The internet entrepreneur faces several criminal charges in the US, including copyright infringement.

  • ben@lemmy.zip
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    4 months ago

    It’s hard to feel any sympathy for the guy at this point, he went from odd eccentric file sharing site founder, to adware distributor, all the way to misinformation spreading conspiracy theorist.

        • Refurbished Refurbisher@lemmy.sdf.org
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          4 months ago

          Oh, absolutely, which is the entire point sometimes.

          For example, nobody likes terrorists or pedophiles, so make laws against them, because everyone can agree with punishing them. Only problem is, our system works on precidence and doesn’t limit those laws to exclusively terrorists and pedophiles, but they instead apply to everyone. An example of a bill like this that Congress has tried to pass in the past is to ban encryption, since it helps criminals communicate with each other, but non-criminal civilians also use encryption for communication, amomgst other things.

    • smooth_tea@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Am I the only one who fails to see anything seriously wrong with what you list there? I’m purposefully ignoring “misinformation spreading conspiracy theorist”, because that’s a pretty meaningless accusation and is often added as an easy character assassination rather than something substantial, but I’d like to see you elaborate.

      I mean, we’re talking jail time and extradition, and nothing you’ve mentioned is even against the law in the slightest. Yes, there was piracy on his file sharing site, but that’s true for practically any service on the internet, from Google drive to Amazon S3 and anything in-between and vaguely related.

      Characters like him are targeted because they are both successful and anti establishment, the eccentricity just tops it off. But why should that result in a lack of sympathy? The world doesn’t have enough of these people who rock the boat if you ask me.

      • ben@lemmy.zip
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        4 months ago

        You ignored the adware distribution, if you want to see him spreading misinformation feel free to check his Twitter. It runs the gamut from antivaxxer to literal Russian propaganda.