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Originally Posted by HansTWN
Apparently there was legal action and the site is being blocked for good reason. Will this action reduce piracy? Most probably not. But it does make it more difficult for the pirates to make money and it will make others think twice. It is just like police action against petty theft -- it is never "worth" it. But if society takes no action, then the "bad guys" can just act with impunity.
Are any legitimate users being hurt? Not really, they have plenty of other options. This really only affects the site owners.
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It was a legal civil action, I agree. However, just because it was legal doesn't mean it was just. The UK public is barred from accessing a website and the operators of The Pirate Bay have had their site blocked in the UK even though they could not make any arguments in the court proceedings (since the action wasn't against them). As I said, even if you don't like The Pirate Bay, this sets a worrisome precedent in the UK for site blocking with seemingly little consideration about the harm blocking causes to the public.
Maybe a more apt analogy than petty theft would be the police shutting down a printing press that was printing pro-piracy pamphlets, as well as other material.
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Originally Posted by elcreative
... getting so irate about a site that (by its very name) promotes activities that are not legal, is a poor choice of target... when we start blocking sites without any legal action for no good reason then you are more likely to gather general support from a substantial part of the population.
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Popular speech, like the websites that you describe above rarely need special protection under the law; unpopular speech, like that contained on The Pirate Bay, is where consideration of free speech is actually necessary.