YggTorrent, the famous French torrent site, has just gone private. You are probably wondering why. I’ll explain it to you right away!
Imagine that our dear Ygg, as it is affectionately called in the industry (no), has been under increasing pressure lately. Between court-ordered domain name blockages and incessant takedown requests from rights holders, the site team hasn’t had a minute to itself!
This site is not a simple torrent index like any other. It’s a real community with its own dedicated tracker and all the rest. A concept that has become as rare as a working Commodore 64!
Of course, with millions of visitors each month, Ygg could not go unnoticed for long. Hollywood and the majors quickly put it in their sights, ranking it among the most “notorious” piracy sites. Nice as an honorary title, isn’t it?
In short, faced with this growing pressure, the admins have decided to take a radical measure: switch the site to private mode. Exit the public homepage; now you need an account to access the Holy Grail! The idea behind this change is to escape the constant surveillance of rights holders and authorities while implementing a more reactive removal policy for flagged content. A way to keep a low profile, even if it seems a little ridiculous given the size of the site.
That said, Ygg does not intend to give in to all abusive demands. False copyright claims, which are very common, will continue to be ignored and only legitimate requests will be processed. Behind this decision is also the realization of the ineffectiveness of blocks in combating piracy. For the team, preventing access to a website is not going to encourage people to pay for content they can’t afford.
It’s sad to say, but for many, the choice is simple: download or not consume entertainment/culture at all because access to all this has a price, and not everyone can afford it.
For the moment, only the 6 million registered users on the site can still access it, and registrations should reopen soon by co-optation. In the meantime, YggTorrent hopes that this private move will give it some respite. An eternal game of cat and mouse in which no winner can be designated unless there is a profound change in the rules…
