when you do a search, other hosts report back with the location of the file, and other alternate locations. You see the count of sources LW has been been told might have the file you asked for. The alternate locations are the least reliable.
If you look at your Library Pane, you can see the number of alt locs your files know. You also send those locations to others.
Obviously, alt locs go stale quickly, but they can help LW get started finding other sources.
If you are firewalled, most of those alt locs are going to be difficult to access.
Scammers also like this. They can report 100's of sources for their junk and make their results show up on the top of the lists. Still, we learn quickly which files to ignore
btw, don't insult LW devs until you've read
http://www.limewire.org/
Otherwise you sound as silly as someone who say the Red Cross likes to suck blood.