Earlier, after review, we blocked and removed several communities that were providing assistance to access copyrighted/pirated material, which is currently not allowed per Rule #1 of our Code of Conduct. The communities that were removed due to this decision were:
We took this action to protect lemmy.world, lemmy.world’s users, and lemmy.world staff as the material posted in those communities could be problematic for us, because of potential legal issues around copyrighted material and services that provide access to or assistance in obtaining it.
This decision is about liability and does not mean we are otherwise hostile to any of these communities or their users. As the Lemmyverse grows and instances get big, precautions may happen. We will keep monitoring the situation closely, and if in the future we deem it safe, we would gladly reallow these communities.
The discussions that have happened in various threads on Lemmy make it very clear that removing the communites before we announced our intent to remove them is not the level of transparency the community expects, and that as stewards of this community we need to be extremely transparent before we do this again in the future as well as make sure that we get feedback around what the planned changes are, because lemmy.world is yours as much as it is ours.
I’m in the middle of litigation, through no fault of my own, and it’s costing between $300-$650 an HOUR (depending on who in the firm is doing what) to defend my position. The firm I am using is great for what I need them for, but up against the likes of Disney I would be ruined, fucking ruined, in less than a year. Living in my car ruined.
Knee jerk or not, since none of you complainers are going to foot the bill, whatever helps the admins of this instance sleep at night I am sure is worth it.
[edit] Also knee jerk or not, the 1st time you find out that you are on the radar could be when an officer of the court serves you with papers.