AT's position on piracy

[silent tone]

I haven't read every thread on what legal matters are allowed on AT, and I don't remember all the controversies I have read. But I have been around a while and keep up with the Hot Deals forum often.

I get the impression that if somebody were to admit that they stole a person's bike, or robbed a Blockbuster for DVDs, that they'd get a vacation or banned. OTOH, I've seen people specifically admit they pirate music, software, movies, etc. without any response. Why is this? I thought that AT, being a content producer may have a particular opinion on this. I seem to recall some other hardware site stole AT's HTML layout or review content or something and they were met with legal action(am I imagining this?).

 

[amdskip]

Pretty much any stealing of any form is prohibitted on the forums. Honestly the moderator staff is just unpaid volunteers and with so many people posting it is impossible to monitor every post of every thread and take care of any offenders. There was something a while back about someone stealing some format from AT but I don't remember what it was exactly.

I'm not speaking for any admin or mod but this is my take on the subject.

 

[Angrymarshmello]

If they just flat outright say they stole it then usually the mods take action if they see it. However, stating something vague like "My Ocean's 11 DivX movie has weird sound to it" could mean that either they downloaded it or they ripped it themselves. Without actual proof/admittance from the person that they indeed engaged in illicit activity, it's hard to ban them.