10 replies to this topic

[Vyse]

If you're like me, and like to keep an eye on any big cases concerning the internet, you might have heard about these guys. Gottfrid Svartholm (anakata), Fredrik Neij (TiAMO) and Peter Sunde (brokep), all swedes, are some of the most famous people on the internet, and I'm including moot of 4chan fame in that calculation.

The Pirate Bay is easily the largest BitTorrent tracker on the internet, and they claim to take up alot of the percentage of total internet traffic on a global basis. Here's an excerpt from a press conference on february 15th:

Q. How big is TPB today?
Well.. about half of the BT traffic is coordinate through TPB, and it is extreme amounts. About 80% of the worlds Internet traffic is expected to be BT traffic, and about half of it is tracked by TPB. That should be roughly just about 40% of all Internet traffic in the world is somewhat depending on TPB.

Q. How much data are we talking about here?
I cant even begin to estimate it, we have no figures of that.. It’s, It’s a lot. More than I can store at home.
Last weekend TPB was down during a couple of hours and we can see graphs of this.. that about 108 Tb of data was missing from the Swedish Internet. That’s quite a lot during 5 hours.

As you can see, they're big business, and has managed to build quite an impressive empire online.

Graph of torrent trackers --Click here to view--

Psssst; note that dattebayo is on the tracker-list!

I'm also sure that alot of you have read articles about The Pirate Bay, and very few of them are very positive. They have been sued multiple times, only for them to shrug the charges off and get back on their feet. In 2006, the american and swedish government forced the police into raiding the Pirate Bay, taking their servers down. This resulted in a 3-day downtime, and a boom in popularity for the already huge tracker. And now they have managed to get their asses to court once again, this time being charged with various charges ranging from breaking the copyright laws to outright piracy and theft, and they revealed the prosecution claim for damages of 117 million kronor ($14.3 million) in claims for compensation and damages.

While these three guys are in court, the internet is abuzz of activity. Hackers, gamers, online communties and casual surfers... a huge amount of people show their support as these three guys are charged with ridiculous claims, which most believe will blow over and be forgotten in a couple of months anyway. I'm guilty of downloading movies myself, and I'm a big fan of the Pirate Bay and the work they do. They want the internet to stay free, and for information shared on the internet to stay both anonymous and free of charge, and the big guns don't seem to like that very much.

You can read more about what's happening in the links below:
Blog Pirate
Wikipedia's article about the trial
The King Kong defence


So, what do you guys think? Is the internet censorship good as it is? Do you think the Pirate Bay is guilty of these charges, or is this yet another stupid attempt from the big companies to gain free PR and a chance to cut off a HUGE and important piece of the piracy community?

Personally, I'm confident they will win this trial. I think the Pirate Bay works for bettering the internet, and they are heroes to geeks all over the world. The record labels and movie studios etc... well, I don't think they're losing as much as they claim, and to charge a few regular swedish guys with charges over 170 million kronor is completely moronic, and I'm positive that they will be back on track quickly, without anything changed. They'll keep trolling the companies, as they know they're not doing anything wrong, and if they're not breaking the law there's no reason for a trial.

Discuss!

[Pite]

Actually the music recording market is being pirated at the level of 5%.-> Only 5% of the music downloaded is pirated, all else is legal. According to The Economist, 20% of last years music revenue was made on-line and I'm pretty sure songs downloaded through such media like Limewire prompted some people to purchasing albums on iTunes etc.

The same with other stuff... I mean if one gets a free PC games on-line w/o some capabilities (DEMO game but without some on-line features etc.) than maybe it will prompt people to buy the full version of the game.

[BlackLightning]

I should say, Piratebay is pretty much innocent. they only host the torrents and the trackers. its not like they are the 1 pirating the files, I think the governments and the officials are just trying to find a blacksheep but unable to find it, so they go to the nearest one they can find. if they really want to stop the piracy, they should try to locate the one ripping the music/film/movies/anime/whatever instead of the innocent people that does absolutely nothing other than hosting the torrents

[dl316bh]

The Pirate Bay is far from innocent, but that's a long discussion I don't feel like going into right now.

The long and the short of it is that they'll very likely be fine. They have a habit of getting out of trouble and going back to business as usual. Even if something were to even happen to them, it's not like they're the only torrenting fish in town. Merely the biggest.

The truth of everything is that the law still hasn't managed to catch up with the internet yet; and in some ways I don't think it ever will. They're not actually selling the material, which opens up a lot of legal loopholes they'll never be able to fully combat; some have made the case that it's like letting a friend borrow a copy only on a much larger scale and that companies are just sore because they can't cleanly do anything about it.

Edited by dl316bh, 19 February 2009 - 10:14 AM.

[Vyse]

Half of the charges has now been dropped, as the PB has proven that they have not ripped music, dvd's or other copyrighted material themselves and uploaded it to TPB (yeah right, lol). The remaining charges is for making pirated material available to the public, which will probably be harder to win, but to get rid of half the charges in one day is pretty good.

The only way to really shut down the pirate industry is to completely shut down the internet or put up so many censorship filters that the world wide web will stop being a free source for information. If the Pirate Bay owners will lose this, there will be other trackers ready to take over. And I think that even if the Pirate Bay would be shut down, it won't be long before it will come back up.

And I'm with you on what you said Pite. I think most people use torrents to get material that's very difficult for them to find, and if they like it there's a high chance of them paying money to get it when the item in question does come. I live in a PAL-region, so alot of the time we'll have to wait for big releases, especially where video games are concerned, and for some reason big companies keep trying to shut down import dealing as well. If I get to try a game out, I can decide if I want to own the game or not later. The same thing goes for movies and music. To censor the internet to the level these big shot companies seem to want will be to take the internet back in time, and I'm pretty sure the world has enough nerds to make sure that won't fly well!

[jim1982]

It all boils down to weather or not the public will settle for the governments censoring everything and then taxing it. As it stands, alot of governments are eyeing the internet as a potential sources of income to help bailout the econemies.

The pirate bay, or some form of it will survive. People do not like paying too much for various things. And of course, some things are stuff that you can't get in certain areas.

But yea, cases like this will set the tone for the internet in the future.

[Derock]

This won't happen. It does not only apply to Pirates Bay but to other sites, especially websites from China and Russia because of the free sources or something like that I found out. Censoring the whole internet is like the First Amendment.

[Zatren6]

I agree with Pite with respect that losses seem to be exaggerated, and really the entertainment industry is just looking for a scapegoat to put their "losses" on. On the link you sent me, Vyse, with the interview with the Pirate Bay, they made the reference that 2000 is when the online sharing really became popular, and since then the music and movie industry has also been enjoying prosperity.

Pite is right, sometimes these downloads actually stimulate sales. Usually, the reason I download is because the material is simply not available to me by means of purchase where I live, or the product available here is of a lower quality. And yes, if I enjoy something enough, I do go out and try to buy it, if its good quality and the price isn't outrageous.

The simple fact is, it is nigh impossible to stop P2P sharing. Even if most things on the internet are censored, I'm sure hackers and/or "pirates" will find a way. And you know...it may not be a terrible thing.

[Vyse]

When the trial ended on friday last week, the guys behind the Pirate Bay showed the world how afraid they are of the big guns by having a party. They even got a diploma from some kind of internet liberation group of some sort, for their work for "keeping the internet free and uncensored". I think they should wait with their celebrations until AFTER the trial is over, but they're still going strong. The trial might go on for another week, and the tentative end-date so far is march 4th.

The fate of the internet as we know it depends on this trial!

Also, here's the newest banner on their website. I found it amusing, so I figured I might as well share it with you guys!

Amusing comic --Click here to view--

[dl316bh]

That's definitely the sort of banner I'd expect from the Pirates Bay...

It's kind of ignorant though. There is a difference between keeping the internet free and deliberately putting up copyrighted material on the internet for free. It's easy to make fun of the previous BS claims corporations used, but the internet really does have the capacity to cripple some industries as it stands right now. Those other formats and reasons didn't allow millions to download something all at the same time for free, directly taking money out of creators pockets. Basic humans rights does not equal being able to have what you want for free just because you want it.

To be honest, some days I wish Pirates Bay WOULD go under. Torrenting would still survive of course and people would still e able to illegally obtain copyrighted material for free, but it wouldn't be quite so easy. Putting a little effort into it is enough to dissuade a surprising number of people.

The whole things a sticky situation with no real right answer.

Edited by dl316bh, 25 February 2009 - 06:16 AM.

[Kamina-Yoshi]

Freedom for Pirate Bay. 'nuff said.