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ThePirateBay Will Rise Again?
Posted by
Zonk
on Thu Jun 01, 2006 08:31 AM
from the can't-keep-a-good-torrent-down dept.
from the can't-keep-a-good-torrent-down dept.
muffen writes "IDG.se has an interesting article up giving more details about the raid on PirateBay, and a little history of the organization. The news organ reports that nearly 200 servers were taken, and many of them had nothing to do with the torrent-serving group. After yesterday's raid, the site is back up with a single page explaining the situation. Brokep, one of the people behind PirateBay, claims that the site will be up and running within a couple of days. He also says that there is no legal basis for the raid against them and that he is certain that the case will not go to trial." From the site: "The necessity for securing technical evidence for the existence of a web-service which is fully official, the legality of which has been under public debate for years and whose principals are public persons giving regular press interviews, could not be explained. Asked for other reasoning behind the choice to take down a site, without knowing whether it is illegal or not, the officers explained that this is normal."
Related Stories
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News: ThePirateBay.org Raided and Shut Down 1189 comments
An anonymous reader writes "ThePirateBay.org, a longtime fixture of the BitTorrent community, is currently under investigation. Slyck.com is reporting their servers have been seized by the Swedish police." What's really interesting about them is the strange political power that they held in their homeland. There was much discussion even of a political party. This will be interesting to watch unfold.
Offsite: BBC Coverage
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News: Pirates, Web 2.0, and Hundred Dollar Laptop 339 comments
A few quick updates on some recent Slashdot stories in Slashback tonight. We have some additional information on the ever-interesting hundred-dollar laptop, the ongoing flap over the trademarking of 'Web 2.0' for conferences, and the shutdown of the Pirate Bay site. Read on for details.
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Cross Link & Clickies (Score:5, Informative)
I myself live in America and the only way I can find information on this political party is online. I wish that there were more official resources in English aside from their site [piratpartiet.se]. There seems to be one page with the content exactly the same as Christian Engström's post.
Is it possible that this party is popular via lack of information? I would like to see them explain their strategy & give very detailed specifics about what they would like to see changed and why. I think that if this was posted, it may cause them to lose some support but would definitely let Sweden & the rest of the world know a lot more about the Pirate Party. I like their desired end results but how to plan to achieve these goals?
I don't want to sound like an ass but in my opinion, having 200 servers of a controversial party raided and confiscated by the local government is one of the best things that could happen to said party. Especially since nothing incriminating was found on them. Do political parties now earn "street cred" like this? Certainly would strike a chord with the youth & idealists. Hmmm, sounds like pretty unlawful search and seize action
Dennis: Come and see the corruption inherent in the system. Help! Help! I'm being repressed!
King Arthur: *seizes the servers* Bloody file sharers!
Dennis: Oh, what a giveaway! Did you hear that? Did you hear that, eh? That's what I'm on about! Did you see him repressing me? You saw him, Didn't you?
Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:4, Informative)
Popular via lack of information? It's a Swedish party, for Swedes. If you can't read Swedish, you probably won't be able to vote for them either.
And that's the way it is. There's plenty of information there, but it's in Swedish.
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Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:4, Funny)
I'm not swedish, and my reply was an attempt to
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Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:5, Interesting)
Which makes your sentence much more funny.
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Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:5, Interesting)
Link Here [gardianul.ro] (in romanian - but the picture is worth a thousands words)
The jail term for software piracy in romania is up to 15 years (more than rape) and in a few days the police arrested almost 100 people for this - with the only proof being an IP address.
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Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Translation, please - ! (Score:5, Informative)
If it sounds strange to you, don't worry, that's what they actually wrote.
They are targetting LAN DC++ users (and LAN hubs) right now.
It is unknown wether they will extend this to torrent users of well-known ISPs or not.
___
The following is the translation of the bolded text in the article:
A hysteria broke all across the country following operations directed towards those who illegally use the "share" option in the so-called neighbourhood networks (translator note: LANs spanning users from a few buildings up to a few city blocks). Sources from the MAI (translator note: Ministry of Internal Affairs ? well, the police anyway) have declared the operation is code-named "The Gramophone".
Because in the IP-rights category Romania got a "yellow flag" warning from the EU, Romanian Police has enacted measures regarding weekly raids organisation in order to control this phenomenon, in all counties.
Within the scope of this endeavour, policemen and prosecutors will work together with ISPs and hub operators. Another method used by the cops to penetrate the hubs is by assuming innocuous user identities.
In Iasi (translator note: rather large city, "capital" of the county with the same name in the NE of the country, region called Moldova), cops and prosecutors have made several household searches, seizing HDDs, computers and switches. In Tulcea (translator note: city by the Black Sea coast/ Danube Delta), over 20 Internet users have ended up with penal records, and cops have confiscated "dozens" of HDDs.
The chief of the IP department from the "Parchetul General" (translator note: the higher prosecuting autority), Monica Otava, has declared that prosecutors all across the country will start [such] actions, benefitting from both legal grounds and the necessary logistics for the "annihilation" of LANs.
The only other relevant (and worying) bit is the following:
That loosely translates into something like this:
*Interviewer* : So, are we to understand that from now on anybody who is connected to a local LAN can end up with the police holding a search warrant at their door?
*Monica Otava* : Yes, anytime, he can end up with a search warrant at his door
Well... no comment.
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Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:5, Informative)
Though I am not an expert on Swedish law, I doubt there was anythign exactly illegal in this operation, though it was obviously heavy handed. European law works quite differently compared to US law, so any comparisons are useless.
If there was no reason for this seizure, of course compensation will be paid and if the evidence used to justify it was flawed or faked or the wrong kind, senior police officers may or may not face disiplinary action.
Of course, the police in Sweden have been caught lying and faking evidence before, such as when covering their backs after shooting someone (who was unarmed) in Gothernburg during a demonstration there a few years back.
I'm not sure how that ended up.
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Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:5, Funny)
The guy is still dead.
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Re:Cross Link & Clickies (Score:4, Informative)
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The MPAA did it (Score:5, Informative)
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Good luck (Score:4, Funny)
Or, as anyone who knows a smidge of Spanish calls them, "The The Tar Tar Pits."
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you are SO wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
I have personally witnessed this violation of rights BS and been the target of cops at *completely* peaceful protests where they went apeshit under some orders and attacked the crowd, going back to civil rights days, pre-anti nam war days, and from then onwards. Not to say violent protests don't happen as well, I won't deny that, but by no means are they all, most usually at least start out peaceful until the overt or covert(yes, this happens) functionaires start the violence, giving them the excuse to go nuts. I have seen it too many times now to not know this isn't SOP with them.
It does no good if you can't assemble where the action is, 10 miles down the road behind a fence is not "the right to assemble",the government has placed illegal and unconstitutional restrictions on a right, they have said you need "permission" to exercise a born-with right. This is illegal. That right no where states you have the right to assemble where THEY tell you to assemble. That's something they just started doing because they got the guns and follow orders from their "superior beings" whomever those entities are.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."
It does not state you have "some" rights to assemble or that you can only assemble in some designated "zone". Show us where it says that, I have provided the full quote. If you can, I'll concede gracefully, but I have read that numerous times in my life, and can't seem to see those little clauses you insist are there. If it is public property, you have a right to assemble there (obviously personal private property is a different subject entirely), you have the right to your speech, and the right to be heard with your petitions, whether the petitions are oral, written, or visual, as petitions could take any or all of those forms. We the people have a right to tell our elected folks what we think about what is going on. Period. If they keep trying to dodge the petition, they are violating their duties as elected people, no matter what media form the petition is in. They can't refuse the petition. They can't legally order their mercenaries to keep you away from them when you are trying to deliver your petition to them, but they constantly do that. I know why of course, it's because by and large they are mostly corrupt crooks and want to keep their cushy well paying jobs and positions of "rule" over people.
If you got a political beef, you and your peers have a right to assemble, and to petition the government. That's it, it is that simple ancd clearly the intent of the founders. they were just coming from a time where the redcoats broke up crowds, told them they couldn't be in the town square in a group, arrested "ring leaders' for their "speech", kept them from "petitioning" the crown's authorities, etc, that's why the amendment was written exactly like that. It is beyond clear. They do NOT have the right to restrict you in such a way that they are dodging their duties as governmental workers/politicans/or functionaires, they are REQUIRED to listen to your petitions as acceptance of their official office, to follow the laws. Yes, they have to listen. They still might not agree with your petition, but they have a duty that goes with their oath. And if you come in a group, to show solidarity and the numbers,i.e., an assemblage, too bad, that is a free persons right.
They are NOT RULERS, we are NOT SUBJECTS, much as they and apparently you seem to believ
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PirateBay will rise again? (Score:5, Funny)
Seriously - of course the pirate bay will rise again - what they were doing was not illegal under Swedish law.
Re:PirateBay will rise again? (Score:4, Interesting)
The mpaa (pdf warning) [mpaa.org] press release is the usual drivel:
Hate to break it to the spinster who wrote this, but it does appear (though IANASL) that their actions were not illegal in Sweden, and it seems to me that PB never said they were immune to copyright law; just that their specific actions didn't fall under that particular law in their particular country.Like I said ... might as well charge them with speeding; it's equally related.
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Re:PirateBay will rise again? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:PirateBay will rise again? (Score:5, Funny)
Maybe you should tell the people at http://www.google.se/ [google.se] that directing people to copyrighted works is illegal in Sweden.
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This is bad... (Score:5, Funny)
"criminal police?" Oo (Score:5, Funny)
the police are criminal?
well at least in sweden they tell it like it is.. i guess Oo
Re:"criminal police?" Oo (Score:4, Interesting)
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Sounds familiar... (Score:5, Interesting)
"...the site will be up and running within a couple of days" Hmmm, thought I heard that once when ShareReactor got raided a couple years ago.
http://religiousfreaks.com/ [religiousfreaks.com]They were ready (Score:5, Interesting)
At least, I hope so.
Best of luck to them
Re:They were ready (Score:4, Interesting)
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Don't make me ask (Score:3, Funny)
Exactly where on the author's anatomy is this organ located?
MPAA (Score:5, Informative)
Seems like Swedish authorities gave in to the pressure from **AA groups. This may be good as it will put the general public on the side of TPB.
A poll [aftonbladet.se] in the largest evening newspaper in sweden shows what people think of the takedown of TPB. The question in the poll is, is it right to "attack" people that are involved in filesharing. Ja = YES and Nej = NO. The results speak for themselves.
MPAA Document title : (Score:5, Funny)
Hmm... How are you going to sink a bay ? Isn't it already full of water ?
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Re:MPAA (Score:5, Informative)
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right ... but wrong. (Score:5, Informative)
WRONG: so it IS illegal for Pirate Bay to do what they are doing.
Pirate Bay was NOT, under no circumstances, authorizedly or unauthorizedly redistributing copyrighted works. There were NO copyrighted works in PB's servers. ".torrent" files are just files that contain the following information: "the tracker XXX is keeping files YYY, ZZZ, TTT available for bittorrent swarm downloading." And "contributory infringement" is NOT part of the Berne convention... it's an USofAn "innovation". BTW, down here in Brasil there is no "contributory infringement" either.
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The Purpose of Copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The Purpose of Copyright (Score:4, Interesting)
"Rights" cannot be sold or transferred. If, for example, I decided I never want to vote in a public election again, can I then sell my right to vote to someone who is otherwise not elligible? Could I sell my right to vote to someone so they could vote more than once? Why then can we sell "copyrights"?
The whole idea of intellectual property is really out of control and clearly well beyond its original intent. (In fact, the notion of intellectual/creative property is well beyond the intent of copyright and patent.) Will there come a day when things are restored? Will that pendulum swing the other way?
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Re:WTF? There's no reason why a CD should cost $20 (Score:5, Informative)
Bzzt, wrong.
What it takes is hard work. Being the son of a career musician, I can tell you that it is not hard to make a -very- decent living making music. What it does take, just as any other career, is years of constant work building a name for yourself in your community, and then beyond.
Would people please get it out of their head that labels somehow make music as a career viable. My dad has produced and sold several records, tapes and CDs in his career; has performed all over north america, and now in his late 50s owns his own recording studio and takes students. He has a waiting list of several dozen students, and has hired several teachers to help with the load.
You've probably never heard of him. His original music doesnt have raw mainstream appeal, BUT, contrary to your idea, he has made a very good living for himself through his music. And he never had a label around to rape his ideas and keep most of the money.
"Reality" has nothing to do with big buisness advertising, it has to do with hard work. Pure and simple. Does he support getting his music out there via filesharing? Yes. It helps him build his reputation and get other work.
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Since when are the **AA confined by mortal laws? (Score:5, Insightful)
The MPAA can hack servers and harvest private information [slashdot.org] if it wants; not a single MPAA employee would suffer any sort of police harrassment. But someone ostensibly assists violation of MPAA copyrights and BAM! - 200 servers are confiscated by police authorities.
The reason for this is explained in Sterling's account of the first major institutional crackdown [chriswaltrip.com] on hackers, ezine publishers and other dispensers of information which some powerful corporation don't want to see in the wild. From the text:
So police is acting as mercenaries for the big corporations, since otherwise they'd hire their own. Not a very comforting thought, especially considering you are nowadays likely to be arrested for suspicion of violating corporate copyrights. Remember when police and laws were used to protect citizens, not criminialize millions for hurting corporate profit machines...?
They were forced to leave DNA (Score:5, Interesting)
The most amazing thing of all is that the persons that were questioned, were forced to leave DNA. That's totally unheard of, and make one think that maybe this was done, and this will sound completely conspiracy nuts, on request from the US ("MPAA"). Collection of DNA has been reserved for severe crimes; Rape, murder, etc.
Personally I believe the goal here is to make an example of the ISP, PRQ. Taking non-related servers makes perfect sense in that context. They want to make sure no one dares host trackers, even if it's found to be legal! I believe the charges as they relate to "TPB" will be dropped, but they'll go ahead with materal found on the suspects home computers (sadly, it seems they weren't smart/careful enough to not sample their own warez, so to speak). However, for PR reasons they'll blur this issue, making a case against the individuals based on their home computers seem like a win against trackers.
The drama unfolds (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The drama unfolds (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:The drama unfolds (Score:5, Informative)
Let me say up front that I'm for legalizing Marijuana as a substance similar to the way Alcohol is legal.
I checked what I believe is the source of your data:
http://www.drugwarfacts.org/causes.htm [drugwarfacts.org]
The "zero" number you quote is only for deaths directly related to smoking it. The number for alcohol (85000) includes car related accidents. The number of direct alcohol deaths is more like 68400 - not an insignificant number. The number of car accidents related to "illicit drug use" including Marijuana is included in the 17000 number near the bottom. If we count every incident as a "Marijuana related car accident" (which I know is unreasonable) then we still end up with a number comparable to alcohol. What that says to me is that no matter what substance you have available to let people alter their minds with there is a percentage of the population that will do stupid things like drive and take other people out.
I think it's stupid that smoking it is illegal but perhaps something a little more realistic than "it's harmless" should be the message. If you tell people its harmless and the statistics start to show more indirect deaths due explicitly to Marijuana then you risk backlash.
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Re:The drama unfolds (Score:4, Interesting)
It's not entirely without issues, but in general alcohol and tabbacco cause more problems. Most of the marihuana related problems are legal problems (you can get a license to sell marihuana, but not to grow it. Growing is still done in a criminal setting).
We have far less problems with marihuana users then the countries that surround us. I have never seen any form of violence in a coffeeshop, while pub fights are almost normal.
What I'm trying to say is, look at the facts. Don't believe what some company with a big stake in the outcome tells you.
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Re:Think Prohibition (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, you couldn't be more wrong. Most people back then didn't do drugs if they were Joe Six-Pack. However, most people already break the law when it comes to pirating.
Not only that, the RIAA and MPAA want to get rid of fair use.
They want to make time shifting and recording TV shows illegal because using the DMCA they have made it illegal for Joe Six-pack to by pass the DRM.
This is stuff that grandma, Bob the Blue Collar worker, and Sara the Single Mom already do and they don't think its morally wrong. This was stuff they were doing in the 70s and 80s with the VCR and tape recorders.
So this is more like Prohibition of the 30's. People, young and old, don't think it is wrong and they actively do it every day without thinking twice.
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Global Warming (Score:4, Funny)
Piracy, or Pressure to Make Good Products? (Score:5, Interesting)
Some of the other servers were related, insofar as they were also torrent servers. The site known as Karagarga was affected, as was the Asian DVD Club. There was no warrant against these sites, but they are down nonetheless... and I repeat, according to the police themselves, they are not even sure that the Pirate Bay, which they did have a warrant for, was violating any of the laws in Sweden.
What Pirate Bay did more than anything else to bring this massive shitstorm down upon their heads was not facilitate filesharing; rather, they taunted the MPAA/RIAA and their lawyers egregiously and often, and no doubt caused quite a bit of apoplexy among these people over the last few years.
Me, I'm not interested in the films that come out of Big Hollywood. I like old classics, I like arthouse, I like cult, I like rarities. The torrent site I frequent specializes in those genres, and doesn't even allow people to share Big Hollywood product. The site owners don't like the DMCA, but they do comply with it, and consequently have never been bothered by MPAA/RIAA about their activities. In their private forums, they have had a running poll going for most of a year now, which is somewhat illuminating... and overwhelming percentage of the members there (82%), people who are all quite familiar with where and how to download anything they want for free, still buy commercial DVDs and CDs! This data corroborates findings of researchers at major US universities, who have concluded that filesharing does not necessarily hurt the sales of traditional media. The research indicates that filesharing of majorly hyped Big Hollywood releases (like a new STAR WARS movie, for instance) has a small but noticeable negative impact on ticket sales and DVD rentals, but that filesharing of more obscure fare actually has a significant POSITIVE impact on ticket sales and DVD rentals -- it exposes more people to the work in question, and consequently, more people go out and buy a commercial copy of it.
It seems that the real problem is not that filesharers are evil 'pirates' who are cutting into MPAA/RIAA profits due to their wicked refusal to pay for culture... the problem is that when you buy a cinema ticket or buy/rent a DVD, and you have never seen the film or heard the album before purchasing, you are far more likely to spend money on movies and music that you ultimately find disappointing, and people don't like that. Filesharing should properly be regarded by Big Hollywood as pressure to stop making such a tremendous amount of recycled garbage, stop using marketing as the ultimate focus and raison d'etre of every film and CD produced, and get back to the old school traditions of making fine art for fine art's sake, with marketing a strictly post-production affair that has no say in what scripts get chosen or how directors do their jobs.
Would you buy a car without taking it for a test drive? Would you pay for clothes without trying them on? How many times have you walked out of a theater after a film, or ejected a DVD from your DVD player, and wished for your money back? All the actual hard data that has been collected shows that even hardcore filesharers DO go out and buy commercial DVDs and CDs; they like to own the tangibles and they like to support the artists and companies whose work they appreciate... so filesharing isn't piracy, it's more akin to trying something before you buy it, and rejecting it if it's poorly made. MPAA/RIAA's strident insistence that filesharing is piracy is simply their bid to retain their obscenely high profits without doing the tough job of making products worth buying. They prefer to work according to formulae and sell the same tired bullshit again and again, with explosions and special effects in lieu of actual
It will not rise in Sweden (Score:5, Interesting)
This is all classified, but leaked to a very authoritative (as BBC) TV channel in Sweden.
Therefore, the swedish government is determined to ignore the law, as has happened so many times before.
Look for the pirate bay in the free world, i.e., in china or something.
Re:As a record store owner, I hope not (Score:3, Funny)
Anyone that grabs someone by the shirt in a store is going to get sued... I don't believe this story is credible. Plus, someone that sells christian music and calls a patron a "bitch". (Not that christians don't cuss, but again, if the guy is having problems clothing his kids I doubt he's scare off a customer.)
Old troll - no longer amusing. (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:As a record store owner, I hope not (Score:4, Insightful)
Boo hoo.
Do I cry that my 5th generation industry was stolen out from under my feet? Do I cry that my grandparents and parents endured hardships? No. They rolled with the punches and my dad worked construction/trucking. Maybe you should look into another industry. You smell the times changing, so react (you are allowed to do that, you know). Here's your plan: Get into another business and do it fast. You can keep your house if you're smart. No one is going to be crying over your family drama on Slashdot. Don't be emotionally soft and don't feel sorry for yourself. Pick yourself up and move on. Sell the store or change your business. It was a fun 12 years but the trend is over.
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As a troll store owner, I hope not (Score:4, Funny)
I bought the store about 12 years ago. It was one of those boutique troll stores that sell obscure, lame jokes that no-one laughs about, not even the people that make them. I decided that to grow the business I'd need to aim for a different demographic, the geek market. My store specialised in trolls - stuff that geeks find hilarious and/or annoying. I don't sell sick stuff like Goatse or Tubgirl, and I'm proud to have one of the most extensive In Soviet Russia sections that I know of.
The business strategy worked. People flocked to my store, knowing that they (and their children) could safely purchase trolls without anuses or violent diarrhea. Over the years I expanded the business and took on more clean-cut and friendly employees. It took hard work and long hours but I had achieved my dream - owning a profitable business that I had built with my own hands, from the ground up. But now, this dream is turning into a nightmare.
copy Every day, fewer and fewer customers enter my store to buy fewer and fewer trolls. Why is no one buying trolls? Are people not interested in pop culture references? Do people prefer to watch TV, see films, read books? I don't know. But there is one, inescapable truth - Slashdot is mostly to blame. The statistics speak for themselves - one in three trolls world wide appears on Slashdot. On Slashdot, you can find and read hundreds of dollars worth of pop culture references in just minutes. It has the potential to destroy the lame joke industry, from artists, to troll companies to stores like my own. Before you point to the supposed "economic downturn", I'll note that the karma store just across from my store is doing great business. Unlike trolls, it's harder to copy karma on Slashdot.
A week ago, an unpleasant experience with space ninjas gave me an idea. In my store, I overheard a teenage patron talking to his friend.
"Dude, I'm going to post this troll on Slashdot right away."
"Yeah, dude, that's really lete [sic], you'll get lots of +1, Funny."
I was fuming. So they were out to destroy the troll industry from right under my nose? Fat chance. When they came to the counter to make their purchase, I grabbed the little shit by his shirt. "Zo...you ah going to post zis to your frends on Slushdot, punk?" I asked him in my best Arnold Schwarzenegger/Kindergarten Cop voice.
"Uh y-yeh." He mumbled, shocked.
"That's it. What's your name? You're blacklisted. Now take yourself and your little bitch friend out of my store - and don't come back." I barked. Cravenly, they complied and scampered off.
So that's my idea - a national blacklist of space ninjas. If somebody cannot obey the basic rules of society, then they should be excluded from society. If space ninjas want to steal from the pop culture reference industry, then the pop culture reference industry should exclude them. It's that simple. One strike, and you're out - no reputable troll store will allow you to buy another troll. If the pirates can't buy the trolls to begin with, then they won't be able to post them on Slashdot, will they? It's no different to doctors blacklisting drug dealers from buying prescription medicine.
I have just written a letter to the GNAA outlining my proposal. Suing space ninjas one by one isn't going far enough. Not to mention space ninjas use the fact that they're being sued to unfairly portray themselves as victims. A national register of space ninjas would make the problem far easier to deal with. People would be encouraged to give the names of suspected space ninjas to a hotline, similar to Bust Your Boss. Once we know the size of the problem, the police and other law enforcement agencies will be forced to take space ninjutsu serio
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Re:BAD name (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:BAD name (Score:5, Insightful)
they were just sayin g NA NA NA NA NA NA: you cant catch us!
Yes, that is exactly what they were doing. It's roughly similar to civil disobedience.
They were saying: We are the people, we want things this way. A democratic government is obliged to respect our wishes because we are a majority of the population. Foreign corporations cannot make up ethics and laws to suit their business plan, they require our consent.
They have always been treating this as a political battle, not a legal one. It will be interesting to see how it plays out. Sweden is unusual in that a large portion of the populace is informed about this issue and supports TPB rather than the MPAA. I don't think this is over yet.
This is the stuff that brings down governments.
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