Er... I *did* ask why the thread of mine was closed but the answer wasn't exactly clear and seemed pretty debatable which is why I brought it up. I wasn't and am not in the slightest bit angry, just very confused by why it happened. This is a fairly worthy public debate matter for a site such as this when you start throwing legailty into it.
You say its illegal, that we were boasting about the ownership of illegal software - well, where exactly, when we were just happily discussing best config files and fps rates? Because we mentioned p2p software? People already know about that...
Truly if you want to question the legality of a thread like that, better question the more plentiful supply of "how can I get (game-x) running better on (emulator-x)?" threads as well. After all, aren't they encouraging people to get the highly illegal full-game ROMs working better? Isn't supporting ROM use in such a way virtually identical to what we were doing with a small, buggy, out of date demo? ROM piracy of FULL GAMES would do more harm than tweaking that little DEMO ever would. Emphasis on the important words there...
Another little fun fact for you. On an average day, getting an N64 rom used to take me on average 2/3 hours with a crappy modem. That's a full, available commercial game remember - say a 40 hour epic like Zelda.
Right now, without broadband, getting DOOM 3 is taking around 36 hours. Which is more encouraging for piracy? 3 hours for a full commercial game of Zelda quality, or a day and a half for an alpha stage demo which in all probability won't run very well for you?
If anyone wants to continue the legality debate here in the fairly intelligent manner we're probably all capable of, feel free.
I personally find it very interesting that a 3-level early demo is being seen as if it were more illegal than piracy of full games. ???
And if anyone regards them as being the same sort of thing legal-wise, please answer the original question and tell us what we're allowed to talk about now, as that puts ROM's out of the question too as they must be equally illegal. IMHO, talking about something like this is no more likely to influence piracy, than playing a violent game is to make you want to go out and blow things up with a shotgun. People are gonna do what they want, and talking about it as we were after the fact affects no-one.
And incidentally, thanks to Martin and Jaz for allowing this thread to continue btw. Nice to see two high-class people finally recognising what's *really* been going on around here lately, and I have great respect for you both for that.
EDIT: Gee, long post even by my standards.
