[mc808]

That's a terrible analogy. Try: "Yes, making meth is illegal. Yes, selling meth-lab kits is illegal. Okay, maybe publishing instructions for building a meth lab is illegal. Wait, linking to someone else's instructions is illegal? And now you're telling me that sharing a short hash that validates someone else's link to someone else's instructions is also illegal?" (Is it even illegal in the meth lab scenario?)

[roel_v]

Why, yes, of course. Or are you saying that as long as there are enough indirections and 'wink wink nudge nudge', anything is legal? So I'm a drug runner and it's illegal for me to take your money and point you to the guy at the other side of the street who has your stuff, but it's OK when I give you a piece of paper with a map to a rock under which is another paper with a phone nr which you need to call that will then tell you to walk to the other side of the street?

Or let's say I'm an electrician who wires indoor marihuana plantations. That is illegal. Do you think it would be OK to stand next to some other guy and tell him what switch to connect to which socket and which tools to use to strip the wire? 'Oh your honor I was just distributing instructions on how to build a plantation, not doing it!'. You might want to prepare your diddly hole when you rely on such argumentation as a legal defense.

Again: INTENT MATTERS. When something is done with enough proximity to actual illegal actions, that 'something' is quite likely also illegal and punishable. Which is why Uncle Fester is a free man and Kim Dotcom isn't (well only barely).

[vacri]

In your analogy, TPB acts as the middleman, hooking the user up with the supplier. Yes, when it comes to meth, that's illegal.

[mc808]

I was referring to the example of publishing a hash code for a torrent. So it's like saying "Someone told me that there is a drug dealer (haven't verified this myself) where if you add up the GPS coordinates of his house, divide by 317 and take the remainder, the result will be 42."

It's not at all obvious that saying "42" (with the other operations unstated) is or should be illegal speech, and it's by no means comparable to putting a small bullet into somebody.

[vacri]

I don't know about you, but when I go to TPB, I'm not greeted with a bunch of pages with nothing but simple low numbers. I'm greeted by a search engine, which shows me great lists of things by TV show name (for example), which I can click on and get taken to a page where someone describes what's on offer with this 'number', and other people comment on the quality. I can get the torrent hash, and also instructions on what to do with it. It's generally not something that needs to be verified very often, either.

And in any case, if someone says "hey, where can I get meth", and you say "42, just deconstruct the number with this algorithm", you've done the same thing as just handing over a phone number - you've facilitated the contact.

[MichaelGG]

It's actually illegal to share instructions on how to make "controlled" substances? That sounds utterly abhorrent.

[vacri]

If it was instructions on how to make a movie, I don't think anyone would have a problem. But it's instructions on where to get illegal goods. It's not like the receiver is going through a recipe themselves like they're baking a cake.

Don't get me wrong; I torrent tv shows and the like. But what I find silly is the way people are trying to boil the intent and action away from torrenting, spin-doctoring it to sound as innocent as possible.