You pay to rent from stores, you have to give it back. They will even get more money in the long run by renting rather than selling that 1 particular game. Buying used is just like a reduction, you still pay and pay for the asked price.

I just don't think it's right to ban someone for something you can't prove they did. If it's because they are trying to start a fight, that's different and that would have to be a judgement call, but if they are simply just discussing a topic like piracy, and they aren't posting links or helping anyone else pirate a game, I just don't see how that is bannable.

The game companies don't make any money out of rented titles or used titles so in that sense it is the same as getting a pirated copy.  I don't like getting pirated copies of games as i think if you want to play the game and feel it is good enough (and want to see future games from the developer) than you should pay for that.  At the same time i don't see any reason not to download older titles instead of buying used games, or if you are looking for an older title that you would be getting used also.  Pretty much unless you are buying a game brand new it is the same as "stealing" it to the developers revenue.

The difference is Mircosoft actually KNOWS they have modded consoles. The Mods here can't prove someone actually pirated a game.

The difference is that when a person says they've pirated (i.e. they've "confessed"), there's no legitimate reason for that statement that I can think of. In a way, they've already proven that they did the deed: a confession is one of the greatest peices of evidence that can be entered against you. After all, why would you lie about committing a crime? Every year, tons of people get jailed based exclusively on their confession. And in this case, there's no good reason for a person to lie about their past misdeed. So under those grounds, I think a ban is justified.

Now, if you were to say that merely being a pirate (admitted or not!) is NOT a bannable offense, I'd agree. There is nothing in this site's rules or terms of use that say that BEING a pirate can cause you to be banned. Hence the link I posted earlier: it seems to be an unwritten rule. And I hate unwritten rules. Especially here, where there is an explicitly stated rule against posting links to/asking for links to piracy materials.

This is the internet after all, people have been pretty well known to tell lies to make themself sound cooler. And unwritten rules are bad, I agree there, but banning someone for pirating just seems kinda, wrong, pirating a song is no different then pirating a game, and I have to bet that if someone said they pirated a song, they wouldn't get the same backlash as they would for pirating a game. double standard.

Why do you have to prove it anyway?  If somene confesses to a crime the authorities don't continue gathering evidence. 

Anyway, people seem to be under the misapprehesion that Vgchartz is a democracy.  It's not, it's a benevolent dictatorship.  If ioi or the Source or whomever decided they don't want admitted pirates on their website because they feel those people's actions are harmful to an industry they love, then they are perfectly within their rights to do so. In fact they are perfectly within their rights to do so without any justification. 

OT: Spend three years working on a research paper, have someone steal an electronic copy and publish it under their own name.  You can have the original, after all the person didn't really steal anything, but three years of your life and any acclaim that you may have gained are gone.  You think this isn't worth something, you think this isn't worth protecting?

Since when did pirating a video game involve changing the credits and republishing it? I think that's a little bit different then pirating a game. And if they don't want admited pirates on the site, it should be clear and say that.

You are taking something that doesn't belong to you, therefore it is stealing. No IF's, AND's or BUT's about it. Please go to jail now.