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Italy May Hold Its Own Pirate Bay Trial

Posted by timothy on from the keeping-up-with-the-johannsens dept.

hyanakin writes with an excerpt from TorrentFreak: "Following the Swedish verdict, Italy is now considering starting its own trial against the people involved with The Pirate Bay. This would be the first criminal prosecution against the Pirate Bay 'founders' outside their home country." Funny thing: almost 20 years ago, CD stores in Germany all seemed to be full of bootleg concert CDs pressed in Italy.

4 of 120 comments (clear)

  1. How... by Darkness404 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    How can they be tried in Italy? That doesn't make any sense unless the founders A) Lived in Italy B) Had Itallian bank accounts or other finances C) Did (physical) business in Italy with a physical presence.

    Really, this doesn't make any sense.

    --
    Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
    1. Re:How... by TheSpoom · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Thank you, this is exactly what I was thinking.

      My guess is that they believe that because it happens "over the internet" (duh-duh-DUH!) it's an international issue and that they may be able to get them extradited. Which, y'know, is stupid, but then, that's government for you.

      --
      It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
      - E. Debs
    2. Re:How... by Darkness404 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      But that doesn't make any sense either, because then you could get sued for a situation like this:

      A) Create a website that violates some law in one country that is part of the EU, such as distributing Nazi texts which (as far as I know) is illegal in Germany, but legal in some EU nations such as the UK (where they actually have some shell of freedom of speech)

      B) The website is hosted in a legal country such as the UK and all maintainers of it live, work, and have all financial ties in the UK

      C) Germany brings charges against you

      That just doesn't make any sense (not that most governments do), and seems contrary to having independent nation's laws rather then general EU laws.

      --
      Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
  2. Those Bootlegs Were Legal by Telephone+Sanitizer · · Score: 5, Interesting

    > Funny thing: almost 20 years ago, CD stores in Germany all
    > seemed to be full of bootleg concert CDs pressed in Italy.

    In fact, it was perfectly legal to record a live concert and sell the recording from Italy if the bootlegger opened a bank account and deposited a royalty for the artist.

    There was even an official stamp issued to those bootleggers who registered with the Italian Authors Society.