Which has nothing to do with the fact that your explanation is lacking. People can still get the point of a badly explained example. Hell, I myself got the point, do I really have to repeat that it's not the point that I'm arguing, but the exposition of said point?

Again, get off yourself. Do I have to remind you that I made that simple inference just fine, as shown by my reference to the missing information probably being implied for the sake of the argument?

Excuse me, what? Now I know you're not even making the slightest effort to read and/or understand my posts. If anything, it would be "but I wonder if it needs to be more clearly stated that your neighbour knows that the person that damaged his plant is your guest". And even then it wouldn't be a correct interpretation of my words, because I do not wonder if it needs to be more clearly stated: I'm certain that it needs to be more clearly stated. Not because I don't see it being implied, not because I don't get the point, but because there are other possibilities that render the whole hypothesis moot, so it's best to explicitly rule them out from the start.

Please, if you don't even get what I'm saying refrain from discussing it. It only serves to make me lose time I won't ever get back, and to embarrass you.

Get off yourself. Specially considering you just proved you don't even understand what I'm saying. In fact, you don't even understand what you're saying: since when is my neighbour knowing that the other dude was a guest of mine a necessary precondition for the neighbour to a suit involving either my guest or me? After all (and that was one of the points of my first reply to you) he can subpoena every neighbour just in case they know anything. And that should backfire, of course, one can't go just filing suits "just in case".

How do you call it when the same act (linking) is punished or unpunished depending on the level of indirection of said act? Or when an act that may or may not be illegal (because hosting torrents or linking to them is only "aiding and abetting" copyright infringement if the use of said torrents is copyright infringement) is punished despite the inability of the person being sued to know if there was any infringement?

Trying and failing.

How do they know my intentions, by the way? They can't assume I intend to aid on infringing copyright since I have no way of knowing if any given use of what I offer (be it a link, a tracker, or anything else) is infringing. Therefore, it is clear that my intention is not to aid on infringing, because for that to happen I would need to know for sure that there's infringing acts being carried out and not do anything to prevent them.
It's like the old comparison about the guy that sells guns: unless he knew I intended to kill someone, selling me a gun wasn't "aiding and abetting" murder. By that logic, unless I know at least one of the guys accessing the torrent I link to is committing copyright infringement, I'm not aiding and abetting copyright infringement. And given the fact that I have no way of knowing that...

The ones being sued disagree. I, despite not being sued (or having been sued), disagree.

Then they would get sued because even if the uploader had permission to distribute, the downloader didn't have permission to download. Then they would have to make it so you can't access their tracker to download any given file unless you show them proof that you have permission to download it...

To facilitate non-infringing filesharing, obviously. He who runs the tracker has no way of knowing if any given download or upload associated to the tracker constitutes infringement.

That is, if they have the resources.

I can't stop if I haven't started. You, on the other hand...

But you didn't specifically state that the owner of the plant knew it, which was exactly my point. Could it be that you started learning how to read and write last week? 'Cause it sure seems so.

No, we're dealing with a craptabulous analogy and your inability to properly word what you want to communicate. Stating that X is a guest of Y (which is what you stated) does not imply that Z knows that X is a guest of Y (which is the core of your example).

Not really. It's your analogy that seems complicated because of your failure in properly covering certain details.

You're in no position to tell me to shut up. The analogy and the hypothetical are fine, what is not fine is the way you explain it. And the only one that's trolling here is you. So get off yourself and shut up. And learn to behave like the adult I'd assume you are, and not like a spoiled brat that can't take criticism. Grow the fuck up.

Nice double standard. There is no reason to sue me if I link to a page that links to an infringing torrent, and not sue me if I link to a page that links to a page that links to an infringing torrent. Both are links to non-infringing material.
Then again, there is no reason to sue me if I link to a page that links to an infringing torrent, since I need not know what that page links to. Furthermore, the page might have started linking to the infringing torrent after I linked to the page: am I supposed to regularly visit all pages I link to, and cease linking to them if they start linking to infringing torrents? Oh, wait, the MPAA/RIAA will do that for me.

Bottom line: the whole thing is getting pretty retarded. Someone please inject some common sense in the brains of those guys.

Which is something I didn't do.

Great, 'cause I didn't intend to attack the argument. I was just pointing out how it's not a good analogy.

Except it wasn't. I fail to see where you explicitly say the owner of the plant knows that the person responsible for damaging it is a guest of mine. OK, so it might have been implied for the sake of the argument, but that raises the question of how he knew, provided he knew neither me nor my guest. I take it that I told him myself?

*agrees*

And I would obey that order. My complaint was not about the results of the subpoena, but rather about the reasons behind it. You have now properly adressed that, however, so I shall say no more about this.

Except violating the GPL is illegal pretty much anywhere. Sharing pop music and shitty hollywood movies, on the other hand, not so much.

Even if I agree with the rest of your post, there's a little something that I find somewhat objectionable, if only because it's impossible to apply in a rational way without incurring in a double standard:

And if I link to a webpage that links to a webpage that links to an illegal torrent? And if I link to a webpage that links to a webpage that links to a webpage that links to an illegal torrent? And if... Well, you get the idea. Do I have to check every link of every webpage I link to, and every link of each of the linked pages, and so on and so forth, to the Infinite and Beyond?

Also, "illegal torrent"? Even if a torrent file itself could be considered illegal, which I doubt it could be in most cases (it's what an individual user does with that file, or with the contents obtained through it, that could be illegal), what is legal is not always and everywhere a constant. Therefore, do I have to limit my actions or activities just because there's that slim chance that what I do could potentially be used by citizens of some other country to break the laws that apply to them (laws which I need not know, by the way, and which have absolutely nothing to do with me)?
In particular, if websites that host torrent files that allow to download copyrighted works are legal in my country, do I have to deny access to all foreign IP adresses if I build one such site, considering that it is not my responsibility to know if such downloads are legal anywhere else, or if any given user regardless of their origin has the legal right to perform any such downloads under some fair use provision (e.g. if they already own that work, which in most places with non-retarded laws gives them the right to make a copy of it)?

Not so much, even if we take into account only "what counts" according to you.

And that is not the same everywhere, which was exactly my point. Judges and men with guns don't call "infringement" and "aiding and abetting" the same things in all places.

And who claimed they did?

I do not hang any hopes on anything, so don't worry...

The question here would be: how does the neighbour know that I know the dude who damaged his plant? Though clearly, in the case of OBT the ISP knows who the people behind OBT are, but your example, unless the owner of the plant plans to subpoena all of his neighbours, it's not a good analogy. And that's assuming he has proof that at least one neighbour knows something about what happened, which he might not have. After all the culprit could have been somebody completely unrelated to anyone else living in that building.

That depends. Now, I'm not too knowledgeable with regards to swedish IP law (it was a swedish court, right?), but I know there are countries where it's precisely the existence of profit that makes it illegal... Just saying, maybe it's the same in Sweden, maybe not.

Not necessarily. What you call "copyright infringement" may not be considered "copyright infringement" in certain places under certain circumstances. See the recent rulings of courts in Spain regarding that topic, for example.

Which brings me to the major point against the ruling that OBT, TPB or any other simillar site is "aiding or abetting copyright infringement": they are not, because they have no means of knowing if what any given user of their services does is "copyright infringement".

And conversely, if I'm foreign I shouldn't be affected by American laws, unless of course I set foot on their jurisdiction. Now you tell that to Gary McKinnon, for example.