Very mild here, three story building, almost undetectable movement. Quite a few people felt it at the office.

You couldn't be more wrong. The reason your torrents are still "distributed as a bunch of small RARs" is because that's how the groups or "The Scene" distribute /their/ material via FTP/FXP unless things have changed much since the early 2000's.

I'm sorry to say but it's not Usenet that's the problem, it's how things are handled up higher in the food chain.