#18. Azureus

Azureus is a great BitTorrent Client.  That does much more than download your favorite torrents.  In case you don’t know, BitTorrent is a p2p protocol which is widely used in the distrobution of software, movies, music, and pretty much anything else.

More information on the BitTorrent Protocol can be found on wikipedia:

BitTorrent is a peer-to-peer file sharing (P2P) communications protocol. BitTorrent is a method of distributing large amounts of data widely without the original distributor incurring the entire costs of hardware, hosting, and bandwidth resources. Instead, when data is distributed using the BitTorrent protocol, each recipient supplies pieces of the data to newer recipients, reducing the cost and burden on any given individual source, providing redundancy against system problems, and reducing dependence on the original distributor.

Azureus is more than just a BitTorrent client, however.  It provides a nice user-interface for downloading media and has numerous plugins to be the only application you need to download stuff.  It does not provide the actual torrent file, for those you will need to find a BitTorrent search engine.  Such as YouTorrent.com or you can google numerous other ones.  Just remember it cost money to develop movies, music, and software, and while the cost of distributing software is practically zero there is a cost in initial development that needs to be recouped from the developer so that they will continue to produce more software.  Just a way of saying, pay for things you can afford.

From the developer’s site:

Azureus implements the BitTorrent protocol using java language and comes bundled with many invaluable features for both beginners and advanced users:

* Multiple torrent downloads

* Upload and download speed limiting, both globally and per torrent

* Advanced seeding rules

* Adjustable disk cache

* Only uses one port for all the torrents

* UPnP sets the forward on your router

* Can use a proxy, for both tracker and peer communications

* Fast resume

* Can set a default download dir and move completed files

* Can import torrents automatically from a set dir

* Highly customizable interface

* IRC plugin included for quick help

* Embedded tracker, host your own torrents, automate your shares (periodic scanning of a dir)…

* Distributed Hash Table: host on it a completely decentralised torrent and/or benefit from it when the tracker is offline.

Download now.