Several weeks ago we featured on this blog a brand new private torrent tracker called ‘The X’. It was the latest project by the crew behind SceneLife (now defunct) and needless to say, caught the attention of many in the BitTorrent community. The X was the first tracker to be based on the much hyped SCTBDEV codebase and even more importantly did something many other start up General/0Day trackers failed to do – it started off operations with more than 15000 active torrents – movies, music, games, TV shows and pretty much everything else. As we highlighted in our last article, getting into ‘The X’ was initially only possible after going through an IRC interview. Now, a few weeks into the launch, this has changed – the site has opened direct signups probably for the first and the last time and potential new members are now able to get in almost instantaneously.

Before we go into open signups, it would be interesting to see how ‘The X’ has done in the past couple of weeks since its launch. After starting off operations with 15600+ torrents, they’ve managed to keep the momentum going by adding several hundred new torrents a day. As of 14/5/2010, the active torrent count on X stands at 20600+, averaging at around 250 new daily torrents added during the last three weeks – impressive stuff indeed. The user count too has slowly but surely increased and stood at ~1900 just before open signups began. This is bound to increase further now with the flood gates open and this news being posted everywhere. Opening signups IMHO was the correct move by The X administration – no tracker can survive without leechers and direct signups are way more faster and usually generate more enthusiastic response from the BT community than IRC recruitment.

Speaking of the recent changes on X, a new section has now been introduced for ‘spam’ scene releases. This is a separate browse page which can be accessed from the main toolbar and makes it easier to discover and filter hundreds of new uploads that get added daily. Some of you will be glad to know that all releases in the Spam section (which include Applications, AudioBooks, E-Books, Mobile, Music & Music Videos) are FreeLeech. For a more detailed account of the type of content available on this tracker and other site features, please refer to our previous article located here.

In other news, The X has finally launched the ‘snatch policy’ we talked about in the previous article. The snatch policy is a system that promotes user activity and weeds out inactive users, for example tracker collectors. Here’s how it works:

Every month (every 30 days) you MUST download and fully seed at least 2 torrents above 100 MB. There is absolutely no excuse to not follow this policy. We are providing our members with the latest and absolute best releases, and we also have many FreeLeech torrents. If you cannot download at least two small torrents (100 MB and above) every month – you have absolutely nothing to do here.

However, the snatch policy requirements cease to exist when you progress further upwards the user classes scheme – that is, higher user classes are exempt from this rule. For more information on this, please refer to /rules.php and /faq.php pages.

Anyways as stated at the start of this post, The X is currently open for signup. According to a news post on site homepage, this could the the first and only time they will open registrations:

Open Signups:
Sign-ups are going to be open for the next 5 days. This is the first and probably the last time we are going to open our doors. Tell all your friends and those whom you trust the most!

If you are looking forward to becoming a member of this site, the signup link is posted below (in this case with permission from tracker staff).

Site Name: The X

Signup URL: http://scenexpress.net/opensignup.php

Note: IP ranges from Romania and Israel are banned from signing up. Only existing users from these countries are allowed to use the tracker.

Official Trailer: Embedded on this page

Related Articles:


40 Comments

  1. Unknown // 5/14/2010 07:20:00 AM  
    This comment has been removed by the author.
  2. Anonymous // 5/14/2010 08:19:00 AM  
    This comment has been removed by the author.
  3. Lightning_Struck_Tower // 5/14/2010 10:30:00 AM  

    1200+ new signups in ~10 hrs.

  4. Unknown // 5/14/2010 01:18:00 PM  

    Now, a few weeks into the launch, this has changed – the site has opened direct signups probably for the first and the last time and potential new members are now able to get in almost instantaneously.This site like ridiculous requirement.
    Goji

  5. zoomby // 5/14/2010 02:43:00 PM  

    created Acc ~ Read FAQ ~ utorrent 1.6.1 banned!!~ deleted my acc.

    C00l

  6. Anonymous // 5/14/2010 08:26:00 PM  

    I'm really impressed with what i've seen. Nice clean interface, good explanding materal and a rapidly buiding community. You cant fault it .

  7. Unknown // 5/15/2010 05:48:00 AM  

    they are getting desperate for new members because they must have realised that leaving their loyal ScL members out in the cold without an invite didnt go down too well and shot themselves in the foot, alienating their grass roots seeders and donors....
    i wonder how long the x will last?
    especialy with all these regs they are throwing in....

  8. Anonymous // 5/15/2010 11:07:00 AM  
    This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
  9. 1draq // 5/15/2010 03:22:00 PM  

    they want money?

  10. Michael // 5/15/2010 08:05:00 PM  

    anybody else getting this error? [1049] Unknown database 'sctbdev'

  11. Thevil // 5/15/2010 08:28:00 PM  

    @Michael - I'm getting that error too.

  12. Michael // 5/15/2010 08:34:00 PM  

    It seems the tracker is responding but can't visit the website :(

  13. Adriano Guerreiro // 5/15/2010 08:36:00 PM  

    'm getting the same error. It should be fixed in a couple of hours.

  14. Michael // 5/15/2010 09:27:00 PM  

    lets hope so i just joined up last night

  15. Michael // 5/16/2010 02:36:00 PM  

    Forbidden

    You don't have permission to access /browse.php on this server.

    anybody getting this error msg?

  16. bucky // 5/16/2010 04:32:00 PM  

    yep i'm getting the same You don't have permission to access - 403 errors

  17. bucky // 5/16/2010 04:33:00 PM  

    my user registration confirmation link doesnt appear to work..is the site down?

  18. Anonymous // 5/16/2010 06:53:00 PM  

    not sure whats up with site.
    getting this mesage
    http://j.imagehost.org/0056/scene.jpg

  19. Fernando // 5/16/2010 08:51:00 PM  

    Same problem here.

    Access forbidden (error 403):
    You don't have permission to access /opensignup.php on this server.

  20. Unknown // 5/17/2010 05:54:00 AM  

    Cant login, and when i try to retrieve password "That email address was not found in the database. ". What happened?

  21. Thevil // 5/17/2010 06:20:00 AM  

    I can't login either, don't be alarmed. It's probably just part of the maintenance they're doing. We'll just have to keep waiting patiently..

  22. Unknown // 5/17/2010 06:42:00 AM  

    Hope it is, now im getting invalid passkey

  23. Unknown // 5/17/2010 07:10:00 AM  

    I got invalid passkey too. And I get failed logins now (Login failed! Username or password incorrect). Seems like my account got deleted and I have no idea why.

  24. Anonymous // 5/17/2010 07:30:00 AM  

    I am getting invalid passkey error too, i think they had a database problem and all new accounts got deleted.
    :(

  25. Unknown // 5/17/2010 08:06:00 AM  

    I think your right, this is sad

  26. Unknown // 5/17/2010 10:21:00 AM  

    It looks ScL's issues followed them to the X. What a waste.

  27. Michael // 5/17/2010 10:34:00 AM  

    I go to reset my password and it says email address not found WTF 0_o

  28. Unknown // 5/17/2010 11:29:00 AM  

    To all you lost folk:
    "Due to some unforeseen reasons, our server had a mini meltdown of sorts and our database had gotten corrupted to the point that we could not recover it. As a result of this, we are forced to roll back and use a slightly older backup than we would have liked to use and ALL accounts that were opened since 4/29 are lost. There is slightly silverish lining to this story, it appears that pretty much most of the site code was untouched. We know this comes at an awkward time as we were in the middle of open signups and moving forward from the "Beta" process. However, this is a minor set back and we will continue to move forward, we do apologize for the inconvenience. As an extra note: any torrents that you have downloaded during this time are also lost"

    Biggest fail tracker ever.

  29. Thevil // 5/17/2010 12:05:00 PM  

    Thank-you for the information. What a huge disappointment.. "inconvenience" is an understatement.

  30. Anonymous // 5/17/2010 12:36:00 PM  

    At least their keeping people informed.

    Things happen, and a mini-melt-down can occur to anyone.

    I think the tracker rocked when it was there, and have no doubts it will come back stonger than ever

  31. Unknown // 5/17/2010 01:12:00 PM  

    So they have a meltdown and lose all the people that joined during their open signups and then close said signups without letting people join again. Screw this tracker.

  32. Anonymous // 5/17/2010 01:28:00 PM  

    They have not said anything regarding signups one way or the other.

    I lost my account as well, and donate some euro's to help the cause.

    We'll just have to sit and wait.

  33. Anonymous // 5/17/2010 01:31:00 PM  

    i take it hey dont have an irc server.

  34. ridicol // 5/17/2010 01:37:00 PM  

    Closed

  35. Mard_3_Momin // 5/17/2010 06:10:00 PM  

    Hay guys
    seems like the open signups are back up again
    I lost my 1st account, but manage to create another one...
    just visit the signup link given in this post and You will be able to signup again

  36. Alessio // 5/17/2010 06:10:00 PM  

    JUST REOPENED!!!!!

  37. Unknown // 5/17/2010 11:26:00 PM  

    Yep, sign ups are indeed open again.

  38. ridicol // 5/18/2010 01:40:00 AM  

    http://filenetworks.blogspot.com/2010/05/x-tracker-goes-down-resurfaces-opens.html

  39. microd20 // 5/21/2010 01:53:00 PM  

    THanks for the info. i signed up for the site and am liking it so far.

    almost as cool as http://www.seed-bytes.com

  40. Sponsor // 5/23/2010 08:55:00 PM  
    This comment has been removed by the author.