Honestly I disagree with a few of the current digital media copyright laws, or maybe better: a few paragraphs in them. Times change, the way things are handled change and that means our laws and their implementation should be updated aswell. Nevertheless, piracy is a crime as long as it is a crime, at least, if it is a crime. It is so hard to really know what is really legal and what isn't - and when. For example, if the laws in China are so low on this (if they have any) - how legal is a site discussing pirate software, or even distributing it. If it is owned by someone from the US or UK, .. or any alike strange situation where owners are from country X and servers are purchased in country Y but hosted in country Z - or the content is stored on servers in country A or B.. I hope you understand what I am trying to say.

Our site policy is that if we suspect someone distributing or running pirated software, be it vBulletin or anything else: We will decide to ban the user or request the user to explain his post; who knows, we might have misunderstood the user.

I believe it is our right as site owners or staff to decide what we allow or not - and have the freedom to decide who is welcome on our site or not. If that would stand by law I do not know, but I believe it is the right thing to do.

How do you see this on your own web site, and what do you do about piracy on your site?

This should invoke some healthy debate?

I think older people like me would intially have had more right to use pirate software than the modern day young pirates.

We bought so much rubbish software that didn't do what it was supposed to that a bit of payback was long overdue.

Compare that to the current pirate who doesnt want to pay for anything and also wants to make a living and income from someone else's hard work and that's a different story.

Payback is over, the playing field is level again and good reliable software is readily available if you do your research.

There is no longer any excuse to run a server in China just to evade the law. Wake up people you are feeding the next new superpower and who knows where that will take us.

There is always a bigger picture to consider.

I would not entertain any piracy on a site I own but I guess I would have to say that.

If I wasnt an anti piracy agent my attitude would still be the same. Without developers our PC's would have a blank screen and that deserves financial recognition and honest support from everyone.

Compare that to the current pirate who doesn't want to pay for anything and also wants to make a living and income from someone else's hard work and that's a different story.
I am 100% against deliberately making it a hobby to distribute copyrighted material and 1000% against specifically benefitting from this through an income.

But it immediately generates a grey area.

There are artists who want their music to be spread (besides the cd/dvd in the shop) for free through the internet, be it through online music stores, their own web site or things like iTunes. But their record/movie company doesn't allow this, and even fight piracy of those who get the mp3's online.

There are more of those examples where I feel we live in a twilightzone and aren't allowed to come out of it.

We live in a new era, things change. You CAN get mp3's cheaper online, through iTunes and the likes, how much more cheaper does it have to be.. things like that ARE a solution and the world should move towards that.

People are not given a choice, the money makers put a lock on the choices before we can think for ourselves. And that's wha makes me feel rebellion about issues like these.

Of course, it is just obvious when someone buys a dedicated server/line in China to evade laws and sells copyrighted materials from others for 1% of the price to benefit him/herself and not pay the copyright fee.



Keep in mind I have no knowledge about what is exactly what and go at this with nohing but my idea of how things are and what I feel. Wouldn't suprise me if I am 100% wrong in everything that I say. And that's me .. a 28 year old, it for me explains how a 12 year old kid thinks. Who thinks it is 'normal' to exchange music with their cool mp3 players - how else do you get mp3 on an mp3 player? The CD doesn't have an usb plug and mp3's are on the internet and say 'download me now'.

Our site policy is that if we suspect someone distributing or running pirated software, be it vBulletin or anything else: We will decide to ban the user or request the user to explain his post; who knows, we might have misunderstood the user.


I don't have a problem with this, but just to clarify, you'd ban him if he was using an illegal copy of windows?

Our site policy used to run under a points system. You'd get x amount of warning points for an infraction of the rules (different rules had different points attached). Once they hit a certain limit, they get banned for a week.

With piracy, they generally got 3 chances before their points hit the ban limit. If however, they posted direct links to obviously pirated software, they got a ton of points (instant ban), Just talking about pirated software got them a couple of points and an edited post.

It's usually best to run a zero-tolerance type rule - saves hassle that way if companies ever come sniffing around looking for scape-goats.

I don't have a problem with this, but just to clarify, you'd ban him if he was using an illegal copy of windows?On my site, if you bragged that you where running an illegal copy of Windows in posts, or told people where to get an illegal copy of Windows, then you would have recieved warning points.

My policy on piracy and other illegal things is very simple: don't discuss it in public. I don't need hypocritical behaviour, but I don't need to get in trouble either. I won't report or ban people if I suspect them of illegal activity, it is hypocritical as well, because in the end, nobody is an angel. Just don't get me or my forum in trouble.

If you admit to me you support piracy by running an illegal version of windows, yeah. I wouldn't mind considering it.

My policy on piracy and other illegal things is very simple: don't discuss it in public. I don't need hypocritical behaviour, but I don't need to get in trouble either. I won't report or ban people if I suspect them of illegal activity, it is hypocritical as well, because in the end, nobody is an angel. Just don't get me or my forum in trouble.

Live and let live is a very human attribute and very worthy in my opinion.

Shame it is not more widespread:(

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone"

PS: I throw rocks cos I am perfect;)

My rule: don't discuss it where it could get me/my site in trouble. Otherwise, I honestly don't care if people PM each other about it but they know they are taking full responsibility for any consequences and hold me blameless.

As long as there isn't excessive talking about it, and a good majority of it is handled through PMs...I could careless.

As long as it's not discussed openly on our forums then they can carry on.

If it IS discussed openly, the thread/post/links get deleted and the user warned by PM. Happens again - they're out (yellow card/red card basis).

Doesn't just go for downloaded material either. We have a problem in that links to Chinese based video streaming services were being posted on our site in their masses. These services were feeding in football (soccer for those in the US! ;) ) pictures which, under the contract terms agreed by the clubs (one of whom I work for), were to be blocked from being seen in the UK.