Recently there's been some uproar in the local anime community because the main distributor of anime in Singapore, ODEX has just sent a settlement letter to an anime fansubber who downloaded one of their copyrighted materials. Now people are complaining well, because they love to complain (not talking about you tk!)

http://www.riuva.com/astuff/letter.pdf - copy of that letter

Now just several points to highlight:

1. Downloading copyrighted material infringes copyright law. And the company who owns the copyright has the right to prosecute. No argument there. Unless you can somehow twist the law. In which case i salute you.

2. In the US theres the mentality that if an anime is licensed for release, distribution of the fansub is halted at least by those who care about the companies who care to spend money to bring the stuff in. Now thats respect. No such mentality here.

3. If your willing to spend money on anime merchandise you should be willing to spend money to buy the medium on which the anime is stored on. Because this directly affects the companies who produce the anime as well.

4. Local fansub watchers know they have been playing a dangerous, illegal game. in the words of TK you gotta know when to fold, before the house crashes on you.

5. ODEX can't and won't bother to persecute you, if your not distributing material for which they have not obtained license for, and which they will not get revenue from. they don't have the incentive to, they don't have the right to, its god damm free speech. So go ahead and choose wisely.

6. http://miyamoto-sensei.com/lolicontrol/2006/12/31/i-talked-to-odex/
According to this the goverment plans to blanket ban all anime downloads. first of all they wouldn't have much incentive to. Second of all they would not be able to (see point 5). The most they can do is publicise via their local mouthpiece the legal persecution. And other speculation is just playing into their hands by driving fear into the minds of fansub downloaders.

So basically the situation has't changed overnight. the stakes just got higher.