I think a lot more happened there than just piracy. Just based on what I heard, I certainly never had an account on any of the sites... . Perhaps over time, more will be known publically. SA lead to 4chan and 8chan, many conspiracies started on these sites as memes. Look at 8kun for example. Behind the scenes of sites like SA existed a large collection of questionable groups. Just imagine the bandwidth needed and the kinds of political connections required to keep it off of the radar. Also consider how the whole Warez scene operates in general. Experienced programmers writing cracks, leaked movies and tv shows, drugs, etc.

Kind of like the silk road before the darkweb.

Hopefully more will be known over time because there are some crazy stories.

Not that I would know anything about any of it