Suprnova.org

Suprnova.org was a Slovenia-based website that distributed BitTorrent trackers for various music and video files, computer programs and games. Started in late 2002 by Andrej Preston (known as Slonček, Slovenian for "little elephant") and for a while considered the most popular BitTorrent search engine, Suprnova.org closed in late 2004 after legal threats. The site operators supported the development of the eXeem BitTorrent client software, deeming a fixed website too difficult to operate in the present legal climate. On 2 August 2007, the domain name was donated to The Pirate Bay, which relaunched the site on 21 August 2007. The site first ran from Slonček's (site founder) home. As it grew fast it moved to professional servers. Suprnova did not host any of the shared files, nor did it operate any BitTorrent trackers for long. It offered the ".torrent" meta files which would tell a BitTorrent client where it could find the BitTorrent tracker. As well as the torrent files themselves, there was a set of Internet forums for visitors, where people talked about various subjects, and requested different files that they'd like to see people upload. Suprnova's popularity inspired copycat sites at Suprnova.com and Suprnova.net. These had the same layout as Suprnova.org but requested a usage fee while Suprnova.org did not. For a brief time in 2004, and again in 2007 Suprnova partnered with an amateur internet-base radio station, Suprnova Radio. On 19 December 2004, a message was displayed on Suprnova's front page stating it had officially closed down. Some speculated it was due to its poor server and constant downtime, but others noted that Suprnova had been receiving legal warnings. Later, Slonček revealed on Suprnova's IRC channel that he and the other administrators were not willing to continue fighting the legal warnings which they had received. The Suprnova page reappeared encouraging visitors to visit the eXeem project webpage. Other reasons for closure were posted by LivingWithTrolls at slyck.