[lordCarbonFiber]

I think the biggest deal is the profit aspect of the situation. If there was a person earning money for every person that he tells where Tarantino's script (in some fashion analogous to Gawker's add revenue from site hits) is your analogy sounds a lot worse. Publishing that link wasn't any kind of public service, they were using Tarantino's unreleased work to make a profit and he has grounds to sue for that.

[farginay]

But is it illegal, or is this simply a civil thing?

[lordCarbonFiber]

As the law stands it looks like it is illegal (http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap5.html section 3 subsection D [or search for link]). It looks like the linker is only protected if they don't have knowledge that the link is infringement and doesn't receive any financial benefit from the action.