About Sweety439's ban and the removal of Windows Primo links...

[Dr Sardonicus]

Originally Posted by kriesel

<snip>
Please stop advocating criminality on this forum.
(Moderators, how much more of that are you going to allow?!)
<snip>

As long as it's only a general opinion to the effect "nobody should have to abide by laws I refuse to try to understand" the user can rant on, however tiresome it may be.

Speaking for myself, I would not rely on any of the factual assertions in any of the OP's posts to this thread.

If the OP wants a haven against enforcement of US intellectual property laws, I would suggest he emigrate to Russia. On March 28, 2022 Russia issued Decree 299, which denies compensation (royalties) to patent holders from "unfriendly" countries. In effect, it allows Russian companies to tear up patent agreements with such patent holders and not pay royalties. Russia considers the United States of America to be an "unfriendly" country.

Although Decree 299 does not explicitly deal with copyrights, I seriously doubt the Kremlin would pass up an opportunity to stick it to Uncle Sam WRT intellectual property.

[retina]

Originally Posted by Dr Sardonicus

If the OP wants a haven against enforcement of US intellectual property laws, I would suggest he emigrate to Russia.

Emigrating seems excessive when simply uploading the contraband code to a Russian based server would probably achieve the desired effect for the OP.

Hint: look for a .ru domain, and then check the IP address to confirm the location of the hosting server.

[Dr Sardonicus]

Originally Posted by retina

Emigrating seems excessive when simply uploading the contraband code to a Russian based server would probably achieve the desired effect for the OP.

Hint: look for a .ru domain, and then check the IP address to confirm the location of the hosting server.

I don't know what you mean by "the desired effect." One effect of the approach you suggest which is desirable from the Forum's standpoint is, the Forum would not be involved in any way.

Effects on the OP might be legal action from the copyright holder, and/or from some US government agency or agencies involved in enforcing sanctions against Russia. While a "cease and desist" letter, a Summons and Complaint, or a house call by government agents might be educational for the OP, it is not clear to me why he would find them desirable.

[retina]

Originally Posted by Dr Sardonicus

I don't know what you mean by "the desired effect."

The OP makes no mention of consequences for themselves, so just this ...

Originally Posted by Stargate38

I believe that all discontinued software should be archived permanently, regardless of the license.

That is the desired effect, it gets archived (possibly) permanently, regardless of the license. I leave it up to the OP to continually monitor it to ensure the permanentness.

[xilman]

Originally Posted by retina

Emigrating seems excessive when simply uploading the contraband code to a Russian based server would probably achieve the desired effect for the OP.

Hint: look for a .ru domain, and then check the IP address to confirm the location of the hosting server.

does the word "conspiracy" mean anything to you?

[ixfd64]

I wasn't involved in the decision to ban Sweety439 but do agree with Stargate38 that the ban was an overreaction. It's fine that Marcel has decided to stop distributing the Windows version of Primo, but it's not in his best interest to prevent others from doing so. He certainly isn't losing money as Primo is distributed as freeware. In this case, providing a mirror is very minor compared to pirating commercial software.

People have hosted copyrighted software for ages without issues. As an example: the Internet Archive has "the largest collection of historical software online in the world." Although abandonware is technically illegal, they have not gotten in trouble for this as far as I'm aware.

According to the logs, Sweety439 is banned for two months. However, several mods have said in the private forum that the ban should stay. As much as I want to remove the ban, I don't think I should be going against consensus. It's a decision that should be left to George or Mike.

[ixfd64]

[mod note] Some off-topic posts have been moved to a separate thread: https://mersenneforum.org/showthread.php?t=28012