Torrent users freak out over shift from Xvid to x264, threaten to pirate elsewhere

Even pirates need rules, and a number of groups responsible for releasing pirated TV shows have joined together to set some new quality standards— but some of their “customers” aren’t too happy with the change. The groups recently released a document called “The SD x264 TV Releasing Standards 2012 ,” which went into practice on February 22nd, and saw them move from the Xvid standard to x264, an open-source encoder for H.264 that’s often used for HD releases.

And while some users are happy with the increased video quality, a vocal minority is also quite upset because the new format isn’t compatible with many DVD players and other devices. “I’ll be moving on to better sites,” one user wrote in an EZTV thread for the Starz series Spartacus. “YOU CAN TRY RAMMING IT DOWN SOMEONE ELSES THROAT.” The blame is largely being placed on the sites as opposed to those actually releasing the shows, but users are threatening to leave regardless. For their part, the 13 groups behind the agreement don’t appear to be going back on the shift towards x264, despite the threats from their non-paying users.