The problem with these people is that they have made a lot of money. And as such they are prepared to protect their investment.
I phoned up their ISP last year and said that they were selling copyrighted material. Their websites came down for about an hour or so and then I got a phone call back saying that their solicitor had been on the phone saying they had rights to all these games and I had to provide copyright documentation or it was going back up. I said to the ISP, have you seen these "rights"? And they said "Erm, no. But we've not seen anyone elses either and they were our customer first."
I phoned several of the companies who were still alive (codemasters etc.) and they basically told me "Piracy you say? Thanks for bringing this to our attention. What platform? Amiga? 1991 you say? Goodbye"
In desparation I even called FAST (federation against software theft) and they again told me there hands were tied unless one of the companies, with written proof of copyright ownership, got in touch there was nothing they could do.
AmigaGames / Butterfly Media (what ever you want to call them) is "above the law" in this area until someone with some time and money and more importantly documentation and a lawyer/solicitor can go after them.
If you want to send them some hate mail, they stoopidly used their real name and address in Swindon for one of their earliest Domain Name registrations
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Why was it acceptable to pay £2 a disk at the car boot in the early 90's
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I dont know what it was like in your area, but in our "scene" it was never acceptable to pay anything (except postage and media costs). It was ok for no-one to benefit financially, or the authors/publishers to benefit, but never the traders. "Share and Enjoy".