does the pirate bay make money off of the distribution of copyrighted material? no, they give it away for free. do you consider what pirate bay does to be perfectly legal? according to your numerous explanations they are in the right for offering copyrighted materials for no cost. yet, some of the admins of the site are in jail now because sweden changed their laws to make what they do illegal, in large part because of pressure from the very industries that want sopa and its ilk. i would love to see you go to sweden and explain to them that what pirate bay does is perfectly legitimate copyright infringement and i'm sure the judge will clear the charges.

so, once again, THERE IS NO WAY TO FULLY SHUT DOWN PIRACY! no matter what you propose for penalties, SOMEONE will always find a way around it, and many people will take it for no other reason than that they can. when it can be proven that over 50% of people who illegally download actually come back and buy the same products they've "stolen", you'll still argue that tougher restrictions should be put in place instead of changing the market to suit the ACTUAL PAYING CUSTOMERS.

if you want to use phish as an example then let's see how it works for them: they have allowed recording of their live shows since their very first performance (12/1/84 or somewhere around that time). because of this, there is an extensive back catalog of shows which lots and lots of people enjoy trading for no more cost than the price to ship some CDs or tapes. when the digital revolution happened to music, instead of CDs and tapes it went to FLAC and SHN files. when phish got back together this last time, they launched a store where they sell certain specific copies of shows for purchase. their informal, but written, request is that any show which is put up for sale no longer be traded for free. because of the loyal fan base (and this is the real key -- LOYAL FAN BASE) anyone who puts up a torrent of a show which is in the phish store is blacklisted and their files taken down. this is phish enforcing their copyright, and exactly how the system is designed to work.

what the movie studios are doing, is to go to the people who have been BEGGING for other formats or different delivery systems for movies and tell them all they are thieves and should be locked up for a felony for up to 5 years because they dared to go outside the normal distribution channels. they berate people who are paying customers and push for tougher laws which continue to extend copyright beyond the life expectancy of the original artist. people are pissed off and there are fewer and fewer loyal fans/customers of the major studios left every year. in the case of phish, the fans actually help with copyright enforcement. in the case of the mpaa, this is what they want, but they're trying to get it by insulting everyone who should be on their side and trying to put them in jail.