Quote Originally Posted by Dr Unne
Illegal doesn't equal immoral. They did deserve to be shut down though, yeah. No one could say they didn't have it coming to them. At the same time, I don't think piracy will ever be stopped. I doubt it'll even be significantly slowed by this kind of thing.

suprnova.org hosted plenty of non-illegal things too. For example I downloaded an old book about teaching yourself Latin, and some Linux stuff. bittorrent does have legal uses.

I won't pretend I didn't also download things illegally. Right now I'm downloading some Monty Python episodes. I watched the episodes on TV, and it was legal. I could've taped them onto VHS, and it would've been legal. I'm downloading them to my computer, and it's illegal. If I'd taped them on VHS and somehow input them to my computer via video-in, would that be legal? Maybe not legal; would it be moral? The legality of this kind of thing isn't something that's clearly defined, to me, let alone the morality. This is something we're still trying to figure out as a society.

But yeah, some things on those sites are blatantly illegal and blatantly immoral to download, and I probably downloaded some of those too. I am not the king of morals.
I didn't mean that everything illegal was immoral, but it's like you said you admitted to downloading illegal files and you have the funds to purchase the material that's illegally downloaded, that's what I referred to as immoral.

I'm guilty of that myself...at least in the past. It didn't take me long to delete my stolen files when I had contracted a virus. I know that it's tough for some people who don't have a lot of money or any money to not be tempted to just download whatever they can find, but it doesn't make it right.

The thing that shocks me most is that on my LJ Friend's list and this forum is that no one feels the least bit of sympathy for the creators.