> From like 2000-2010 in the US, you could find Napster or Limewire icons on the desktops of people who would self-describe as not-a-computer-person.

Which, just to add some context, is exactly how people/groups who want to watch football at home does with football streams today in 2026 in Spain, except now also with a VPN of course. Regular football fans who have no idea how/why these streams work or where they're coming from and couldn't tell you the difference between a website and a desktop application, know the website addresses and the know-to about how to access them. Which is why you're seeing the reaction from La Liga and the courts.

> problem might be that LaLiga is acting both as the distributor and enforcer?

Isn't this true in movies and other areas too? HBO and other distributors send DMCA requests left and right like everyone else, as far as I can tell, aren't they too then "the distributor and enforcer" or is that different somehow?

Thank you for the context, that makes sense and helps explain how it's so popular.

> Isn't this true in movies and other areas too?

That's a good point, though now I wonder if there's something particular to the content being live vs. VOD. By the time a DMCA request or equivalent pulls through for live content it might be too late to prevent the primary "theft" of the stream's value, vs. a movie distributed by HBO that has a longer tail of interest.