The Pirate Bay on Trial

[Likfisken]

This is worth taking a look at:
http://thepiratebay.org/special/2009epicwinanyhow.php

Peter Sunde having a little streamed internet press conference.

[Irrationalist]

I don't use PB, I prefer other torrent sites and trackers. Still I found this a real disapointment. Its a real loss that they didn't win because it would have made quite the statement.

Long live dead business models and broken business!

I can only hope that this depression will keep culling the weak and take out the RIAA with it.

[Mirdin]

Man, that video brought a smile to my lips and a tear to my eye. Beautiful. You know, for a long time, I was listening to Redeemer and DXM, downloaded rather than bought. I told myself, damn, I'm so buying all these CDs when I can afford them. Overworld came out and I made an oath that I wouldn't fall to temptation and listen to it until I could gather up enough cash to buy all the CDs at once and marvel in the MaSu goodness.

Then economy happened. But I grabbed Overworld off the 'web and it's growing something awful on me. It's the only thing I've listened to for almost a week now. Yesterday when I woke up, the first thing that sprung to my mind was the melody to Stand. Today, after pondering what time it is and if I should get up, I started humming the chorus to Skin.

I'm still going to buy all MaSu's CDs and a T-shirt or two whenever I manage to get a freaking job. But until then I don't see why I shouldn't get to enjoy it. Especially to make this situation I'm in seem a little less depressing. That is how it should be, isn't it? I'll gladly pay for it later if you let me just enjoy it right now!

Goes for games, too. Most recently, Mirror's Edge and Fallout 3. I downloaded them to try them out, I got hooked on both of them. I beat them each once, and now I'm uninstalling them. I want to play more, but now that I know how awesome they are, I'm going to start saving up so I can buy them whenever I can afford it. Gives me something to look forward to, as well. Instead of these overhyped to-be-announced titles that everyone else is pre-ordering. I know what I'll pay for and I'll do so when I'm able, until then I'm going to keep enjoying the things I wish I could afford. I'm not going to sit here and stare at a blank screen at night just because the law tells me to.

[WereVolvo]

Pirate Bay judge accused of bias

... I have no words. How the *fuck* can that happen? That's GOT to be worth a retrial at the very least.

[Gravehill]

I'm not surprised at all. Similar cases have been revealed when new copyright law was pushed through in government. Information and entertainment is power and it's not surprising that those who have copyrights for such things are near the throne of power. Judges, lawyers, politicians... They are closely related to that world. In Finland questions about bias did not lead to anything but I surely hope that it will happen in Sweden.

[olyckan]

Sad parts about this whole trial:

1. How The "industry of media" has failed to produce a service that is as fast and efficient. I my self work in media and its sometimes sad to see how things has to be so damn resistant to changes.. I mean there should be this gigantic library where you can find anything for a reasonable cost..

2. Others then producers and media companys earning money on others achivements.. Yes the pirate bay has been earning some serious amounts of money from advertises.

3. The pirate bay was launched bye money from a Person who actively support right side extremists in sweden... If you are from sweden or understand swedish look up Pirate bay - Bert karlsson on youtube... Where the truth about how pirate bay got started..

[Gravehill]

1. Change never happens without resistance or revolution. "Industry of media" would never change unless challenged. P2P challenges old ideas about methods of distributing ideas and information. Instead adapting to reality "industry of media" tries fight against it by supressing new ideas and their practical applications. What saddens me more than this is that they have had some success in this. Is money stronger than ideas and innovation?

2. For example Google, Youtube and Facebook does same. Is it wrong? That's how it works. Advertisers goes where it happens, where people gather, where new ideas and innovations are abound. They don't advertise there because "other's achievements" are there - they advertise there because PEOPLE are there. It's one and same what brings people there... Is it legal content or illegal. And in TPB there's plenty of both available (and that alone depends where you live - some legal torrents here could get me in jail in China for example).

3. I don't care about someone's political stance - TPB doesn't censor their links, they give people freedom to express themselves through files they share. That's freedom of opinion, it's freedom of choice. I gladly grant and support that same freedom of opinion and choice to whoever who runs such place. Freedom of thought, speech and expression is very basic right of man here in Europe. Anyone who supports those rights is doing good thing there. My personal stance may be in opposite direction than his but I don't mind... The advantage of such technology far exceeds the few ad pennies that might go to other ideas he might support.

[olyckan]

1. Change never happens without resistance or revolution. "Industry of media" would never change unless challenged. P2P challenges old ideas about methods of distributing ideas and information. Instead adapting to reality "industry of media" tries fight against it by supressing new ideas and their practical applications. What saddens me more than this is that they have had some success in this. Is money stronger than ideas and innovation?

2. For example Google, Youtube and Facebook does same. Is it wrong? That's how it works. Advertisers goes where it happens, where people gather, where new ideas and innovations are abound. They don't advertise there because "other's achievements" are there - they advertise there because PEOPLE are there. It's one and same what brings people there... Is it legal content or illegal. And in TPB there's plenty of both available (and that alone depends where you live - some legal torrents here could get me in jail in China for example).

3. I don't care about someone's political stance - TPB doesn't censor their links, they give people freedom to express themselves through files they share. That's freedom of opinion, it's freedom of choice. I gladly grant and support that same freedom of opinion and choice to whoever who runs such place. Freedom of thought, speech and expression is very basic right of man here in Europe. Anyone who supports those rights is doing good thing there. My personal stance may be in opposite direction than his but I don't mind... The advantage of such technology far exceeds the few ad pennies that might go to other ideas he might support.

2. Dont put a = with facebook, youtube, google and the pirate bay. When a producer makes a claim at youtube it is removed.. When producers make a claim at the pirate bay they get an email saying to fuck them selfs... And google is a search engine= map. Pirate Bay isnt a search enging - it has servers that has the key and map to where you can find illegal content. Google = show you where you could if you like steal a "car" (like a map). TPB shows you where the car is and gives you  the tools = a fake key so you can open up the car and steal it= thats helping in a criminal act.. And what is even worse is that other people are making money of it. Its like when alcohol was outlawed in the states.. Since it was outlawed the mob started making money off it.. Yeah I know its a rough example but my meaning is that The wrong people are making money because the industry isnt living in its own time = that saddens me alot..

3. I wasnt refering to what files you can put up on the pirate bay. I was refering to that it was started bye a person who ACTIVELY with money Supports right extremism = racism.. The same person uses The pirate bay to get commercial for his media company = gets more money =he can give more money to this political organisation. Personally I dont care what the fuck peoples opinion is(U are allowed to your own belief) but I do care of my own actions and their conseqvence= I wouldnt use Pirate bay since it with a middlehand supports something that I despy..

Now that sounds like a attack against the pirate bay. And it somewhat is but Not against the service or techniqe itself but rather against the people behind it. Any other similar service that acts properly I really dont have anything against..

Am i against Peer to Peer - no. I Am all for a open internet I would pay good money for a fast and efficient service like TPB and DC++ legally. The problem is that the industry havent provided us with that yet and it needs to happen ASAP.. The verdict of TPB trial could be BAD. look now we have people consuming more media than ever before - the industry just needs to learn how to get money from it = commercials or low costs to download = massive amount of downloads = massive amounts of cash even if the price of a song is half a dollar or 3 swedish crowns..

I sure dont see the people behind TPB as defenders of the freedom of choice or speech or free media. I see them as opportunist that makes good money off something that is broken and then uses thes freedom of choice and speech as a mean for continueing their business..

[Xhu]

A question regarding #2: Wouldn't the "providing tools for a crime" analogy be more akin to something like a safety deposit box or a locker somewhere owned by a private company? TPB doesn't actually upload these tools nor maps. They just provide a place for other people to upload whatever they wish, which is in many [perhaps most?] cases completely legal. And the main point - they do not hold nor spread the copyrighted material. If somebody rents a locker from anywhere, say a train station, to hold stolen money, it is they who are at fault - not the station or any officials. In fact, once again, since they do not store the illegal files themselves, it's closer to somebody hiding a treasure map to said money in this locker. Even less culpability, and slightly more like Google, which merely gives maps to the maps of which you speak, and a much better access to the tools for downloading such as torrent clients.

[Bocom]

A question regarding #2: Wouldn't the "providing tools for a crime" analogy be more akin to something like a safety deposit box or a locker somewhere owned by a private company? TPB doesn't actually upload these tools nor maps. They just provide a place for other people to upload whatever they wish, which is in many [perhaps most?] cases completely legal. And the main point - they do not hold nor spread the copyrighted material. If somebody rents a locker from anywhere, say a train station, to hold stolen money, it is they who are at fault - not the station or any officials. In fact, once again, since they do not store the illegal files themselves, it's closer to somebody hiding a treasure map to said money in this locker. Even less culpability, and slightly more like Google, which merely gives maps to the maps of which you speak, and a much better access to the tools for downloading such as torrent clients.

+1

[Gravehill]

2. Dont put a = with facebook, youtube, google and the pirate bay.

Why? Facebook profits only from people and material they upload there. They don't provide anything else than platform, they merely cash from other's achievements. Legal or illegal the morality and logic of their actions is very same as TPB. Same applies to Youtube. Youtube doesn't achieve anything, they just give space for other's achievements and then cash from it. Our difference is that you speak of law side of that matter, I speak of morals and logic. And law, by definition, is something that those who rule give to their underlings so that rulers could keep status quo. It's nothing more. Now... If nobody questions that status quo how in hell the change is bound to happen? It shall not happen at all without that. There must be some factor that pinpoints the weak points and injustice of some system so that people would actually wake up and see things differently. There must be some catalyst in evolution or else everything stays as it has always been. Now every application I mentioned is just a tool for self expression - each of them can be used to legal or illegal purposes. You can see plenty of examples of such actions for each of case I mentioned. They are just tools and so is TPB. They don't delete torrents because somebody asks them - and why should they? If China asks them to delete torrent about democracy or something that happened on Tibet or some footage of people killing animals for furs should they do it because China thinks that it's best thing to do and that is from China's point of view illegal? Any westerner would say "no", probably. What if - just imagine this for just one second - somebody claims that such material should be withdrawn because copyright reasons - would that be more just cause for deleting those torrents? How in hell should someone who runs such place which merely stores TORRENTS know what is just cause to limit someone's freedom to share files with other users? I still think that freedom of speech exceeds any possible or "might-be" harm done by such application.

Besides I still haven't seen any real proof that filesharing harms anyone. Quite many researches, including certain very fresh Canadian research, points out that filesharers actually do buy more media than people who don't share files. Besides... TPB don't cash out of torrents, they don't cash from files. You can see, search and download ANY or NONE of those torrents there - and advertisers still would pay because people are hanging out there. If someone goes to TPB and search some torrents but don't download anything TPB still gets same amount of ad-money as they would get if that person would download something. So do they cash on someone's work? I think not.

3. I wasnt refering to what files you can put up on the pirate bay. I was refering to that it was started bye a person who ACTIVELY with money Supports right extremism = racism.. The same person uses The pirate bay to get commercial for his media company = gets more money =he can give more money to this political organisation. Personally I dont care what the fuck peoples opinion is(U are allowed to your own belief) but I do care of my own actions and their conseqvence= I wouldnt use Pirate bay since it with a middlehand supports something that I despy..

As I said : "The advantage of such technology far exceeds the few ad pennies that might go to other ideas he might support."

Now that sounds like a attack against the pirate bay. And it somewhat is but Not against the service or techniqe itself but rather against the people behind it. Any other similar service that acts properly I really dont have anything against..

What means "acts properly"? Who decides it? You? Should everyone play nicely with rules that "media industry" has made with big money? Can't nobody challenge them and demand change? Change is good, you said it yourself! And without good challenge there never shall be change... Because people would actually see what kind of crap media houses are force feeding to masses through radiostations, television and so on and so on... Media houses are horrified even from the fact that people are DISCUSSING about new movies on internet because BAD MOVIES won't get as many VIEWERS as they would get if people were not informed about those movies. That's logic of media houses. Are they acting properly? I think not... They are not acting properly in any sense... In any other business such thinking would leave to doom of said enterprise and it's surprising that this form of business has been able to continue to do their job without anyone challenging their logics until now.

I sure dont see the people behind TPB as defenders of the freedom of choice or speech or free media. I see them as opportunist that makes good money off something that is broken and then uses thes freedom of choice and speech as a mean for continueing their business..

I challenge you to go on TPB and try to find alternative news sources about what's happening on world. Youtube does cencor videos that are "too violent" or anything like that... Same applies to other applications as well. TPB does cencor nothing. For me it has been valuable source of comparison material in many cases when I've tried to figure out what's happening on somewhere on the globe. If you are not interested on that kind of things it's sure as hell you can't see good things they are doing there. Educate yourself and try to find something usefull from there - recipes, pictures, news footage (also supplied by those who are opposing governments and so on) and many other types of good stuff that's there. If you are interested only in main stream commercial music and movies that's your loss... There's plenty of other good stuff there too and if you would study your case more you could see good things that TPB has done.

[Ant]

This goes far beyond the music industry, it's a further attempt at a government having an iron fist around its people because they are paranoid little bastards with too much cash and responsibility.

This story hasn't affected me or worried me too much, it's all rather unimportant when dealing with the conflicting thought that your country has quickly become a shadow police state.

[Gravehill]

That's my point, exactly. If some media companies can force their government, USA, to force government of Sweden to do something to some service which is run by Swedes and which has operated according to Swedish laws it seems pretty alarming to me. Should we all act upon American laws and standards of morals? It surely seems so... Otherwise one might end up into trade embargo, into "blacklists" or to be on the group of terrorist states. It feels odd that some other government uses trade embargo card against Sweden just because some service that runs on their soil. I think that alone proofs how big thing this is if even mighty USA is so afraid of such application.

[Ant]

That's my point, exactly. If some media companies can force their government, USA, to force government of Sweden to do something to some service which is run by Swedes and which has operated according to Swedish laws it seems pretty alarming to me. Should we all act upon American laws and standards of morals? It surely seems so... Otherwise one might end up into trade embargo, into "blacklists" or to be on the group of terrorist states. It feels odd that some other government uses trade embargo card against Sweden just because some service that runs on their soil. I think that alone proofs how big thing this is if even mighty USA is so afraid of such application.

Exactly, everyone seems to want to be America, follow its example or accidentally get caught up in a struggle between a free world and totalitarianism when, if you ask me, their culture is something left to be desired and their fragile economy, as we have so recently seen, can collapse at any moment. This is what happens when the very fiber of our existence is placed upon mostly hypothetical money.

[dezo]

Exactly, everyone seems to want to be America, follow its example or accidentally get caught up in a struggle between a free world and totalitarianism when, if you ask me, their culture is something left to be desired and their fragile economy, as we have so recently seen, can collapse at any moment. This is what happens when the very fiber of our existence is placed upon mostly hypothetical money.

I missed you in the bandsection m8 =)