Ok it's a bit far back in this discussion now but going back to my original statement and jayde's response:
I actually don't know much about liam and what he has developed, but from what he's posted it it doesn't seem like this is an issue from a developer's perspective, but rather a personal moral issue. If I'm wrong please correct me. Also, by that same logic of scaring away developers, couldn't this discussion of cracking down on games with copyrighted sounds also do that? They might just decide that if people seem so strict on this, it might not be worth the hassle to develop an audio game. At the very least it doesn't seem any less likely than them being scared off by the audio described stuff.
Also, this thing of us having agreed to the rules and only now complaining isn't true. Most of us have disagreed with that rule from the very beginning because of this possibility, and left it alone after the mods agreed that the things we were concerned about were a bit of a gray area and they essentially conceded to leave it alone.
I'm also not convinced that your slippery slope argument that talking about audio described stuff leads to all kinds of other piracy is valid. The things you mentioned are distinct phenomena, and it is very much possible to crack down on some of them while leaving others.
And lastly, you keep calling it stealing to bolster your argument, but piracy and stealing are two very different things. Consider this, why is stealing wrong? The way I see it, it deprives someone else of what you have taken. Let's say you steal something from someone who created it, it not only deprives them of the payment they would have gotten for it, but also of the item itself that they put their work into, and consequently they can never get payment for that item. Piracy only possibly deprives that creator of money they could have made for that sale, assuming the pirate would have bought it if they didn't have another option, which isn't always the case. So even though both might be wrong, they really aren't comparable, so please stop calling it stealing, because it really isn't.
Actually, with regards to audio described content, where it isn't possible to legally obtain it, obtaining it illegally has no negative impact on anyone what so ever as the fact that there is no legal route to get it means there are no lost sales. I mean we do have a netflix subscription, so they get that money anyway even though a lot of their content is not available in south africa. So what does anyone lose if I get it somewhere for free?

@grryfindore, it is not about who can afford what, although I certainly respect and actually agree with your point.
It is much more about protecting the forum. It is not, and I will say again, it is not, about actually stopping the vault in it's tracks, at all. In fact, when Jayde locked the thread, I told the list as much. "have we stopped the vault in it's tracks", and I will just say again, that is something I did not and still do not want to happen.
I will also say, I begrudgingly agreed, after reading about various copyright cases.
but I would rather protect more than a decade of history on the *one forum* that we currently have, rather than risk it all being closed down because someone asked for a movie. Now, I also think that yes, the chances are a bit slim that we might get caught if we were to continue, but the chance would be there, nevertheless. At the moment we might be dealing with a simple takedown request and can go from there. But what happens if, say, in five years time, things get even more tightened? Plus, who would be responsible? Richard and Sendermen are not responding to things. If they didn't respond to a request, what would happen then? WOuld you rather have a forum that's been around for more than a decade, be seized?
Richard and Sendermen did not respond to me at all. This actually means that I do not even know if they received my email. If they are fine with it, I wish they'd told me then I could have told the list. Keep in mind, I tried contacting them three weeks ago now. They might be busy but why couldn't they have sent me back a short response saying yes we don't mind this continuing, or no, lock the thread immediately and stop it from happening? They didn't respond either way, which meant we were stuck with it once again and the staff had to make a decision.
We're trying to run a forum here, and I had to swallow my personal feeling regarding audio description because of it. This is the price we are paying as staff members. The forum's getting bigger, more devs are coming, but what if they are noticing a bumped up thread saying can I have this or that movie? Would they really stay?

We can't think that far into the feuture, and lets not just be giving it bad thoughts shall we,

The thing is @307:

You do not have 'freedom of speech' on a privately owned and operated forum at all. You agreed to the rules when registering, like it or not. You agreed by registering and if you didn't read the rules beforehand.....then....

@Juan Riena: Given the way the EU is going with tightening up copyright and copyright holders are acting, it's perfectly valid to assume the worst. See how trigger happy the music/movie industries are for example.

The moving of direct links to n off-site forum is a fantastic idea....because it ensures that forum/subreddit/whatever it is will show up on serch engines and then show as hey, we're linking to other people's copyrighted material. Or, in short, it protects this site/forum.

I have to agree with the statement that the chances of some huge ass cumpony like hollywood or 20th century fox seeing this site among the billions that exist sharing around copyrighted stuff is pretty much non existent. I also agree with the argument that what we're doing right now can hardly be considered copyrighted, seeing as these are just mp3 files, no visuals, none of that stuff most sited people actually buy there films for, nothing. So even if some huge ass film directer spotted this site and the bmmv topic, I seriously dout he'd give a shit. We're already a huge huge minority as it is, and considering there's no chance in hell any sited person, AKA the rest of the world, is going to want to watch a film with no graphics, they really wouldn't have anything to worry about regardless. No way would it get to the point of them sending a take down notice. Heck, if they wanted to do the hole cort thing, I'm pretty sure that'd lose them more money than just leaving it alone would.
Now to liam, jayde and all others who are in agreement with there viewpoints.
First of all, I am from the UK, and am fortunate enough to live in a country where audio described content is sort of mostly available on things like netflix, but even there is very, very hit and miss. Even if you find a film with audio description, they're usually done with some crappy tts voice that sounds both robotic and distorted and seriously takes away from the enjoyment of the film. Now, this last point isn't intirely netflixes falt since they're pretty much working with what they've got and probably can't aford to be hiring human voice acters to describe litterilly billions of films, but it's still a huge huge issue. And then there's those films that are actually audio described, but for whatever reason the publishers just don't sell them with it in a lot of cases, that happens a lot over here too, both in shops and when buying them online. It's actually a pretty huge problem.
So with all these reasons combined, I personally don't see a problem with asking for / receiving these mp3 files for free. I receive a small amount of money every month and am hoping to find a job soon, and I have no problem paying for audiogames / supporting audiogame developers, AKA people who actually need my money, but for people who have billions of dollars, but can't be half assed to spare a couple hundred to get there huge ass film audio described? That film, mind you, that is probably gunna earn way more than that in return investment anyway? Yeah, you can take my money and shuv it up your ass.
Now I think I've made my point well enough, I am not going to start demanding that the bmmv topic be re opened. What the mods choose to do with there forum is intirely up to them and them only. I can only say what I've said here and hope it at least opens up there eyes a little bit. Steeling / piracy isn't just black and white. The line between legal and illegal can be a lot more blurred than you might think most of the time.
With all that said though, if someone does open up a new forum, I'm all for it. I'm personally getting sick of all the ag net drama that's been going on as of late. I'd really like a place where I can talk about games / give game updates and the like without having to scroll through pages and pages of drama to get to what I'm looking for. So if someone could do that, I'd be very greatful.

@309, I have told you that doing that is pretty much not possible -- unless, of course, you want to start from an empty database without any users, topics, posts, etc?
@301 and co., you, sir, are a melodramatic drama queen. Jade and co., as you put it in another thread, are not taking away your rights. Your just bitching and wining because a rule, a rule that you *agreed* to, is finally being enforced. You are bitching and wining because a rule that has been there for ages is finally being enforced. This is not taking your right to watch audio-described movies. Wait! That's not a *right*! That's a *privilege*! Woops!
The thing is:
1) There is a rule on this forum that strictly says, without exception: "The sharing or encouragement of illegal material or activities (game cracks, copyrighted torrents that are not in the public domain, etc.) is not allowed." This does not specify "on this forum", "on the internet", etc., because it does not have to; context tells you that it is a rule strictly to this forum and this forum only.
2) This rule has been in existence since the forum was first published, though with varying language.
3) This rule has not been enforced until now.
4) You are unhappy -- no, outraged -- that a rule you agreed to when you signed up is, at last, being enforced by the administrators, and you are outraged that you can no longer violate that rule freely on this particular sector of the internet.
But wait! Sites like Reddit have a similar rule/policy in place:

That "s illegal" (surprise, surprise!) covers copyright violation.
So, no, this little rule you agreed to is not new. You've agreed to a similar, if not identical, rule on every site you've signed up to. The difference is how said rule is enforced. Sites like Reddit use copyright reporting mechanisms; this one uses deliberate moderator action. (Technically, the report function also functions as a copyright report mechanism.) Thus, stop bitching and wining that something you agreed to is finally being enforced by the administration of the site, would you? Acting as though "oh, it'll never happen, companies will never notice" is a stupid viewpoit and only makes you and co. look even worse.
Edit: also, the user agreement of Reddit says...

Must I go on and get you googles TOS, too?

@313, yep, my point in 312. People hate it when rules they've agreed to aren't enforced for ages and then are finally enforced by a compitent administrator/moderator team. I'd think that thy'd be overjoyed, but hey...

This is a done deal, , but if people want to carry on discussing the implications, fair enough, it has aspects that are interesting and stimulating. But for God's sake will the people on the side of viewing the rules as some kind of Gospel stop accusing the opposition of bitchiness, whining, and drama when you yourselves are still here arguing and sniping. I'm sure you're so convinced of your own innate righteousness that you can argue indefinitely and it's only those opposed to you who are causing drama because you're clearly in the right and they won't listen to reason. On the whole we should abide by the rules, but they're just principles not physical laws. It's fine to challenge them. Just because you're defending the rules, doesn't mean you're inherently right about everything.

And you could argue that since some of us registered before that rule was even a thing, self included, we didn't actually agree to that rule at all. When I registered in 2017, the main piracy no no rules were strictly about games. I don't remember seeing any topics about the movy volt or anything similar back then, but I'm pretty sure if one had existed people wouldn't have really minded given the nature of the forum back then. I personally don't think jayde is mod / admin material whatever his other quolitys might be. My oppinion was the same even before the hole bsg drama and everything else kicked off and he was promoted in the first place. He always thinks he's right no matter what, his attatude as of late seems to be more one of act first ask questions later, he can be very oppinionated at times, in fact most of the time, has this kind of strange manner of speaking that makes him seem more like a pollatition than anything, and can acasionally get quite snarky twoords those who disagree with him / criticise him or his viewpoints. Liam has some of these quolities as well, and however good a game developer he might be, I'd honestly never even dream of making him a mod. That doesn't necessarily make either of them bad people or anything, and as much as I disagree with some of his practisses, the way he sort of snarkilly rebuffs anyone who disagrees with him in a similar way to how jayde does, his kind of entitled attatude when it comes to his games and other people borrowing his ideas, see my huntation topic, and his treatment of some game devs like mason, ivan etc, I still have a lot of respect for the guy since he has made lots of very good games before, and has probably helped shape a lot of the audiogaming seen with games like super liam, etc.

@319, it does not. But yes, the rules were very clearly outlined when they were changed. We all agreed on the copyright rule, or 80-99 percent of us did (which overrules the minority), and the rules went into effect. Therefore, you are bound by them. That therefore means that you agreed to them as if you had just registered today and had agreed to them.

ok then if the rule was there since the beginning of time then why is the topic about the BMMB  shows still opened and was only closed this week? oh and we are not sharing direct links are we? look at r/piracy. we are just referring to the audio vault.
and i am sure all users, mods and admins has used the audio vault at least once.
again i go back to my argument. if the 2 owners of this forum cenderman and the other guy didn't respond well why not just wait for them? we have 2, 2, years before this article 13 stuff really takes into effect. that's a lot of time. ask the people who actually built this forum if they will allow it. we need their input.

Nice assumption there.
Speaking personally, I have never used the audio vault. I did have a look at it once or twice, to see how it was laid out, but did not download anything from there.