The second wave was . In 2018 and again in 2022, Reddit’s Trust & Safety team, under pressure from investors and the movie studios, conducted "black flag operations." They banned r/piracy ’s primary megathread for "violating content policy." However, the hydra grew heads faster than it could be cut. For every r/piracy banned, r/PiratedGames , r/GenP , or r/FREEMEDIAHECKYEAH would rise in its place.
This wasn't just chaos; it was a functional, crowd-sourced logistics network. When a major scene release group dropped a high-quality 4K rip of a blockbuster, the subreddit was where it was indexed within minutes. pirate subreddit
The community enforces a strict code of ethics regarding safety: The second wave was