Not unless you are using a dial up service. That will affect it. Otherwise if you're using broadband or cable, etc. then it won't steal anything from the other. In fact, uplding will help you get connected thru other people for much better search & downld results. I can turn LW on & not do any searches but my incompletes will start downlding by themselves within 40 mins or more b/c people are very quick to upld from me ... even before all my shared files are loaded.

LW is p2p (peer to peer or person to person) which means sharing b/w others. If there's nobody sharing then there would be nothing to downld would there?

See http://www.gnutellaforums.com/showth...ighlight=share to see what other people think about freeloaders & leechers which is the language you're talking. These people are not very well liked or welcome b/c they're seen as thieves, not giving back anything for what they take. Not understanding this concept & you're not understanding the concept of p2p sharing.