What motivates people to upload?

[Sushi]

Since the advent of Napster I've been an avid user of all manner of filesharing methods and now use newsgroups regularly.

The thing that has always perplexed me is what is it that motivates people to upload the content in the first place. Even with Napster I was amazed how comprehensive it became as I was certain there would be a small hardcore of people uploading what they could and then everyone would end up with copies of the same thing, but I was very wrong.

Torrents with all of their seeding / leeching principles were a nice idea to force people to "put something back" but, ultimately, people (even in here) tend to think "Why bother?" which is why newsgroups are so popular with those 'in the know'.

Why do you think people upload? Do you upload? If so what motivates you to do so? Is the kudos enough?

I'm just interested to know really.

[BertRoot]

I upload the occasional thing if I haven't seen it before for download via a particular method. I usually bang things on Rapidshare for others and just let folk I know get them or put them on here. Someone on here has a sig stating that real pirates don't steal, they share and to be honest these days I think that is a load of wank. I use newsgroups myself for download as it is a leachers paradise and plenty of others upload. Torrents are for the birds and it can be hard to maintain a decent ratio when your download is 16 times as fast as your upload.

Release groups upload things purely to beat the other groups and if that is what floats your boat all the better but at the end of the day it is those groups that feed the leachers like myself.

[lagigolo]

I think for a lot of people, uploading is the satisfaction of getting their work out there. Especially with movies, you know everybodies waiting to watch it and if you can get it out there first, they must get quite a buzz knowing that everybody is watching their work.
As for me, if i have something somebody wants or think they may want i put it on there. I have downloaded enough, so it only seems right to try and put something back.

[masterbates69]

Agree with above post. I have uploaded a few large files in the past, simply because if you're leeching you may as well at least TRY to give something back occasionally. I almost feel guilty at times by not giving anything back! Of course, it's rare I actually have anything to give back, but when I do...

[Freaky]

yeah i think a lot of people would LIKE to upload, but they just dont have anything that isnt there already coz they download them from the same place

[Sushi]

I think for a lot of people, uploading is the satisfaction of getting their work out there. Especially with movies, you know everybodies waiting to watch it and if you can get it out there first, they must get quite a buzz knowing that everybody is watching their work.

Yeah - that's another thing! It amazes me (probably, even more) that people actually do the physical "work" to get stuff out there so quickly. I mean, imagine puting yourself at risk of arrest smuggling a cam into a cinema and recording the film then getting it home and spending time working on it to upload it.....for what??!! Sponging bastards like me to download? Fuck that!

J.

[Fusen]

with torrents I make sure I have a 10:1 ratio before stopping seeding but that's just because I have access to a very fast upload and so I'm fortunate enough that I can let others download stuff.

give and take really, why do people do anything that isn't selfish?

[ffrr]

I used to upload heavily for about 3 years or so via irc/newsgroups and private/group ftp. All at 30k too! Recently though, for the last year or so I have stopped completely as I don't have the free time like I used to and have lost pretty much all contact with everyone I knew, apart from irc.

My main reason for upping stuff was as mentioned above to get stuff out before anyone else did-groups wise... but I got pissed off with group policies, and got booted out for not upping enough, lol!

I then went back to irc, solo, and did it purely for quality purposes. If you download / use newsgroups allot you'll know the difference between grabbing a proper group release and some piss poor school boy copy that was posted just for the fuck of it.

I'd love to upload on a regular basis, stuff that either no one has, or can get, and rare things mainly, but as I said I only have a 30k up speed which is absolute shite, it's quicker to send stuff via suface mail these days ;)

[CominAtcha]

What else are you gonna do with your upload bandwidth....?

[casio]

personnally i dont share things that are illegal (movies music) obviously but i do seed some torrents mainly linux (older distros for the older machines) but thats cos i feel they should be helped out, i dont seed them all the time but over night and when im not useing the pc then i dont see any problem with it

like cominatcha says above, what else are you going to do with your bandwidth??

[DJAd]

I upload in search of fortune & glory

[Over Carl]

Up to about a year ago, I would be into downloading the latest reggae tracks as soon as they were released. Would typically take about 3-4 weeks from release until I could find tunes, and that was only using the keep searching for 999 minutes option in kazaa lite.

When I would download tunes, I would keep them all in a non shared folder, but if I had been downloading any fresh music that I had real difficulty finding, I would leave them shared with my pc on solid for a week or so, to let others have a chance of getting the tunes of me.