Unfortunately, I'm kinda siding with Hasbro on this one. If you're spending however much money and time on a show you're going to want to see some kind of financial return on it. Alongside that, however, you have to make it easy to legally access the show in the first place, otherwise I'm not going to blame someone for stealing it. Half the seasons of King of the Hill have never been released on DVD and so I'm going to say go ahead and find it online. I'm not respecting silly copyright laws if it means the loss of something with real artistic merit.
The alternative to this is taking something really old, something the creators are unlikely to be affected by, like, say, old Thomas the Tank Engine episodes. Okay, yeah, you can buy the DVDs, but considering how much of a juggernaut the franchise is watching the old episodes is unlikely to do any harm in the long run. ESPECIALLY with a new film coming out in a couple of years. A better example is maybe TMNT episodes: only the first 2 seasons, as far as I know, have been released on DVD in the UK and there's no way I'm trekking across eBay for a bunch of old videos.
The point I'm trying to make is that MLP: FIM is an insanely popular show by most standards, but does that popularity necessarily turn into profit? Is watching and discussing a show online enough to sustain it? If you really love something in its infancy like MLP: FIM, maybe you should contribute to it financially where possible, to give it the attention it deserves. Otherwise, you're coming across as somewhat entitled, and moaning for getting caught in the act of stealing somebody's work.
There was a great show on BBC recently called Mongrels. I thought it was a really quirky and imaginative show, but it got cancelled after its second season because nobody watched it. I would hope MLP: FIM does not meet the same fate.