The general sidebar and the c/piracy sidebars are empty of guidance. If piracy links were clearly allowed, more people would post them. If piracy links aren't allowed, we keep ourselves safe from C&Ds, legal action, etc.

Right now, we have the worst of both worlds: we are vulnerable to legal action AND there is no clear mandate what forms of piracy are allowed so some people don't feel comfortable doing so, so posts trickle.

These I gather are okay because the sidebar links to r/piracy megathread backups:

• Links to a directory of sites that host pirated content
• Links to sites with direct downloads

Are these okay?

• Links to specific releases via bittorrent
• Links to specific releases via sites with direct downloads
• News of specific releases but not linking

Some new users don't even know whether advocacy of piracy is okay. The only thing I've sort of gathered is that in practice, anything goes short of actually hosting copyrighted material on Lemmy servers. And that magnet links are apparently okay according to Dessalines' pinned post (but that should go in the sidebar if true).