In the early 80s, the local pirate scene in my hometown revolved around a guy who I'll call George. George's entire basement was devoted to boxes full of diskettes (5 1/4" in those days) of pirated software and photocopied documentation. All kinds of software - games, office apps, scientific stuff, you name it. Some was downloaded from BBS's but the majority of it was shipped USPS from god knows who.

Thing is, he used virtually none of it. He collected software for the sake of collecting it. He didn't even play video games, just loaded them up once to make sure they ran. He was a hoarder basically, who had stumbled into a niche hobby, and like most hobbyists he would happily share it with anyone who asked.

I'm not saying every pirate is like that, or even most, but I am saying, I don't think the pirate scene works without people like that. The music fans are spokes, but people who do it for the sake of doing it are the hubs.