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First Swede Prosecuted For File Sharing
praps writes "The Local reports that a 27-year old man who allowed people to download a film from his PC has become the first Swede to be charged with illegal file sharing, after a tip-off from the country's notorious Anti-Piracy Bureau. It's a critical test case, as prosecutors say that anything less than a prison sentence would make future prosecutions unlikely." From the article: "The case was brought after a tip off from Antipiratbyrån (APB), a lobby organization set up by the media industry to combat illegal downloading in Sweden. Since the man was reported APB has found itself in hot water, with an Internet company accusing the organization itself of illegally downloading films and games.
A prison sentence for copyright infrigement? Are we loosing the sense of proportion here?
What about murderers? Oh right, they also get prison sentences.
Ugh, for crying out loud. I can only hope that the judges are more sane than the persecutors.
It is still a question if that's "stealing" at all but they just have to put someone in prison for it anyway.
Seems like what they're hoping for is that the whole P2P is a bad dream and if they POP it hard enough, it will all go at once. Next aim would be to put a man on an electric chair, I guess?
So... How hard do they need to abuse the next victim for you to stop downloading? Prison? Ass rape? Work camps? Sheesh.
I thought the headline First Swede prosecuted for sharing files on net was fairly ominous but then I felt better after I read down a bit...
Here's a quote from the prosecutor:
"As these cases do not involve criminals, but instead quite ordinary people who share their files, any prison sentence would certainly be suspended," Rudström said.
Is it just me or does this sound like something that would be said by a defense attorney?
I'm a big tall mofo.
I don't know about everyone else, but copyright violations seem like they should ONLY be civil. This criminal prosecution is just taken to far: congress was even attempting to pass a bill that would make copyright violation a criminal offense in the US! (I dont think it passed though..)
Won't putting these people in jail prevent the copyright holders of collecting damages? (Isn't that the point: that they are supposed to be reimbursed for lost money?)
If this happened in the US, the end result would be that everyone that is ever convicted of copyright violation is going to be punished twice: jailtime plus civil lawsuit...
tip off from Antipiratbyrån
My file døwnløåding sister wås bitten by an antipiratbyrån once...
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Since the man was reported APB has found itself in hot water, with an Internet company accusing the organization itself of illegally downloading films and games.
More exactly: for paying a person to infiltrate an ISP to download and spread copyrighted files there, and later sue that ISP. I don't think the infiltrator was actually employed by the anti-piracy bureau; he just got some money to do the job. Also, it's not known anyone else at APB has in any case done this themselves. It's still of course quite dirty tactics to sue an ISP, and I hope they're not getting away with it.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
This could be the end of the low ratio of torrents deleted vs. the law suits...
"accusing the organization itself of illegally downloading films and games."
Downloading ? No its uploading they are accused of. One informant they hired was the main one responsible for uploading films, music and computer programs to a computer at a ISP who they later got the police to raid and take for evidence.
The thing is a whole mess with basically everyone involved having been accused of misconduct or unlawful activities - ISP, police and the APB.
Just saying it like it are.
i-own-everything
Is that a new Apple product?
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Now this will certainly crack you up, but it turns out that Swedish public access radio (SR) channel P3 did an interview with Antipiratbyrån (APB) a while ago. APB then went ahead and published this interview on their website. Naturally, republishing a recording from radio is an obvious copyright violation.
Somehow, SR discovered this. They brought their legal counsel into the studio, rang up APB, and confronted them. APB's response?
* Firstly, they try to claim that they only link to the audio clip, and not a copy of it. The legal counsel shoots this down immediately citing a court decision where linking directly to a file is equivalent to sharing a copy.
* Secondly, APB claim that what they are really looking for are pirates who make a lot of money from their piracy. As has been discussed pretty heavily in Swedish media, this kind of piracy is virtually nonexistent in Sweden.
* Thirdly, they dismiss the whole thing, because, and this is the best thing: THEY ARE TOO BUSY HUNTING DOWN PIRATES!
This news hasn't really broken yet, and because of easter holdays I believe it won't until early next week.
Skip
Actually, I think he mostly speaks in Swedish, since he's from Sweden. That's a large Country in the north of Europe (an area called Scandinavia), boasting one of the world's best education systems, an extremely well developed technological infrastructure (far better than the US, for example) and very strict ecological standards. The people there have got a language that is different from English (although remotely connected, both being germanic languages). English -- since you might wonder -- that's the language you've just used. Or, well, tried to. Swedish sounds quite different when compared to English. It is much more melodic. "Bork" is not a very common word in Swedish, as far as I know.
Surprisingly enough, the swedish people, despite having this beautiful old language, try very hard to learn and speak English, because it happens to be a very popular language all over the world. It might be that a few of them have a rather strong accent, but you should hear how ridicolous native english speakers sound when they try to speak _any_ other language.
Sorry for ranting. I know you where joking. But jokes about other people's lack of english skills mostly come from persons who have never mastered a foreign language (we don't even talk about their own...), that pisses me off.
And, by the way: I'm not swedish. But all (8) the swedish people I know are extremely proficient in English.
It is forbidden. The police are not allowed to entice a suspect to commit crime in any way.
Opinions stated are mine and do not reflect those of the Illuminati
Modded +4 Insightful for bashing the muppet "Swedish Chef"!
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Next thing, I will mention Kermit the Frog, and will get flamed for bashing the French and swamp-dwellers.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
If you want to see how different Swedish is from English, go to Stockholm.
If you want to see how similar Swedish is to English, go to Helsinki.