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Four Indicted in Pirate Bay Case
paulraps writes "Suddenly the founders of the Pirate Bay are not so hearty. The four men behind the popular file-sharing site were indicted in Sweden on Thursday on charges of being accessories to breaking copyright law. And this is more than just a shot across the bows. The prosecutor reckons that they can be hooked for 'promoting other people's copyright breaches' but there will be no walking the plank: instead, they face fines of up to $200,000 and the confiscation of all their hardware. 'The Swedish prosecutor listed dozens of works that had been downloaded through The Pirate Bay site, including The Beatles' Let It Be, Robbie Williams' Intensive Care and the movie Harry Potter & The Goblet of Fire. Plaintiffs in the case include Warner, MGM, Columbia Pictures, 20th Century Fox Films, Sony BMG, Universal and EMI.'"
Can be found here:
http://www.realtid.se/ArticlePages/200801/31/20080131132351_Realtid598/B_13301_06_Aktbil_95.pdf
(In Swedish)
..or if I could have been bothered to realise the submitter was just quoting the prosecutor (who is doubtless very aware of this distinction, and will seek to blur it at every possibel oppertunity..)
"Oops, I always forget the purpose of competition is to divide people into winners and losers." - Hobbes
Comment removed based on user account deletion
While you seem to be under the impression that the prosecutor, police and whole judicial system are running errands for the recording industry, only 15 cases of copyright infringement via file sharing were investigated in Sweden last year. So bribes or no bribes, it's not exactly a systematic witch hunt.
Do you have any facts - not speculations - supporting that any prosecutor, judge or police took bribes from the recording industry or its lobby groups ? I very much doubt that.
Oh, I can't help quoting you because everything that you said rings true
Apparently the government thinks so. The US government recently had a Canadian arrested on Canadian soil for selling marijuana seeds on the internet (something that's not illegal in Canada). At no time did this person set foot on American soil, nor did he ever break Canadian law. Everything he did was above board right down to declaring exactly what he did on his Canadian tax return and paying taxes on the income. All profits were even donated to charity.
Yet the US government felt that they had the right to arrest him. More info here: http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5h9Y7CVPeypqV77yWBmI45x_mP9SA.
Tesla was a genius. Edison however was a overrated hack who liked to torture puppies.
The prosecution is happening in Sweden under Swedish law. No need to add gratuitous America bashing to the discussion.
The people prosecuted are prosecuted by swedish laws in a swedish court. Oh, they are swedish citizens as well... You can't prosecute crimes not commited in Sweden in swedish courts. That is mostly a good thing.
Actually its not court fines. It's illegal gains. It's the money 'earned' by selling ads on Pirate Bay.
Like a bank robber are not allowed to keep the money he robs from the bank, the people behind Pirate Bay arent allowed to keep money gotten while doing something illegal.
The sum is the total of all invoices for ads on Pirate Bay which was found as part of the raid of Pirate bay offices.
Just saying it like it are.
Given Swedish law, they don't have a lot of choice except to go after large folks like TPB. They're trying to get a legal precedent set. The accusation of bribe is likely unsubstantiated, but given that a person is a prosecutor do they a) go after folks committing actual evil acts or b) mount a hideously expensive case against folks sharing music and movies?
A moral prosector would of course tell the record companies to find a business model that doesn't depend on supply of expensive physical media for digital content that can be copied for almost no cost. Since sharing actually boosts sales of music the issue is not piracy per se, but rather the fact that open sharing prevents the recording industry from gaining exclusive control of the media. The only way to do this now is to seek to have ISP filtering/spyware/big brother type shenanigans instituted on the government level and to lock folks out of trying to circumvent government mandated via DMCA-like provisions.
The RIAA is playing the long game here to try to become the world's gatekeeper for all entertainment content and the prosecutor for the Swedish government is almost certainly being offered at the very least political influence, if not actual monetary bribes. The lack of a plethora of prior cases should not be taken as lack of an agenda here. When you make a move like this, it is calculated to have the most impact possible, and the RIAA is hoping for Sweden to make another Napster decision. Then you'll see the courts flooded with cases against infringement.
Unbreakable toys can be used to break other toys.
Much like you, I can't believe your statement got such high moderation points.
First off, just because something is a matter for civil courts does not mean it's not illegal. Civil court cases are still based on laws and statues. Illegal means "forbidden by law or statute." Also, you used the term "civil crime", which actually is a contradiction in terms. If something is a matter of civil court, it's not a "crime."
But it's kind of a moot point. As you didn't specify the country you are in, I'm going to have to assume the US. Here's a post explaining why downloading copyrighted material IS a criminal offense in the US:
http://innovationlost.org/free-the-lyrics/2006/04/23/copyright-infringement-is-a-criminal-offense/
And while it varies from country to country, in some of those countries it is also a criminal offense.
"Quite hefty" is a relative term. In relation to the Pirate Bay with four people behind it, the alleged $4m of advertising income p.a. are hefty. Assuming they spend $2m p.a. on hosting (very probably a lot less, actually), they'd make $500k per person and year, quite a hefty salary, if you ask me.
The MPAA members, OTOH, probably consider anything without a "billion" suffix chump change. Their combined revenue is in the hundreds of billions (too lazy to dig up all the numbers, but it's bound to be in the $100-200bn range). They employ thousands of people. DIS alone has some 130k employees. $4m is somewhere in the range of one of their CEO's pay.
He didn't say it was theft, oh pedant. He said it was stealing. It doesn't have to be a physical item to be stolen.
Webster's
steal -
2. to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment.
Apparently, your ideas about copyright are predicated on linguistic ignorance.
I think my post in another sub-thread is very relevant:
http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=436904&cid=22248796
1) File sharing in Sweden is legal, therefore legal considerations are an aside. What is left if not moral selection. This prosecutor is attempting to show that TPB is violating the law specifically with the intent to cause file sharing to be illegal through court decision, which it is currently *not*. Prosecutors prosecuting people for *not* breaking the law are the ones that should be thrown out of the legal profession. Shall we also discuss the prosecutor harassing the members of TPB?
2) I never claimed that choosing to tell the RIAA to pick a new business model was because they were better or worse than anybody else. You may make that claim if you like, but it is largely irrelevant. My statement was meant to show that the government, specifically a member of the judiciary, should have no stake in securing business models that are clearly flawed. If they do have a stake in that, then it would be prudent to question their motives, and by association their morals.
3) I want everybody to decide what is moral, provided they don't mind me disagreeing with them. Going through life without a moral compass, even if that compass points south south east, is not really an ideal thing. In the context of my prior post, I believe that this prosecutor knows that he is doing this at the behest of an industry, which is clearly a conflict of interest with the will of the people, and that he is doing this with the full knowledge that he is being naughty in doing so. Immorality does not require absolutes of morality. You just have to do what you think is bad.
And... moral stand in favor of freedom with totalitarian bias? I have not the slightest idea what you're saying with that one... come see the violence inherent in the system? Help help I'm being repressed?
Unbreakable toys can be used to break other toys.