I did a search for the album R.O.O.T.S from the artist Flo Rida and the first Google result was a torrent to download it on thepiratebay.org. Things have come a long way when the option to download the album free shows up higher than places to buy it*. My particular search query was “roots florida“. Other search terms relating to the artist have different results.

With musicians in the family and friends in the music business, I am a big promoter of musicians getting paid. But things are changing and it’s up to the music business to figure out how to deal with what’s happening–not me. It doesn’t take a million dollars to make a hit record anymore. That and the fact that the web is the number one way to view media creates opportunities like never before to “make it” in the music business. It’s a matter of relearning what it means to make it and capturing new ways of creating revenue from your online presence. But that’s a different article entirely.

This article is about how to download big things on the Internet. I neither promote nor discourage downloading material that is copyright. Just know before you do that it’s illegal and you could owe a lot of money. It’s important you know how to download and open torrent files. If you distribute free content from your website, consider the option of creating a torrent to save money on bandwidth usage.

First you need a BitTorrent client to open the special torrent files. I recommend uTorrent which is the best and coincidentally the first BitTorrent client. Use that link to download it free now, then install and open. Set uTorrent as your default torrent program and choose the default settings to continue.

After you’ve installed the software, you just need something to download. Visit http://thepiratebay.org and do a search. If you can’t think of anything legal to download, search for mike posner and download his free mixtape. If you like his music, check out his video webisodes at JustinHantz.com

Mike Posner Torrent Search Results

Notice the green skull which means it’s from a trusted source. Click the down arrow or the torrent name “Clinton_Sparks_Presents…” to read the comments and download the file. Sometimes the comments will tell you that a track is missing or that there is a potential virus (for software) so they are important to read.

Click DOWNLOAD THIS TORRENT in green and the file downloads instantly. The torrent file itself is relatively small. It merely tells your torrent client (uTorrent) what to do.

Download Mike Posner Free Mixtape

Hopefully uTorrent is set as your default torrent client so when you click on the file you just downloaded, it should open in uTorrent and give you the following options.

uTorrent Popup

This screen is showing you all the files in the download including the mp3 files and album artwork. Click OK to continue. This is where the actual downloading begins. You are downloading bits and pieces of the files from a large collection of people, or seeders.

Seeds

Notice from your search results earlier that this album has 22 seeders (SE) which means 22 people are uploading that file. In most cases, the more seeders, the faster the download. LE means leechers which are how many people are downloading that album currently but not contributing to the upload. You actually upload parts of the album to other people while you are downloading it.

You can see the progress by clicking on Files in uTorrent. You will see something like this.

uTorrent File Bits

This shows which songs I’ve already finished downloading (for the impatient who have to play them immediately) and how much I have left.

Now that my torrent has finished downloading, I look in the folder where my downloads normally appear on my computer and there it is! A folder with all the mp3 files and album artwork that I approved for download earlier.

Using torrent files are very easy with those two steps. I hope this article creates some new excitement in your web-life.

Notes:

*In the first paragraph of this article in the expression “places to buy it,” I referred to websites as “places”. I decided to leave it because it’s interesting to me that I consider websites like Amazon, eBay, and even Facebook a place I can visit. In my opinion, successful online businesses accomplish this feeling and yours should too, most importantly if you’re selling something. You want your customers to feel like they just walked into your online store.

Did you know that you can sell t-shirts and other merchandise one at a time, no startup costs, at places like CafePress and Printfection? I have accounts with both of these sites but have never developed anything. I just wanted to learn how to use them so when I meet someone with a good idea, they’d be in business. Printfection has a $2 t-shirt promo so you can see how quality they are. If you felt like making one custom t-shirt for yourself for $2 it’s a great idea even if you didn’t plan on opening a store.