I never thought I would miss the 2000s, but here we are. During the era, the 2000s didn't feel like it had a specific flavor. Like, at least to me, the 90s had a distinct identity. The 2000s just felt like a trashier, shinier expansion pack for the previous decade. However, there was one key difference that separated the two eras: the 2000s gave us our first taste of free entertainment. That's right; I'm talking about the golden era of Kazaa and Limewire, when every illegal download potentially came equipped with more viruses than the CDC.
My favorite part of the illegal download era was the anti-piracy commercials that used to run before movies. In these intense 30-second spots, billion-dollar corporations would essentially correlate downloading Madagascar 2 to hacking the UN. It was a hilarious time. In the video linked above, the brilliant British sitcom IT Crowd offers their hysterical send-up of those old-school anti-piracy ads, and it's one of the funniest bits the show has ever produced.
