It is not intended as an endorsement of using BitTorrent to find pirated video and music files, I shall insist at the outset, to peruse TorrentFreak’s list of the 100 most searched for phrases and keywords on the representative KickassTorrents site, the “BitTorrent Zeitgeist 2010.” It is purely for educational and entertainment purposes, of course.  Everyone here is paying for their entertainment through legitimate sources, right?

That out of the way, the list is topped, not terribly surprisingly, by “Inception” and “Iron Man 2.” You’d expect that blockbuster movies would rank high on the list of torrent searches, and you’d find examples up and down the list, from “Avatar” at 6th, “Despicable Me” at 8th (and 94th… what?!?), “Clash of the Titans” at 10th, and “Toy Story 3” at 11th. Also up there were “Twilight: Eclipse” and many others. But “Salt” at 13th? “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” at 16th? “Knight and Day” at 25th? It’s understandable that people might not want to pay to see “Knight and Day,” but why see it at all when it’s a few hours you won’t get back, ever? (You could say the same about “The Last Airbender” at 23rd, but a lot of people paid to see that)

Most of the searches, as you’d expect, were of big movies (even “Step Up 3D” and “Skyline” made it, stretching the definition of “big”) and TV shows and video games. It’s interesting that there’s almost no music on the list — we’ve been told time and again that illegal downloading is killing the music industry, but there are no music searches listed other than “Eminem” at number 47.  No Lady Gaga fans here.

And, yes, “xxx” was 4th and “porn” was 9th. “Sex” ranked way down at 87th, just ahead of “Microsoft Office 2010.” You can determine the significance of that yourself.

See the whole list here.

HT: ReadWriteWeb

Image: Warner Bros.