Apparently, you can now download music on the internet.

March 21, 2008 10:16 AM

Shareminer is a clownsuit engine that searches for files upped to Rapidshare, Megaupload, SendSpace, ZShare, and other similar one click hosts. A great tool for locating full, rare, and out of print albums.

Good for other, non-music files as well. The site is as bare bones as can be at the moment but was just relaunched in the last day or so.

posted by item (47 comments total)

Be careful: some of the search results will send you to P2P sites in Eastern Europe, some of which will try to install malware on your system.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 10:17 AM on March 21

hard. to. use.
posted by MeatLightning at 10:23 AM on March 21

I haven't run into such a problem, but I could see it happening. Like anything else on the internet, use common sense.
posted by item at 10:25 AM on March 21

Great post! Discovering that rapidshare wasn't just for porn was a great day for me! Incidentally, rapidshare more or less thrives on savvy underage porn downloaders. The more people you have downloading a file, the more points you have and at a certain points the points result in an actual membership where you can download as much as you like. Or something like that.

Folks under the age of 18 or 21 or whatever applies in your locale can't leave their computers downloading torrents all the time nor can they use credit cards to purchase membership to websites. I'm aware this line of reasoning has a lot of holes in it but it's provocative speculation for me.
posted by christhelongtimelurker at 10:25 AM on March 21

WTH is a "clownsuit engine"? Remarkably, a google search returns no results.

It can't be what I'm hoping.
posted by crickets at 10:26 AM on March 21 [3 favorites]

A clownsuit engine is going to go great with my new chat client, ChildMolestor3000.
posted by DU at 10:31 AM on March 21 [3 favorites]

A clownsuit engine is an engine that dresses up as a clown, entices little boys to sit on its lap, then does an advanced Google search within specific parameters. In this case, it searches for files on one click hosts that contain the keywords the clown and the little boy type into the search box.
posted by item at 10:33 AM on March 21

Oh brave new world, that hath such people clownsuit engines in it!
posted by mosk at 10:46 AM on March 21

(Oh, and I knew the future was going to be cool, but clownsuit engines?! Jesus Fucking Christ! No one even hinted that my future would contain clownsuit engines. This is a big step up from the harlequin jester engines we used back in the day.)
posted by mosk at 10:50 AM on March 21

Clownsuit Engine is good, but their second album was mixed badly.
posted by demiurge at 10:52 AM on March 21 [5 favorites]

I'm glad I wasn't the only person who went "Clownsuit engine?! Awesome!"
posted by brundlefly at 10:53 AM on March 21

I'm working on a Punch engine that will consider your search terms and then invariably hit you with a big stick.
posted by Wolfdog at 10:58 AM on March 21

But in all seriousness, it is going to be incredibly useful to have a search engine where the results keep on piling out of a tiny car.
posted by DU at 11:02 AM on March 21 [7 favorites]

Not to be confused with the clown car engine, which displays thousands of results in a single 2x10 text box.
posted by bondcliff at 11:03 AM on March 21

GAAAAAH! I hate you, DU.
posted by bondcliff at 11:04 AM on March 21

You can have that one--I went twice.
posted by DU at 11:05 AM on March 21

previously, albeit deleted.
posted by unmake at 11:14 AM on March 21

how you people can snark about clownsuit engines is beyond me - it's a significant step forward from hamster wheel engines
posted by pyramid termite at 11:39 AM on March 21 [1 favorite]

Great for finding rare and out of print albums?

I keep looking for the Dump—Skinny Motherfucker with the High Voice but can't seem to grab it (and I'm not sure I want to pay for a bunch of Yo La Tengo side-project covers of Prince tunes).
posted by klangklangston at 11:50 AM on March 21

So… if someone wanted to upload that....
posted by klangklangston at 11:51 AM on March 21

klangklangston, I was dating a Yo La Tengo fanatic when that record came out. I can't help you find it, but I can tell you it's not very good.
posted by item at 11:58 AM on March 21

I'll need some time to process the steps from "clownsuit engine" to "child molestation is hilarious", and then I'll come back and let you know about the post.

Or not.

Gah.
posted by batmonkey at 12:01 PM on March 21

batmonkey is outraged. Best to keep this sad news from our friend the clown.
posted by item at 12:04 PM on March 21

So they can come up with a CLOWNSUIT ENGINE, but they can't get the Terms and Conditions - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Copyright Information - FAQ - Contact Us to actually link to anything? Huh.
posted by Sys Rq at 12:42 PM on March 21

No, dear item, not outraged. Just grossed out and thinking about how nice it would be if I could go just one day - one singly, solitary day - without reading these words:

Child Molester (along with attempts at describing "hilarious" situations wherein adults are trying to take advantage of children sexually)
Rape (along with attempts at using sexual assault as an amusing story device)

...and, really, without overstressing it further, anything else that breaks the yolk of a good day because someone thinks that brutality is funny.

No, not outrage. Just fatigue. I'd like to read things which should not have anything to do with those sad, powerless crimes and get to the end without having had to think about said sad, powerless crimes.

It's a file sharing system. Why did it need to go from interesting to tense? Sucks.
posted by batmonkey at 1:09 PM on March 21 [3 favorites]

Hey, I like That Skinny Motherfucker. But this clownsuit, unlike my other clownsuits, fails me. Why is Sir Lord Baltimore so hard to come by?
posted by kingfisher, his musclebound cat at 1:10 PM on March 21

You can also find psx isos. I mean, I found the one I already downloaded a couple days ago, strider 2. There are others though.
posted by puke & cry at 1:15 PM on March 21

anything else that breaks the yolk of a good day

Beautiful phrase. My day's improving again.
posted by nebulawindphone at 1:37 PM on March 21 [1 favorite]

Okay. I'm still terrified of becoming one of those downloaders our government hates so much, but I could not resist searching for David Bowie performing as Bertolt Brecht's "Baal", since we have yet to procure a turntable and I can't find the EP on CD anywhere.

And, bam, I was able to enjoy Bowie performing "The Drowned Girl" in mere moments.

Hurrah! Much easier than going through all of the different channels one by one.

But...how do we make sure we're only using it legally? I mean, is there a way?

Yes, the RIAA has succeeded in making me paranoid about this, so maybe I'm being dumb. Some reassurance/pointers would go far in making this the boon it seems, though :)
posted by batmonkey at 1:40 PM on March 21

First of all, Batmonkey: As I understand it, (according to the the RIAA) it is no more legal for you to download "The Drowned Girl" than it would be for me to do so.

Secondly, Holy Hell, I had no idea that "David Bowie performing Bertolt Brecht" was a thing that one could download--this is the first I've heard of it, and boy am I excited. Thank you!
posted by Squid Voltaire at 2:02 PM on March 21

Squid Voltaire: I appreciate the confirmation of my fears ;]

Good thing I only previewed and didn't download, then. I know I'm missing out on a lot of cool stuff by not poking the bear, but I'm not going to poke the bear.

However! I'm excited that someone else is now able to enjoy Bowie's version of "Baal", and that makes up for missing out on what all the cool kids are doing.
posted by batmonkey at 2:37 PM on March 21

Also available: every PSP game ever made. Holy shit.
posted by porn in the woods at 2:58 PM on March 21

Handy! Sorta like that g2p filter for Google searches.
posted by First Post at 3:25 PM on March 21

MegaDownload is a similar, more limited site (only searches rapidshare and megaupload) - with the distinction that its results are the actual 1-click files, with sublinks to related files and a google search that usually turns up their source webpages..
posted by unmake at 5:41 PM on March 21

Seriously, where does this "clownsuit engine" thing come from? And what does it mean? Right now this thread is the top hit on Google, and there's not much else. What gives?
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 6:57 PM on March 21

Clownsuit is what happens when you misspell lawsuit as clawsuit and your spellchecker decides to help you out. Of course a the idea of a clawsuit engine is just as, if not more so, intruiging.
posted by damn dirty ape at 8:08 PM on March 21

This post totally sounds like a future jibberish line Warren Ellis would have tossed off for an issue of Transmetropolitan.
posted by Artw at 8:40 PM on March 21 [1 favorite]

BTW, today I bought some CDs from a store. Clearly I am your grandad.

Grrr. Kids. Lawn. Etc...
posted by Artw at 8:41 PM on March 21

Re:vocab

Given that I'm not a hacker/coder, so not down with the argot, my understanding of the reason why this is a "clownsuit" is that it essentially just serves Google's pages with a new front page and html call. It's an "engine" because it allows you to input something and get something else back (it does "work").
posted by klangklangston at 9:21 PM on March 21 [1 favorite]

Hey, thanks all who helped me out! I'm gonna listen to some indie fuxxors doin' Prince now! Thanks again!
posted by klangklangston at 9:47 PM on March 21

"Clownsuit engine" made sense to me. I suspect "clownsuit" or "clown suit" might have first been used to describe Windows as the means for casual users to deal with DOS (see here; and here, from 2002, is someone using the line as part of their sig). You can find other references for different programs, but probably not as "clownsuit engine", since "engine" in this post is related to search.

So, at any rate, a clownsuit application is something that doesn't do the heavy lifting, but instead offers the user a simple and probably "prettified" interface to the program that does. In this case, instead of one having to try various specialized search strings in standard search engines, the Shareminer developer has automated that process, with regular search engines still doing the work, and wrapped it up in an easy skin for you... so not exactly a search engine in its own right, but a clownsuit engine.

It's a description that's basically disparaging of the user (too stupid, or to be kinder, inexperienced or "childlike" to execute command strings) who needs things dumbed down and made more colorful and visually entertaining.

/me is not clownsuit expert... just rolling with the google returns
posted by taz at 1:53 AM on March 22 [1 favorite]

Here's the clownsuit engine... and it will scream through your nightmares forever more.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 5:37 AM on March 22

Actually I think this one is even more scary...
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 5:40 AM on March 22

Thanks taz, klang. Hadn't heard the term used before.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 8:46 AM on March 22

Can't sleep. Clownsuit engine will index me.
posted by DU at 6:12 PM on March 22

FWIW, I think we have indeed be indexed, and we are the progenitors of "clownsuit engine." Big ups to item.
posted by BeerFilter at 9:57 PM on March 24

Did we travel back in time and cause this at some point?
posted by Artw at 11:01 PM on March 24