We’re not heroes. We’re not villains. We’re digital junkmen, picking through the abandoned warehouses of old software, salvaging what still works, and handing it to anyone who remembers – or never knew – that this stuff existed.
“Isn’t this still piracy?” Morally? Sometimes. Legally? It’s complicated. Copyright was designed to balance creator rights with public access. When a work is commercially dead – no legitimate way to buy it, no digital storefront, no re-release planned – then blocking access serves no one. Not the creator (they get $0 anyway). Not the publisher (they abandoned it). Not culture (which loses another piece of its memory). gogtorrent
GogTorrent is a community-driven torrent index with a single, stubborn rule: We focus exclusively on content that is already freely and legally distributable – abandoned software, open-source games, creative commons media, out-of-print books, and restored “lost” digital culture. We’re not heroes
We don’t pretend to be lawyers. We do respond instantly to any verified DMCA claim from a rights holder who still actively sells the work. If a game gets re-released on Steam or GOG, we remove our torrent within 48 hours. We’ve done this 14 times in two months. No drama. No “information wants to be free” grandstanding. Just compliance with a clear boundary: active market = no torrent. “Isn’t this still piracy
If you know GOG.com (formerly Good Old Games), you know their credo: DRM-free, offline installers, respect for the user. GogTorrent takes that philosophy and stretches it to its logical – some might say radical – conclusion. If a piece of software is no longer sold, no longer supported, and the original rights holder can’t be reached or simply doesn’t care, then preservation trumps permission.
Because central servers die. Because corporate archives get deleted after a “strategic review.” Because when a library burns in the digital age, it doesn’t make a sound – it just returns HTTP 404. BitTorrent distributes responsibility. It turns every downloader into a keeper. On GogTorrent, we ask users to seed for at least 72 hours or 1:1 ratio, not because we can enforce it, but because without seeding, there is no archive.
– The GogTorrent collective Preserve, don’t plunder. Our entire site code is open-source. Our torrent blacklist is public. And yes, we have a Matrix room. Come say hi before the lawyers do.