Yikes.

This is especially awkward considering the top post on the our frontpage right now is a TorrentFreak article citing my best efforts to curb away copyright infringement on this community. Lets get down to what's going on.

Who?

On March 14th (9:26 PM UTC) we received a modmail from a Reddit Admin with the following message.

Dear Moderators,

TL;DR: This is an official warning from Reddit that we are receiving too many copyright infringement notices about material posted to your community. We will be required to ban this community if you can't adequately address the problem.

First, some background.

1. Redditors aren't allowed to submit material that infringes someone else's copyrights.
2. We (the Reddit admins) are required by law to process notices from people who say that material on Reddit violates their copyrights. The process is described in the DMCA section of the Reddit User Agreement.
3. The law also requires us to issue bans in cases of repeat infringement. Sometimes a repeat infringement problem is limited to just one user and we ban just that person. Other times the problem pervades a whole community and we ban the community.

This is our formal warning about repeat infringement in this community. Over the past months we've had to remove material from the community in response to copyright notices 74 times. That's an unusually high number taking into account the community's size.

Every community is different, but here are some general suggestions.

1. Consider whether your community's rules encourage or tolerate infringing content, and revise if necessary to be more clear.
2. Actively enforce your community's rules. If you need help, recruit more moderators to help.
3. Remove any existing infringing content from your community so Reddit doesn't get new notices about past content. If you can't adequately address the problem, we'll have to ban the community.

Sincerely, Reddit Legal

What?

This was my initial response to the modmail. Reddit Legal states that they have acted 74 times on these copyright notices through removals, but it is the first time we have been officially contacted regarding any infringement where it be through modmail or PMs. Considering our stringent rules against distributing pirated content through this platform, it is unclear what constitutes copyright infringement to Reddit or whether the simple mention of a release name falls under their broad interpretation. Another issue with this is that as moderators, we do not have the ability to see when a user or Admin deletes content. While "admins*" show up as a moderator in our moderation logs, there are 0 actions listed. This means that Admins can remove content at their own discretion and leave behind no notice or log for moderators. We cannot take any precautionary or preventative measures if we do not know what was removed.

Where?

As of now, we are unaware where all these infringements took place. Were they regular posts? Crossposts? Comments? PMs? We reached out via email inquiring on the most recent DMCA notices and Reddit's Legal Support replied:

Hello,

The most recent DMCA notices we processed (which led to the removal of content from your community) came from Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

Regards,

Reddit Legal Support

We replied immediately requesting a list of offending material that was removed and have not received a reply yet.

When? Why?

Reddit Legal states that these repeated infringements occurred "over the past months" but the timeline isn't concrete in helping us analyze when it occurred and through what means. It is also convenient that Reddit has permitted this number of DMCA notices to accumulate without reaching out to us at all. Had Reddit warned us earlier, we would have had ample time to revisit our current rules or make adjustments on what sort of content is permitted.

 

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What now?

It has become abundantly clear in the past months and years that Reddit has never been the bastion of freedom that many people see it as. The many subreddit purges that have occurred in the past few days further confirm it. Reddit's passivity in enforcing its own rules is continuously tested whenever one of its subreddits are thrusted into the limelight by the media. As we wait for more information from Reddit Legal, there is one certainty that comes from all of this,

r/Piracy will be banned.

It is a matter of when. While we continue moderating the community to the best of our ability, should Reddit continue expanding its definition of copyright infringement and blindly react to every false copyright notice, this community's days are counted - not just us, but the many other related communities that openly permit the discussion of digital piracy or encourage it.

We will continue communicating with Reddit Legal in hopes that we can identify what content broken infringement but it would be naive to expect this will be the last time we hear from them.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask.