That's funny, my internet provider (funky little wireless provider for people who live on mountains) was blocking torrents which made me gravitate towards rapidshare et similia as well.

Incidentally, I wrote several premium link makers back in the day (including one particular implementation which I tried to sell and pirates leaked - oh well, that's what you get when trying to sell to pirates) and I don't remember rapidshare allowing you to download things directly, unless you were premium.