Hacker News Reader

Comment by polkathrowaway | Hacker News Reader

I know of a few teenagers who do this. Their sites have been taken down multiple times, but they never seem to stop. I completely understand that internet forums are no place for seeking legal advice, but I would like to know what can I do to thwart/report these people (in the United States).

(My real concern is that the money they are generating is being used to fund illegal activities in the neighborhood -- which I can not tolerate. I have lost a close one to a drug crisis already, cannot take it more).

View on HN

Talk to your government about their drug policies enacted at the behest of the pharmaceutical industry. That's a much bigger problem than the teenagers in your industry.[1]

Of course, that'll also mean actually getting out the corrupt autocrats currently in charge. So... get politically engaged. (And by that I mean, do real work. Posting on social media is not getting politically engaged. Get out. Organize. Hold your politicians accountable. Run yourself.)

Going after the teens in your neighborhood might feel more satisfying, but the drug problem is a systemic problem. It's not caused by a few teens, it won't be fixed by locking up a few teens.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/investigations/...

If someone says that they're trying to deal with local drug deaths, telling them that their local problems aren't worth their time isn't the right answer.

It's convenient to have a local scapegoat. It feels good to inflict pain on people you perceive as the guilty party. I certainly understand that. I've lost more than one friend.

But that convenience has brought us to where we are right now. If we continue to close our eyes to reality, preferring to go after scapegoats, guess what - nothing is going to change. We need to channel our anger into more productive channels.

You don't solve a systemic problem by attacking symptoms.

You also don't keep things healthy by ignoring the symptoms.

“Can someone help me put some teenagers in jail for pirating movies?”

As banal as this question sounds, I am really interested in hearing opinions. These are not mere teenagers pirating movies -- they run massive operations (sites receiving 20 million+ hits a day).

If they're running sites receiving 20+ million hits a day (how do you know this, btw?) there's no way that the movie studios, or the people they hire to deal with piracy, aren't aware of it, if not the FBI.

If your real issue is about drugs in your neighbourhood, you should be focusing or asking for help on how to deal with that problem, not online piracy.

Sounds like you're jealous.

Wait are you saying that teenagers are running 20M monthly traffic sites and using money to distribute drugs? Any other illegal activities?

Which funds which then?

Something does not sound right in this story.

I am sorry you lost a close one but it seems silly to blame torrenting teenagers for this.

Chances are the law are after them already because of their risk seeking behavior: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/meet-nate-norman-a...

One doesn't have to fund the other; run both operations in tandem and it's a smart way to diversify one's criminal portfolio. If either end of the business goes under, there's still a revenue stream.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com