You should use a VPN anyway if you're going to torrent.
I received my fair share of 1st warnings during the past ~15 years. I only received my first 2nd warning this year. I configured a systemd service `ssh -D myvps` and configured deluged to use this SOCKS5 proxy. Waiting for next April to turn it off...
I firmly believe that sharing "cultural products" (sic) between individuals not seeking profit should not be illegal, and that any attempt to restrict this is vain at best, and most likely counter-productive for society as a whole.
Out of curiosity, how has this changed over years? Are they getting worse or better? My feeling is that they are completely ineffective. Anecdotically, none of my friends living in France mentioned getting emails, and some of them do torrent with abandon.
Ineffective to prevent torrenting, they definitely are. But I think they are winning on the ideas front unfortunately. The idea that 'pirating' is immoral has made its way to the general public. I wonder if I'll see the time where everyone is convinced that you're stealing something when you lend a book to a friend, or when you play music in your house and some people that aren't spotify subscribers can hear it.
Bittorrent, by definition at the protocol, includes sharing all pieces you have downloaded as soon as the piece is completed and finished its hash check[1]. The fact that there are nonstandard workarounds for this changes nothing for the broadly shared default that almost nobody is going to go out of their way to change, especially if it means using a specialized client.
Not to mention the non-ISP groups which also monitors the DHT for who downloads content they "own", ready to serve the data to governments at request.