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Comment by galangalalgol | Hacker News Reader

I think that was the point being made? Outlawing something does nothing if enforcement is not feasible. The music and movie industries didn't crush torrents, they switched business models to streaming with prices being determined mostly by how much hassle was avoided by skipping the torrents.

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I think a major difference is that while torrents are illegal, the main people enforcing it are copyright holders. I think the discussion would change if the government would label people who build/use/distribute "illegal" models as terrorists.

Agreed. While the IP mafia (pardon the derogative) has vast influence on legislators and even the executive, it pales in comparison to the "terrorist" and "think of the children" scarecrows.

Aggressive enforcement tactics certainly haven’t won the war on drugs.

No, but if someone is violating those laws, they make it easier to ruin that person's life if so desired

Torrents can't be illegal right now, can they? Maybe in China, but Ubuntu, Fedora, Arch, etc all advertise the ability to recieve their ISOs via torrent and even seed the torrent in varying capacities.

Do you really believe that all of these major non-profits are advertising, encouraging, and participating in the use of an illegal network protocol?

Using any network protocol to violate copyright law on the other hand, is and has been illegal. But it's the violation of copyright, not the network protocol.

Saying torrenting is illegal is like saying ftp is illegal.

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