Bootleg Sharing
| Synonyms: | Trading |
| See also: | Bootleg, File Sharing, Sharing Deleted Fanworks |
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Stub: This is a total braindump! Feel free to rearrange and sort things out. |
For many theater fans, bootlegs are the only way to see shows. Thus, a community and culture has developed around the sharing of bootlegs.
Terminology
- Master: The person who filmed the inital bootleg (whenever it's a video or an audio only).
- NFT: Stands for 'Not For Trade'. This refers to a bootleg that has been released by a master under instructions not to be shared or traded with others until it's passed a threshold of six months to a year,. These are often bootlegs for recent performances and have to be purchased with money from a master directly. They are meant for private use to protect the master from getting caught and to gain back the money spent on the performance. Leaking or sharing NFTs is often considered disrespectful and bad etiquette in bootleg community. Doing so, can get the user blacklisted from trading sites.[1]
- NFT Forever: A type of bootleg that is shared by a master with specific instructions to not be shared with anyone else.
- VOB (with smalls): This is one of the most common video formats for older bootlegs to be filmed in. The file format is often encrypted and can be glitch-ridden when shared around. VOB files can not be directly uploaded to YouTube. When they are converted into MP4, this often results in reduced and blurry video. This is the reason much of the bootlegs on YouTube are low quality. If the bootleg was initially released in VOB format, the original VOB files are often higher quality, than the converted lower-quality MP4 versions.
Reasons For Sharing Bootlegs
Approaches to Sharing Bootlegs
Overview source - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sL-3a0SeESo
Trading
Source - https://musicalexchange.livejournal.com/
For a few years, Encora was a common platform to trade bootlegs, until it shut down in 2020.
Selling
Current sales - https://sites.google.com/view/imnotpopular/home?authuser=0
Gifting
Youtube
Some bootlegs are titled "bootleg", but many avoid this term in order to reduce the likelihood that they will be flagged for copyright infringement.
Sometimes the bootleg might be titled with a title completely unrelated. These titles go through trends, such as titling after memes. For example, the title of a show followed by "Slime Tutorial" is a popular bootleg title.
Other times they're synonyms or related terms; Checkers for Chess the Musical, or TapDancing Eggs for Something Rotten.
Once, a Hamilton bootleg was posted on Pornhub ? And other bootlegs might have followed suit?