your_challenger parent
I haven't used torrent in a long time. Does it have any other usecase than piracy?
It's really good for distributing huge datasets, stuff that can take multiple days to download.
It's also very good for using maximum available bandwidth efficiently, and have downloaders contribute bandwidth.
Linux isos are frequently pointed out as a use-case. I've seen it used for distributing neural network weights recently (stable diffusion and others). Rainbow tables and password lists too: https://freerainbowtables.com/
I have used it to efficiently distribute big files (disk images) over hundreds of computers in LANs. Computers on local switches can exchange data with each other, and computers can come and go on the network.
OpenStreetMap is such a huge dataset, for example: https://planet.openstreetmap.org/
Yup, downloading stuff reliably over lousy internet connections (packet loss, high latency, intermittent uptime). HTTP really sucks with that.
Linux distros use it for distributing their installers.
LibreOffice as well and it's a joy to use because they tend to be very fast downloads.
Plenty! If you have largish binary assets of any kind that need to be distributed across multiple nodes, it's fantastic.
For instance, if you're in the infrastructure group in a company, and you need to distribute VM images around the place, it's great.