"Ummm... try telling that to any other group that has been harrassed by stupid laws. Why don't you start with homosexuals? 55's the limit."
But that's precisely my point. These laws are created by lawmakers. In the US system, the lawmakers are elected by the majority. When these lawmakers do stupid shit (take bribes from major media companies, for example), it's the public's perogative to get them out. If not, that's the public's fault. Bottom line: the populace is ultimately responsible for stupid laws.
Very rarely does deliberately ignoring laws actually work. What does work is voting the bastards out.
"You must've been The Little Lemming That Could. Standing at the edge of the precipice while your friends were getting laid."
Quite frankly, Slashdot as a whole contains a lot of lemmings. We all consider ourselves the "counterculture" -- the reality is we're just as interested in popularity among our peers.
I've read their party platform. I don't see anything about freedom. I see a lot of stuff about not wanting to bow to the US, which seems more popular and fashionable than noteworthy.
When the news first broke that Pirate Bay was taken down, I commented "Good for them" on Slashdot. Immedate "flamebait" and "trolling" mods. I also got quite angry that people were so vehemently supporting them. I eventually got a temporary IP ban for my responses (Yeah, Slashdot! Way to block IPs if they get 5 or more 'Flamebait' mods in an hour. Glad to see I could ban just about anybody by modding them down enough).
So, anyway, my question is this: why are we supporting them?
The common response is this long and circuitous argument that Pirate Bay is somehow like Google, that links to copyright infringement aren't the same as direct copyright infringement, etc.
Bear in mind this takes the same broken logic of copyright law (When is a copy a copy? When I have all the bits aligned perfectly? When I convert the AAC to an MP3? Etc...) and tries to stand it on its head. The whole bunch of laws are mired in inconsistency -- adding the "free information" take doesn't really add anything to the conversation and may make it worse.
For some reason, no one wants to step back and look at the big picture. We, as nerds, dig into our one piece (digital copies) and ignore the rest.
The bottom line is this: copyright infringement DOES cause serious problems. It causes money not to go to shows/movies/etc. It causes creative ventures to be cancelled. It causes people to lose jobs (not just the stars who have money -- people like the crew that have little).
Yes, some people pirate to "try before they buy". Some use it to test software before buying it for a production environment. I'd venture to say the vast don't, however. Ask the average teenager/college student/etc. if he/she's REALLY going to buy that 3rd season of Family Guy/CD from Radiohead/V for Vendetta flick. Chances are they aren't.
People say "pirated works aren't taking away money from anyone". I disagree. Way back when (for hundreds of years, actually) you had to buy items to find out if they were bad. And if they were really bad, tough. That was how the market worked. If that comedy recording from Vaudeville sucked, you didn't buy any more comedy recordings from Vaudeville.
Nowadays you have tons of free ways to "sample before you buy":
1.) Go to a store and watch the movie/listen to the CD. 2.) Go to a friend's house and do the same thing. 3.) Double-click a stream on the internet. Get a sample from iTunes, for example. 4.) Listen to the radio (yes, SOME channel out there plays what you like). 5.) Rent the item before buying it.
With all those options available, pirating seems less and less of a legitimate option.
Who's pirating? A lot of people. What are they pirating? A lot of stuff.
Just because a lot of people do it doesn't make it legal, moral or right.
I made this point in another post: Pirate Bay is the dark alley. It may not be a "direct" route to illegality, but it's certainly "more direct" than blaming people like the electric company. The electric company services people, businesses, charity -- probably 99% of which is legal. The Pirate Bay points you directly to the illegal stuff. Big difference.
In my city, the dark alleys are routinely visited by cops, and the crime rate is way down. Some dark alleys are permanently walled up or turned into apartment buildings, businesses, etc (you know, something useful). The Pirate Bay will be the same thing.
You could just as easily say that Pirate Bay is "less legal". Google at least serves up useful information. A minority of what they serve up leads to piracy. Practically every link Pirate Bay offers leads people to pirate things.
It's akin to an interstate versus a back alley. Sure, the interstate may *eventually* get you to the shady characters, but the back alley leads straight to them.
Last I checked, the cops heavily traffic the back alleys in my area, until all the scum is removed...
"This thread is a masterpiece. Abstruse argumentation, but always very close to the real thing, never giving away too much. Full of subtle yet irresistible hooks. You, Sir, are truly an american trolling icon. I commend you on your prowess."
And it's perfectly ok to infringe on copyrights? Are you on crack? There's laws for a reason, dude: enough people think it's right to follow them.
There IS loss when copyrights are infringed upon. Every person who gets a copy from their friend is one less sale to the record company/television studio/etc. People only think about the stars with tons of cash. If a new record sells only 100,000 copies instead of 200,000, because some asshats thought it'd be cool to pirate those 100,000 copies, everyone involved with the production (sound engineers, guys who get the coffee, etc.) gets the axe. Business execs look at the bottom line, and the bottom line doesn't say "These copies were pirated," it says "We didn't meet our target 200,000 sales. Get rid of this artist and everyone who works with them".
People don't think of this shit. Usually it's the kids who pirate tons of crap but don't care. I assume you're a child, because that's the only way I can see someone wanting to defend this practice.
"Let's start rounding up everyone hosting, posting, using, creating content for anti-communist sites and porn-sites and start shipping them to China and Iran to take their due punishment! Are you ok with that?"
"The pirate bay people are in Sweden, and are following Swedish law. If they were operating in the US, that would be different."
But you can't just steal products in one country, move them to another country and no longer consider it theft. Just because you moved somewhere else doesn't erase the fact that you've stolen the good.
That's effectively what the Swedes are trying to do. "If you come here, no laws apply." Yes, they do. There's international constructs and even laws for a reason. It's considered very undiplomatic to go against what nearly every other country agrees on. Theft is theft.
Take a look around, dude. Do you think you get those clean DivXes from store bought DVD rips? That no artifacts from MPEG2 -> DivX compression occurs because the piraters are SO good they can remove them?
Get real.
Most of these stuff is direct from the uncompressed studio master. How do you think they get them out before the movies are out?
"So you'd prefer another country to have hold over what is and is not legal in your own?
What if the shoe was on the other foot? What if the law being violated was, for example, Iranian, and the website was American? I'm sure there are thousands of porn sites hosted in California that are just as blatantly illigal in repressive countries as TPB is in America. Would you be so quick to say "It doesn't matter what country they're in, it's still illegal in the prosecuting country, so that makes cracking down on them OK" ?
And no, it doesn't matter that the prosecuting country in question is "unfreindly" - in case you missed the memo, what matters legally are local laws and possibly extradition treaties. Plus, many Swedes would undoubtably view American law as repressive on IP issues, just as many Americans would view Iranian law as oppressive on free speach issues.
The "not in my country" defense is otherwise known as national sovereignty. Don't like it? Tough. You either abide by it, or accept the idea that another nation can enforce it's laws upon you remotely. If you wish legal sovereignty for your own nation, you must allow others the same right. To grant them any less makes you little more than a hypocritic shill."
If someone in my country was doing something illegal in another country -- something that nearly every country in the world had a law against -- I would support extraditing them so they get a proper punishment. If some studio in Sweden produced music that Americans were stealing, the Americans should be held absolutely accountable and face Swedish justice.
To give a real world example, some years back an American was going to get caned in Singapore for a crime. I had absolutely no problem with that. If you break the law, you deserve the punishment.
"ok lets try this on for size....I buy dvd(with real dollars), I copy dvd. Now wherein did a physical theft take place?"
That's perfectly within your right. I never said the DMCA should be followed. You're free to make as many copies as you want -- for yourself.
Except that's not what we're talking about here. Take a look at the stuff on these sites. Most aren't store-bought copies -- they're cuts released before the theatrical debut. SOMEONE has to PHYSICALLY STEAL the item from the studios. There is actual theft going on, whether you like it or not.
"Theft is when YOU HAVE SOMETHING, SOMEONE ELSE TAKES IT, and YOU NO LONGER HAVE IT."
How DO YOU THINK they GET THE ORIGINAL ITEM? Someone PHYSICALLY TAKES IT. When a different CHOCOLATE comes out, SOMEONE PHYSICALLY TAKES that. Repeat AD NAUSEUM.
Enough WITH the CAPS.
Again, you (as many Slashdotters) start looking at digital theft at one point: the copy. A lot more goes on prior to the copy -- the actual crime.
And again, that doesn't affect my analogy. We're talking about the newspaper that tells *you* where to get the stolen goods. The governments don't go after the torrent sites just to take them out -- they're after the guy physically *stealing* the CDs/DVDs/etc out of the stores/recording studios/etc. The torrent sites just help find them.
Physical theft of CD/DVD/etc : physical theft of chocolate Pirate Bay : Newspaper that tells you where to get the chocolate
At some point, a physical item IS stolen. To take the analogy further, there's a lot of different kinds of chocolate out there. Every time a new one comes out, someone HAS to steal it.
Slashdotters forget that part. They think the process starts with a digital copy. It doesn't. It starts with a physical theft.
American produce the largest quantity of exportable corn in the world. I wouldn't consider that a good export, as most overseas countries that need that corn own the farms and farming companies here. Being a commerical success means little if you're owned overseas.
Seriously, I'm not. I've pirated (and continue to pirate) a fair share in my day. That was back when I was a kid, of course -- as an adult I have a different perspective (although if a friend brings over a DVD, occasionally I'll copy it -- I think the DMCA is moronic).
I do get a little perturbed when sites like this thumb their nose at the establishment, though. They're just asking for trouble. It's better to keep this kind of stuff quiet.
"You mean like the jets, avionic engines and rockets, trucks and cars made by the little known companies like Saab and Volvo?"
Saab is owned by GM, an American company. Volvo is owned by Ford, also an American company. The American military buys some of their parts overseas, but builds 90% of the final planes on American soil.
So, like I said, give me an example with commercial value. Preferably one not owned overseas.
"Please try to keep your analogies vaguely relevant. We're talking about copyright infringement here, not theft, so let's at least keep it IP-related. Examples of relevant crimes would be Americans infringing Swedish copyrights (downloading ABBA tracks or whatever), or violating other Swedish IP laws (maybe making fake IKEA furniture, or using industrial espionage to get illegal access to Saab trade secrets)."
See, this is the classic Slashdot response and it's totally faulty.
How do you think sites like Pirate Bay get their material? I'll give you a few examples:
1.) A guy walks into a CD store, pockets the CD and walks out. The CD store eats the loss. 2.) A worker at a major motion picture steals prerelease cuts and takes them home. Not along has he stolen physical goods, but he and his coworkers may lose their jobs in the process. 3.) A worker at a game store opens a game and makes a copy before it's released. The consumer buys the now scratched-up version, returns it, and the game company eats the loss.
In all cases, physical theft DOES occur at some point. In nearly all cases, people get fired -- often having nothing to do with the theft. Not to mention all the copies the companies could have sold if hundreds of thousands of teenagers didn't download it for free.
The common Slashdot mistake is to isolate copyright infringement as its own event. It isn't. It's part of a circle of events that involve physical loss, loss of jobs, etc.
"This arguement is the sole reason why the Chinese/North Korean/whateverwhich police force cannot come knocking on your door in America (i guessed, didn't I?) and hold you responsible for, for instance, spekaing your mind about the communist regime."
They can, however, come knocking on my door if I stole millions or billions of dollars of copyrighted materials. Personally, dude, if my neighbor was stealing millions of dollars of (let's say) Korean music, I'd be glad to see North Korean knock on his door and take him away. We're not talking about the DMCA, we're talking about basic theft. Every country in the world has laws against that.
Also, I know it goes against Slashdot "fashion", but digital copyright theft DOES have analogues to physical theft. That's why I used the newspaper example. The newspaper company is telling you where to get the chocolate -- it doesn't contain the stolen chocolate. You get the newspaper to stop hosting the ads (kill the torrents). Simple and effective means to get to the real crooks (going back to the analogy, the ones physically stealing the prerelease copies of the movies out of the studios).
"Learning the basic difference between the Nordic (Scandinavian) country of Sweden/Sverige and a country called Switzerland/Swiss/Suisse/Schweiz/Svizzera located between Italy, France and Germany would be a nice start before tooting your horn about either country's laws."
Honestly, dude, I don't really give a damn, since I don't know of anything Sweden or Switzerland produces that has any commercial value. My point was to provide an example. If we want to be stupid about that, substitute "meatballs" for "chocolate". Doesn't invalidate the argument.
And it has nothing to do with "tooting my country's laws". I personally think the DMCA is mornonic, but we aren't talking the DMCA here. We're talking basic theft which EVERY country laws for. I can't take stuff out of another country, run back to my own and expect not to be extradited.
Slashdot Mirror
You still haven't answered "why" people support them.
"Ummm... try telling that to any other group that has been harrassed by stupid laws. Why don't you start with homosexuals? 55's the limit."
But that's precisely my point. These laws are created by lawmakers. In the US system, the lawmakers are elected by the majority. When these lawmakers do stupid shit (take bribes from major media companies, for example), it's the public's perogative to get them out. If not, that's the public's fault. Bottom line: the populace is ultimately responsible for stupid laws.
Very rarely does deliberately ignoring laws actually work. What does work is voting the bastards out.
"You must've been The Little Lemming That Could. Standing at the edge of the precipice while your friends were getting laid."
Quite frankly, Slashdot as a whole contains a lot of lemmings. We all consider ourselves the "counterculture" -- the reality is we're just as interested in popularity among our peers.
I've read their party platform. I don't see anything about freedom. I see a lot of stuff about not wanting to bow to the US, which seems more popular and fashionable than noteworthy.
When the news first broke that Pirate Bay was taken down, I commented "Good for them" on Slashdot. Immedate "flamebait" and "trolling" mods. I also got quite angry that people were so vehemently supporting them. I eventually got a temporary IP ban for my responses (Yeah, Slashdot! Way to block IPs if they get 5 or more 'Flamebait' mods in an hour. Glad to see I could ban just about anybody by modding them down enough).
So, anyway, my question is this: why are we supporting them?
The common response is this long and circuitous argument that Pirate Bay is somehow like Google, that links to copyright infringement aren't the same as direct copyright infringement, etc.
Bear in mind this takes the same broken logic of copyright law (When is a copy a copy? When I have all the bits aligned perfectly? When I convert the AAC to an MP3? Etc...) and tries to stand it on its head. The whole bunch of laws are mired in inconsistency -- adding the "free information" take doesn't really add anything to the conversation and may make it worse.
For some reason, no one wants to step back and look at the big picture. We, as nerds, dig into our one piece (digital copies) and ignore the rest.
The bottom line is this: copyright infringement DOES cause serious problems. It causes money not to go to shows/movies/etc. It causes creative ventures to be cancelled. It causes people to lose jobs (not just the stars who have money -- people like the crew that have little).
Yes, some people pirate to "try before they buy". Some use it to test software before buying it for a production environment. I'd venture to say the vast don't, however. Ask the average teenager/college student/etc. if he/she's REALLY going to buy that 3rd season of Family Guy/CD from Radiohead/V for Vendetta flick. Chances are they aren't.
People say "pirated works aren't taking away money from anyone". I disagree. Way back when (for hundreds of years, actually) you had to buy items to find out if they were bad. And if they were really bad, tough. That was how the market worked. If that comedy recording from Vaudeville sucked, you didn't buy any more comedy recordings from Vaudeville.
Nowadays you have tons of free ways to "sample before you buy":
1.) Go to a store and watch the movie/listen to the CD.
2.) Go to a friend's house and do the same thing.
3.) Double-click a stream on the internet. Get a sample from iTunes, for example.
4.) Listen to the radio (yes, SOME channel out there plays what you like).
5.) Rent the item before buying it.
With all those options available, pirating seems less and less of a legitimate option.
Who's pirating? A lot of people. What are they pirating? A lot of stuff.
Just because a lot of people do it doesn't make it legal, moral or right.
If the purpose of pirating stuff is to get it for free, who on earth is donating? Strange priorities.
Not necessarily.
I made this point in another post: Pirate Bay is the dark alley. It may not be a "direct" route to illegality, but it's certainly "more direct" than blaming people like the electric company. The electric company services people, businesses, charity -- probably 99% of which is legal. The Pirate Bay points you directly to the illegal stuff. Big difference.
In my city, the dark alleys are routinely visited by cops, and the crime rate is way down. Some dark alleys are permanently walled up or turned into apartment buildings, businesses, etc (you know, something useful). The Pirate Bay will be the same thing.
That's some really fuzzy logic.
You could just as easily say that Pirate Bay is "less legal". Google at least serves up useful information. A minority of what they serve up leads to piracy. Practically every link Pirate Bay offers leads people to pirate things.
It's akin to an interstate versus a back alley. Sure, the interstate may *eventually* get you to the shady characters, but the back alley leads straight to them.
Last I checked, the cops heavily traffic the back alleys in my area, until all the scum is removed...
"This thread is a masterpiece. Abstruse argumentation, but always very close to the real thing, never giving away too much. Full of subtle yet irresistible hooks. You, Sir, are truly an american trolling icon. I commend you on your prowess."
Thanks, they haven't figured it out yet. lol
Does Swedish law permit people to break US law? I'm going to go murder people and run to Sweden, then.
And it's perfectly ok to infringe on copyrights? Are you on crack? There's laws for a reason, dude: enough people think it's right to follow them.
There IS loss when copyrights are infringed upon. Every person who gets a copy from their friend is one less sale to the record company/television studio/etc. People only think about the stars with tons of cash. If a new record sells only 100,000 copies instead of 200,000, because some asshats thought it'd be cool to pirate those 100,000 copies, everyone involved with the production (sound engineers, guys who get the coffee, etc.) gets the axe. Business execs look at the bottom line, and the bottom line doesn't say "These copies were pirated," it says "We didn't meet our target 200,000 sales. Get rid of this artist and everyone who works with them".
People don't think of this shit. Usually it's the kids who pirate tons of crap but don't care. I assume you're a child, because that's the only way I can see someone wanting to defend this practice.
"Let's start rounding up everyone hosting, posting, using, creating content for anti-communist sites and porn-sites and start shipping them to China and Iran to take their due punishment! Are you ok with that?"
Yup.
"The pirate bay people are in Sweden, and are following Swedish law. If they were operating in the US, that would be different."
But you can't just steal products in one country, move them to another country and no longer consider it theft. Just because you moved somewhere else doesn't erase the fact that you've stolen the good.
That's effectively what the Swedes are trying to do. "If you come here, no laws apply." Yes, they do. There's international constructs and even laws for a reason. It's considered very undiplomatic to go against what nearly every other country agrees on. Theft is theft.
Take a look around, dude. Do you think you get those clean DivXes from store bought DVD rips? That no artifacts from MPEG2 -> DivX compression occurs because the piraters are SO good they can remove them?
Get real.
Most of these stuff is direct from the uncompressed studio master. How do you think they get them out before the movies are out?
"So you'd prefer another country to have hold over what is and is not legal in your own?
What if the shoe was on the other foot? What if the law being violated was, for example, Iranian, and the website was American? I'm sure there are thousands of porn sites hosted in California that are just as blatantly illigal in repressive countries as TPB is in America. Would you be so quick to say "It doesn't matter what country they're in, it's still illegal in the prosecuting country, so that makes cracking down on them OK" ?
And no, it doesn't matter that the prosecuting country in question is "unfreindly" - in case you missed the memo, what matters legally are local laws and possibly extradition treaties. Plus, many Swedes would undoubtably view American law as repressive on IP issues, just as many Americans would view Iranian law as oppressive on free speach issues.
The "not in my country" defense is otherwise known as national sovereignty. Don't like it? Tough. You either abide by it, or accept the idea that another nation can enforce it's laws upon you remotely. If you wish legal sovereignty for your own nation, you must allow others the same right. To grant them any less makes you little more than a hypocritic shill."
If someone in my country was doing something illegal in another country -- something that nearly every country in the world had a law against -- I would support extraditing them so they get a proper punishment. If some studio in Sweden produced music that Americans were stealing, the Americans should be held absolutely accountable and face Swedish justice.
To give a real world example, some years back an American was going to get caned in Singapore for a crime. I had absolutely no problem with that. If you break the law, you deserve the punishment.
"ok lets try this on for size....I buy dvd(with real dollars), I copy dvd. Now wherein did a physical theft take place?"
That's perfectly within your right. I never said the DMCA should be followed. You're free to make as many copies as you want -- for yourself.
Except that's not what we're talking about here. Take a look at the stuff on these sites. Most aren't store-bought copies -- they're cuts released before the theatrical debut. SOMEONE has to PHYSICALLY STEAL the item from the studios. There is actual theft going on, whether you like it or not.
"Theft is when YOU HAVE SOMETHING, SOMEONE ELSE TAKES IT, and YOU NO LONGER HAVE IT."
How DO YOU THINK they GET THE ORIGINAL ITEM? Someone PHYSICALLY TAKES IT. When a different CHOCOLATE comes out, SOMEONE PHYSICALLY TAKES that. Repeat AD NAUSEUM.
Enough WITH the CAPS.
Again, you (as many Slashdotters) start looking at digital theft at one point: the copy. A lot more goes on prior to the copy -- the actual crime.
And again, that doesn't affect my analogy. We're talking about the newspaper that tells *you* where to get the stolen goods. The governments don't go after the torrent sites just to take them out -- they're after the guy physically *stealing* the CDs/DVDs/etc out of the stores/recording studios/etc. The torrent sites just help find them.
You didn't read my post.
Physical theft of CD/DVD/etc : physical theft of chocolate
Pirate Bay : Newspaper that tells you where to get the chocolate
At some point, a physical item IS stolen. To take the analogy further, there's a lot of different kinds of chocolate out there. Every time a new one comes out, someone HAS to steal it.
Slashdotters forget that part. They think the process starts with a digital copy. It doesn't. It starts with a physical theft.
"Aka: kill the torrent site."
As in shut it down, not physically kill the people running it.
Dumbass.
American produce the largest quantity of exportable corn in the world. I wouldn't consider that a good export, as most overseas countries that need that corn own the farms and farming companies here. Being a commerical success means little if you're owned overseas.
"ok, now I know you are astroturf."
Seriously, I'm not. I've pirated (and continue to pirate) a fair share in my day. That was back when I was a kid, of course -- as an adult I have a different perspective (although if a friend brings over a DVD, occasionally I'll copy it -- I think the DMCA is moronic).
I do get a little perturbed when sites like this thumb their nose at the establishment, though. They're just asking for trouble. It's better to keep this kind of stuff quiet.
"You mean like the jets, avionic engines and rockets, trucks and cars made by the little known companies like Saab and Volvo?"
Saab is owned by GM, an American company. Volvo is owned by Ford, also an American company. The American military buys some of their parts overseas, but builds 90% of the final planes on American soil.
So, like I said, give me an example with commercial value. Preferably one not owned overseas.
"Please try to keep your analogies vaguely relevant. We're talking about copyright infringement here, not theft, so let's at least keep it IP-related. Examples of relevant crimes would be Americans infringing Swedish copyrights (downloading ABBA tracks or whatever), or violating other Swedish IP laws (maybe making fake IKEA furniture, or using industrial espionage to get illegal access to Saab trade secrets)."
See, this is the classic Slashdot response and it's totally faulty.
How do you think sites like Pirate Bay get their material? I'll give you a few examples:
1.) A guy walks into a CD store, pockets the CD and walks out. The CD store eats the loss.
2.) A worker at a major motion picture steals prerelease cuts and takes them home. Not along has he stolen physical goods, but he and his coworkers may lose their jobs in the process.
3.) A worker at a game store opens a game and makes a copy before it's released. The consumer buys the now scratched-up version, returns it, and the game company eats the loss.
In all cases, physical theft DOES occur at some point. In nearly all cases, people get fired -- often having nothing to do with the theft. Not to mention all the copies the companies could have sold if hundreds of thousands of teenagers didn't download it for free.
The common Slashdot mistake is to isolate copyright infringement as its own event. It isn't. It's part of a circle of events that involve physical loss, loss of jobs, etc.
"This arguement is the sole reason why the Chinese/North Korean/whateverwhich police force cannot come knocking on your door in America (i guessed, didn't I?) and hold you responsible for, for instance, spekaing your mind about the communist regime."
They can, however, come knocking on my door if I stole millions or billions of dollars of copyrighted materials. Personally, dude, if my neighbor was stealing millions of dollars of (let's say) Korean music, I'd be glad to see North Korean knock on his door and take him away. We're not talking about the DMCA, we're talking about basic theft. Every country in the world has laws against that.
Where did you get "kill" from my post, exactly?
Also, I know it goes against Slashdot "fashion", but digital copyright theft DOES have analogues to physical theft. That's why I used the newspaper example. The newspaper company is telling you where to get the chocolate -- it doesn't contain the stolen chocolate. You get the newspaper to stop hosting the ads (kill the torrents). Simple and effective means to get to the real crooks (going back to the analogy, the ones physically stealing the prerelease copies of the movies out of the studios).
"Learning the basic difference between the Nordic (Scandinavian) country of Sweden/Sverige and a country called Switzerland/Swiss/Suisse/Schweiz/Svizzera located between Italy, France and Germany would be a nice start before tooting your horn about either country's laws."
Honestly, dude, I don't really give a damn, since I don't know of anything Sweden or Switzerland produces that has any commercial value. My point was to provide an example. If we want to be stupid about that, substitute "meatballs" for "chocolate". Doesn't invalidate the argument.
And it has nothing to do with "tooting my country's laws". I personally think the DMCA is mornonic, but we aren't talking the DMCA here. We're talking basic theft which EVERY country laws for. I can't take stuff out of another country, run back to my own and expect not to be extradited.