Somebody idly wondered why some people insist on posting copyrighted material and then advertising that fact on forums such as TMF. Forgive me but when people ask "why", I get this crazy compulsion to analyze the situation and try to come up with an answer. I do that because that's my way of entering the world...to help people understand it. I'd call it an occupational hazard except that I was like that well before my current career. Problem w/asking why is that it's like pulling a leg off a centipede...for every "why" there's a "because" which leads to another "why".
My "because": Because the people who post these things feel a deep need to feel as if they're important, as if what they're doing matters--so deep that they need to draw attention to themselves by the easiest means available. Copying copyrighted material is illegal, therefore attention-getting...and notoriously difficult to prosecute, therefore easy to get away with. Hence it's a means for these people devoid of any sense of propriety or self-worth to achieve their dual objectives without requiring pesky things like thought.
I don't bother advising the criminals against breaking the law. Expecting proper behavior from improper people is pointless. As for the rest of you, I'll say this once and have done with it. Ignoring the behavior and those who practice it is the only way NOT to reward them w/the attention they so richly fail to deserve. What you resist, persists. Protesting his posting the copyrighted material only gives him what he sought to gain by doing so, and that's no disincentive.
Analysis complete. "This is my great lesson. You can take it or leave it."--S. Freud, Lovesick