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Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

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Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#91

Post by rayiner »

linuxftw wrote: post #47
sedatk wrote: post #26

I'm pretty sure that I'd have stopped with just probation, yes. Having the feds raid your house, confiscate all your gear, and put you through the hell of their investigations for a year was enough of a wake up call for me. The gap between a sufficient punishment and what he actually got is the harshest reality in all this. It's very similar to what people have gone through for small marijuana related offenses.

That's why it's always important the jury be educated on their rights to decide verdicts however they see fit.

Juries do not have the “right” to ignore the law. Juries are required to follow the law as set forth in the judge’s jury instructions. Their job is just to determine the facts and apply the law to the facts. As a legal matter, nobody gives a shit what twelve random people think about the law enacted by the democratically elected legislature.

“Jury nullification” therefore isn’t a “right” it’s a loophole. It arises from the fact that there is nothing a court can do to enforce a jury’s obligation to follow the law in a criminal trial. That doesn’t mean the obligation to follow the law doesn’t exist.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#92

Post by linuxftw »

gameman144 wrote: post #78
linuxftw wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why it's always important the jury be educated on their rights to decide verdicts however they see fit.

I get the appeal, but this is a super dangerous precedent. If we ignore the law and allow juries to convict or acquit based on their personal preferences, what safety do you have when the public hates you but you've broken no law?

> what safety do you have when the public hates you but you've broken no law?

How is that different from today?

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#93

Post by breck »

paulmd wrote: post #86
breck wrote: post #42

This guy is a hero. What he did should not be a crime. It's time for a Freedom to Publish Amendment: Section 1. Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 of this Constitution is hereby repealed. Section 2. Congress shall make no law abridging the right of the people to publish or implement ideas.

I've been on board the "patents need to be repealed or significantly toned down" train too, but, the legitimate counter-argument that I see is that it's going to lead to a rise in "corporate secrets" style stuff. If they can't legally stop people from republishing IP, then they'll make it hard. Denuvo, other DRM, or just go to fully streaming-only for the first year or two after launch. Want to play Battlefield 6, su…

> If they can't legally stop people from republishing IP, then they'll make it hard.

Alternatively it changes the game on how things are built. Building in public becomes the default, lowering the cost for all.

You'd expect a short term variance (downward) while the system adjusts, but in the long run it'd be much cheaper to produce great works, since your material costs will be lower (no royalties) and you wouldn't burn resources on the security and bureaucratic hoops you have to go through today to build and integrate ideas.

Monopoly profits would be finished though. So yes, <1% of the population would arguably be worse off. (I'm in that group, btw).

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#94

Post by naet »

"The server bit the big one, the head of the Education dept. knew who I was and what I knew, and "arranged" for me to go to work for her. I reloaded the server, got all the terminals set back up, and showed her how to run things more efficiently. I had been working there for about a month, and she was getting ready to go on vacation for a week. Two days after she left, they rounded up myself and two other guys that worked in education and shipped us off to "the hole" at Butner Low Security Correctional Institution. They wouldn't tell us why, what we were being shipped for, nothing. Come to find out, the Associate Warden and the head of the education department didn't get along, and the AW had arranged to have us shipped while our boss was on vacation because she and one of the instructors that worked under the Education Director thought they had something on the ED to get rid of her.

So, from the end of August to the end of October of last year, myself and my cell mate got to sit in a room about 9ft. x 15ft. with a solid metal door that had a little narrow window looking out into the hall and a small slot that they opened to hand you your food tray."

Once you're in prison you lose any rights to any fair type of trial and punishment and you can be subjected to awful things that weren't part of your sentencing, like isolation or sensory deprivation in pitch black cells for no reason at all other than the warden didn't like the department head that you did work detail for. It's a broken system for so many reasons. People don't leave prison rehabilitated, they leave prison broken down and even more vulnerable.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#95

Post by wolverine876 »

projektfu wrote: post #73
orangepurple wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm the last person to defend corporations. That said, US corporations definitely don't avoid "paying taxes." The corporate income tax rate imposed by the federal government is 21%. Employees pay income and social security taxes on top of those earnings after. From the moment a company earns income until it lands in the hands of employees the government can take as much as HALF of it. This includes everyone on salary…

No, wages, salaries, payroll taxes and contractor expenses, along with most other expenses, are subtracted from gross profit to make net profit, which may undergo further reduction in various charges (depreciation, etc) before being subject to tax, and then various tax credits may be applied that reduce the corporate liability further. Double taxation occurs when a corporation is subject to corporate tax and then pay…

> Double taxation occurs when a corporation is subject to corporate tax and then pays a dividend, which is after tax, but counts as income to the investor. There are arguments to be made that this is fair or unfair.

Even calling it double-taxation seems like BS. Generally, we tax at the point of exchange: income, sales, etc. Money moves around endlessly. It's taxed when the consumer pays the corporation (often twice! sales and income), when the corporation pays the shareholder, when the shareholder dies and gives it to their kids, when the kids buy a house, when the homebuilder pays their contractors, etc. etc. etc.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#97

Post by ganoushoreilly »

codezero wrote: post #70
tpoacher wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I was a minor and it was 30 or so years ago, I don't think I'm at much risk. I think it was an interesting time in tech and worth sharing some of the details of what went on. Also, most of the people that served time weren't busted because of piracy alone, they were often involved in some adjacent crime like trading credit card numbers, buying/selling stolen equipment, malware, or some other fraud.

I imagine there are a bunch of us "Scene kids" around, Everyone I know that got arrested were the for same reasons. Ironically most of us ended up in very interesting positions / senior positions at a lot of modern companies. Our general rule of thumb was, don't make any money. I often wonder if there are old boxes sitting in storage around universities all over the US, that contain a ton of releases that have been lost to time.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#98

Post by codezero »

ganoushoreilly wrote: post #97
codezero wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was a minor and it was 30 or so years ago, I don't think I'm at much risk. I think it was an interesting time in tech and worth sharing some of the details of what went on. Also, most of the people that served time weren't busted because of piracy alone, they were often involved in some adjacent crime like trading credit card numbers, buying/selling stolen equipment, malware, or some other fraud.

I imagine there are a bunch of us "Scene kids" around, Everyone I know that got arrested were the for same reasons. Ironically most of us ended up in very interesting positions / senior positions at a lot of modern companies. Our general rule of thumb was, don't make any money. I often wonder if there are old boxes sitting in storage around universities all over the US, that contain a ton of releases that have been l…

That anti-profit motive is exactly the one I followed as well! Yep I remembered so many of the boxes we uploaded to were wired into a university network in random closets in MIT and other universities.

Your HN karma is 1337 right now lol!

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#99

Post by BLKNSLVR »

cruntly wrote: post #28
unity1001 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you don't want to do the time, don't do the crime The same thing was told by the persecutors of those who smuggled slaves from the South to their freedom.

[flagged]

Whilst I disagree with your black and white stance on copyright and punishment for breach, this comment is pretty darn funny.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#100

Post by [deleted] »

fullmoon wrote: post #63
cortesoft wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I never understand people who get mad at ‘lenient’ sentences for crimes. There are no crimes I would commit where, say, 1 year in prison wouldn’t be a deterrent but 5 years would be. If the point of prison is to deter crime, then adding longer sentences isn’t going to change anything.

Consider that the secondary point is to separate society from perpetrator.

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