Earlier quoted context omitted.
>specifically that parent suggested people were only hunted for creating/uploading pirated content, not merely participating in the torrent. For all intents and purposes, participating in the torrent almost guarantees that you seeded, because all torrent clients upload as you download.
These are two separate things: * Making content available for unauthorized distribution * Distributing unauthorized content that someone else already made available Seeding isn't making content available, it's keeping content available.
But then if I download a file, create a copy, and share it with you, have I done anything wrong?
To all intents and purposes, seeding is an act of reproduction. You, while keeping your copy, create copies of (parts) of the file and share it to someone else to allow them to assemble a new, second copy.
Whether this is, or should be, a crime is a different question altogether. The main point I was making is that it’s the copying/sharing to other people which seems to be a crucial element in these prosecutions.
That’s likely intentional: the last thing the *AA folks want is a decision that creating a copy of a copyrighted work for your own personal use is not a crime. But it does seem the courts have decided: making a copy for someone else is indeed illegal.