons Of The Forest – $8.99 on Steam Assassin's Creed Origins – $8.99 on Steam Risk of Rain 2 – $8.24 on Steam Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 – $7.49 on Steam Call of Duty: Modern Warfare® II – $6.99 on Steam CONTROL Ultimate Edition – $5.99 on Steam Dead Space – $5.99 on Steam The Quarry – $5.99 on Steam RV There Yet? – $5.59 on Steam Euro Truck Simulator 2 – $4.99 on Steam Terraria – $4.99 on Steam PEAK – $4.95 on Steam Detroit: Become Human – $3.99 on Steam Far Cry 3 – $3.99 on Steam A Plague Tale: Innocence – $3.99 on Steam The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – $3.99 on Steam Assetto Corsa Competizione – $3.99 on Steam PAYDAY 2 – $2.99 on Steam Wreckfest – $2.99 on Steam Rain World – $2.49 on Steam Watch_Dogs 2 – $2.49 on Steam Planet Zoo – $2.24 on Steam Bendy and the Dark Revival – $1.99 on Steam CARRION – $1.99 on Steam The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth – $1.49 on Steam Plague Inc: Evolved – $1.49 on Steam Don't Starve Together – $1.49 on Steam Metro 2033 Redux – $0.99 on Steam Hotline Miami – $0.99 on Steam RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 Complete Edition – $0 on Epic Store Voidwrought – $0 on Epic Store DRM-free Specials The GOG store is in the middle of its own summer sale. Here are some highlights from the DRM-free store: Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 - $39.99 on GOG Hollow Knight: Silksong - $14.99 on GOG Resident Evil Bundle - $12.49 on GOG Tomb Raider I-III Remastered Starring Lara Croft - $11.99 on GOG Alpha Protocol - $9.99 on GOG Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines™ - $9.99 on GOG Fallout: New Vegas Ultimate Edition - $9.99 on GOG Disco Elysium - The Final Cut - $9.99 on GOG Dino Crisis Bundle - $8.49 on GOG Cold Fear - $8.25 on GOG Star Trek: Armada II - $7.49 on GOG Star Trek: Starfleet Command III - $7.49 on GOG Warhammer: Dark Omen - $7.49 on GOG Hollow Knight - $7.49 on GOG Mortal Kombat Trilogy - $6.49 on GOG Soldier of Fortune: Platinum Edition - $6.49 on GOG Heroes of Might and Magic 3: Complete - $4.99 on GOG SWAT 4: Gold Edition - $4.99 on GOG RollerCoaster Tycoon 2: Triple Thrill Pack - $4.99 on GOG Stranglehold - $4.99 on GOG ANSTOSS 3: Der Fußballmanager - $4.79 on GOG Firewatch - $3.99 on GOG Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom - $2.99 on GOG Myst Masterpiece Edition - $2.99 on GOG Settlers 3: Ultimate Collection - $2.49 on GOG World in Conflict: Complete Edition - $2.49 on GOG Keep in mind that availability and pricing for some deals could vary depending on the region. That's it for our pick of this weekend's PC game deals, and hopefully, some of you have enough self-restraint not to keep adding to your ever-growing backlogs. As always, there are an enormous number of other deals ready and waiting all over the interwebs, as well as on services you may already subscribe to if you comb through them, so keep your eyes open for those, and have a great weekend.
    • Yup, that's a doozy right there 😄
    • It's a bundle of tools created by a variety of people, so things can go wrong sometimes. It's a great addition to Windows, and I use a lot of the tools on a daily basis. Also, it's still a 0.**** release so quick updates are to be expected 😉
    • Oh, I did. And it's even worse than I was hoping! Besides a lot of techno-babble jargon (yes I understand 100% of it but it's still all just techno-babble) there's 2 key points that make me super-weary about even considering testing this out. -- By default, after installation, a relay is automatically set up, so you do not need to care about that. * Non-chatmail apps use email servers as a long-term message archive while chatmail clients use email servers for ephemeral instant message relay. * Supporting the full variety of classic email setups would require considerable development and maintenance efforts, and complicate making chatmail-based messaging more resilient, reliable and fast. -- Basically, the end-user device is the 'server' (relay) so there is NO ARCHIVING whatsoever because every message is necessarily ephemeral. Great for techno-paranoia (and for illicit activities preferring no tracks to cover) but terrible for everybody else. It's also ironically contradictory to engineering principles of redundancies besides the transport layers due to the explicit absence of any persistent storage. Instead of 'classic email address' retaining multi-GB messaging archives on its server, now every device must retain 100% of those storage demands. (Email messages were originally meant to be short correspondences, not the multi-MB attachments boondoggle that now exists with unlimited spam engines flooding every potential recipient.) Any device swap or reset (or loss) makes the entire message history go bye-bye forever... lest there's an off-device auto-archival "relay" mechanism that's really a separate server that holds onto all transported messages (an email server) that utilizes 'chatmail email address' identities (like an email server) and its own persistent storage archive (like an email server). But... this solution is hoping to exist alongside real-world email address identities (based on the email server relay pathway) but simply render messages in chat thread format in an ephemeral manner (with contents being encrypted, and messages auto-expiring) ... In the end, it's a chat app/experience for the Web3/P2P-at-all-costs zealots. (I have accts on all sorts of federated web3 services so I understand the technical and non-technical alike.) For any practical users, however, it's just another service to download/install, register, cross-share id cards/qr codes, but know that there's no history/archive whatsoever (by design) so no account/message recovery whatsoever... update the device, install a bummed update patch, or dare upgrade your device... all history, poof, gone. Ya gotta start everything over again like they're a brand new person.
    • You've tried DuckDuckGo and Brave Search, now get serious with SearXNG by Paul Hill Over the last decade, it has become quite trendy to dump Google Search in favor of privacy-preserving alternatives such as DuckDuckGo, Startpage, and Brave Search. These search engines have done a very good job at highlighting dodgy practices by Google, such as adjusting search results based on what it thinks you’ll like (filter bubble) and stalking you around the web to advertise to you. While these search engines are good starting points when compared to non-private services like Google, there are still quite a few issues with them. For example, both DuckDuckGo and Brave Search require running non-free JavaScript in your web browser, which is comparable to running proprietary software on your computer, meaning you can be sure about what it’s actually doing in the background. Another issue is that these search engines are hosted on the respective companies’ servers, and you are using a service that you don’t control. Finally, DuckDuckGo, while offering privacy features, relies heavily on Microsoft’s infrastructure for its results and, in the past, has permitted Microsoft tracking scripts. If you are looking for a more private search solution than DuckDuckGo, Brave Search, and Startpage, then I recommend taking a look at SearXNG. It is a privacy-respecting metasearch engine that can be used via different public instances, which is useful for mobile users, or you can install it on your computer or server and run it locally with maximum control. Unlike Google, Bing, or Brave Search, which crawl the web and have their own search indexes, SearXNG is a metasearch engine, meaning it taps other search engines, stripping your identifying data, such as IP address, user agent, and cookies, in the process. Your search query is sent to the other search engines you enable before aggregating the results. SearXNG has deployment flexibility. If you are a casual user or a mobile user and don’t want to run SearXNG locally, you can use a public instance that is hosted by someone else. The main problem with this is that you are putting trust in the maintainer of the instance regarding stuff like logs that they may keep; good hosts should have a privacy policy explaining their policies. If you are trying to use SearXNG, you can also install the software on your device and then head to 127.0.0.1:8080 in your browser and search from there. While you don’t have to worry about a third-party admin like the public instances, search engines could ultimately block your IP address if they frown on you pulling in their search results locally. If you want to run it locally, it’s a good idea to use proxies or VPNs to hide your actual IP. You don’t have to worry about this with a public instance, as search engines never see your IP address. The main privacy benefit of using SearXNG is that it isolates your identity from the underlying engines that it’s capable of searching, such as Google and Bing. These search engines will only see requests coming from a generic server, so they can’t profile you and create a bubble filter that influences what results you see. This also ensures that your search engine doesn’t turn into an echo chamber that prevents you from reading alternative points of view. As a free software project, you are allowed to inspect SearXNG to make sure there are no negative features bundled inside. This sets it apart from the privacy search engines mentioned earlier because you can’t check their source code. As a meta search engine, you are not restricted to getting results from one source. Due to the fact that it scrapes content from other websites, your SearXNG instance will periodically get blocked from different providers, so it’s good to select a range of sources as a backup. While enabling all of the services will give you great results, this can make searching slower. I am personally happy with slower searches for the best results, but you can always check which providers are slowing down your search from the search results page and disable them to speed things up. If you want decent results quickly, enable the main search providers such as Google, Brave, DuckDuckGo, Qwant, Bing, and Yahoo. This way, you get wide coverage without the latency. On the Engines tab in Preferences, do note that there are different tabs, such as General, Images, and Videos, with their own providers that can be toggled and are not covered by "Enable all" while on the General tab, so be sure to dig into each. Just a note, if you want to enable everything, press "Enable all" in one tab, then hit save at the bottom of the page, then do the next tab, and so on. If you press "Enable all", then do that in each tab, and then save, nothing will stick. When I had just some of the search engines enabled, I searched “define nefarious” and results came back with the definition of “define” - obviously that was a sucky result. However, when I had everything enabled, it found dictionary pages for the word “nefarious” and even had an inline definition on the sidebar, which is quite nice too - that was delivered by WolframAlpha for anyone wondering! Probably the worst thing about this meta search engine is that the engines you select are saved with a cookie, so you must enable them on every new device you use SearXNG on, including if you decide to go into incognito mode with your web browser. Honestly, I would say this is the most annoying aspect, and perhaps if your browser lets you choose a separate private browsing search engine, then it would be best to use DuckDuckGo for this portion of your browsing. Another weakness of SearXNG is the random blocking of it by search providers. When you are on the results page, expand the “Response time” box, and it will show things like “Suspended: too many requests” or “access denied”. This is why it is good to enable several providers so that there is always a fallback to get results from. I won’t pretend SearXNG will be for everyone, however, if you enable all of the providers and put up with the slower response time, the results can be really amazing. Even if you don’t want to use it as your daily driver, keeping a bookmark handy that links to it is a good idea if you ever feel like doing a deep dive into a niche topic where other search engines are just failing to bring up any good result, due to the amount of sources it looks on. If you’re interested in radical user control over the software you use, installing SearXNG locally can also be a good idea, but be prepared to be temporarily blocked from sites if you trigger bot sensors without a VPN. Personally, I’ve opted to use a public instance, rather than install it myself. If you want to use it via a public instance, head over to searx.space to find a provider. Let us know in the comments if you have used SearXNG or its predecessor, Searx. What do you think about the quality of the results?
  • Recent Achievements

    • Week One Done
      flexorcist earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      Woland13 earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      Woland13 earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Year In
      bernmeister earned a badge
      One Year In
    • Week One Done
      Scoobystu earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      502
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      226
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      158
    4. 4
      Steven P.
      75
    5. 5
      FloatingFatMan
      71
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!