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pkgdesc='Fast, easy, and free BitTorrent client (shared library)' doesn't exactly seem very accurate :)
Generally shared libraries are preferred over static libraries. At least that has been the general policy I've seen around Arch, only doing static libraries when absolutely necessary
I am surprised to find out that the packaging guidelines do not mention a rule for static/shared libraries at all, but this was indeed what I was getting at.
In general, static libs are avoided, but they're ok when shared libs are not an option. It was first implemented because of FS#72015. torrential cannot be built without it.
There is no bug here (apart from the minor issue of incorrect description).