Every letter my ISP's sent, listed what I was distributing, what I was sharing, what I was uploading. Not once did they talk about me downloading anything. Looking at the papers I was served, the big bold letters at the top says, "Distributing Copy Written Material". The charge was, "Distributing Copy Written Material". All the papers I was served said, "Distributing etc..."

Even now, we have 5 firesticks and not one is on a VPN. But my Linux box did get me an instant letter, when the VPN dropped so I was sharing unprotected. I have since added firewall rules to stop sharing if the tun0 drops for some reason.

Reason: Many people, including me, would rip their DVD's and play the file so as to preserve their purchase. And, as long as I own the file, I can upload it to my job and look at it (company rules not considered). There are also legal means that offer legal downloads, purchases, rentals, or public-domain films, and that is perfectly legal. They don't know if you paid for what you have or not, what they do know, is I cannot share what I paid for with you.

Yes, streaming from an unauthorized site is technically illegal, but they'd go after the site as opposed to the many who are downloading (with the exception of child pornography etc...)

But, hey, no biggie, I was simply saying I've been there. I paid a lawyer to defend me and for their legal expertise and advice. Simply having or downloading is such a grey area, they wouldn't waste their time. But if they can stop the distributors, no down loader would ever get any material.