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Pirate Bay Announces Sale to Swedish Company For $7.8 Million
paulraps writes "The Pirate Bay is to be bought for $7.8 million by Global Gaming Factory X, a Swedish company specializing in internet café management software, the company has announced. As well as taking over the controversial brand, GGF has also bought Peerialism, a small IT company with roots at Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology, which has developed a new file sharing technology. The acquisitions mean that GGF will be at the heart of 'the international digital distribution market,' allowing it to introduce a new pay model for file sharing." Reader pyzondar adds "However, the press statement also states that the deal will only go through 'if GGF and its Board of Directors can use the asset in a legal and appropriate way.'"
The technology is legal, some of the files shared may not be. That will depend on your local legal code.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
The tough sell out. As would I. That fine's gotta get paid somehow.
>> 'the international digital distribution market,' allowing it to introduce a new pay model for file sharing."
So, it'll be Napster 2. Big corp buys out great service for the tech alone and uses it to further corporate greed.
And here we were thinking the TPB founders were selfless Jedi helping file sharers and making the digital world a better place for all. They SOLD OUT!!!
TPB was nice while it lasted.
The "owners" of the TPB haven't made a profit: they've asked for payment to a fund for "internet projects" instead. This will presumably be some interesting new political statement.
They also aren't actually the owners as such: TPB was sold in 2006 to a shell company specifically to avoid any legal problems for the founders.
The buyers will find that they've bought another Napster: i.e. nothing but a recognised name, with a value proposition that fades away like fairy gold once the free content goes away. TPB founders start up another interesting project, with boatloads of cash to fund it, and away we go again. If you ask me this is a pretty smart move: the establishment will effectively be funding a new political project around the freedom to share...
Well, there goes the best of the great torrent sites. I'll bet dollars to donuts that this new company attempts to Napsterize the site, turning into a pathetic shell of its former self.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Just like supernova before em. Well that's the end of that..
Well not really. It will be called something else except they probably won't have a cool name.
Personally I don't really approve of piracy because it hurts Open Source alternatives and wouldn't trust anything downloaded from PB to not have trojans on it these days.
That said, I think as a political movement they are something else. Hopefully that money will be used to help the EU Pirate Party in future elections.
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
Something will pop up in it's place. The idealists are misplaced. The rest will just find a new way, but with the lessons learned.
Of course it was always about the money. People really don't believe that they believed all that stuff they were saying, do they? I mean, come on. Information wants to be free? Etc?
I prefer Cory Doctorow's method. Let the artist decide. Artists that are signing contracts that sign away their rights to decide don't get to bitch afterwards. They took their money.
What was the point of going through the court proceedings? Why, money, of course!
Also, as evidenced by Kazaa, Napster, Suprnova, and I'm sure many others that I didn't personally use, taking a free piracy site (sure, sure, pirate bay has a few legal uses, but lets be honest here) and turning it into an "innovative pay model for sharing" just doesn't work. You're fan base does -not- transfer. Apples fan base, yeah, they buy things, iTunes can work. Jimmy down the street downloading bootlegs? Not buying. GGF just wasted 60 million kroner.
Ssshhhh! Let them think they won! Maybe they'll go away for a while.
My blog
I know that it's just a domain, I know that something better will show up. I even know that in the great scheme of things this is actually a good thing. ... but somehow I can't help feeling sad. It is the end of an era. R.I.P. TPB
right...
Right, because I really want Twitter linked to my downloads? When I download I want to be as anonymous as possible, that means no personal information save for my IP (which most people should use a proxy anyways). Having Twitter which might have info on my phone number which then would make it trivial to place a 100% undeniable blame on someone.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Long Live TPB 2.0, whatever they decide to call it. Not to be confused with TPB post buyout which will have a presence and relevance much like that of Napster post buyout, IE, none at all. When will companies learn that just because you bought the name, doesn't mean you've got the people. People don't go to TPB because of the name, they go because it offers something they want, once you stop offering that, then people stop coming, it's so simple even an MBA could figure it out (eventually).
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
TPB, as a community is atually probably quite safe. Between DLing from trusted people, and the comments that warn quickly if it's a scam.
And I am willing to bet sites the TPB are a far bigger concern to the mdia companies that software. Of course my view is probably skewed as I run Linux, so have no interest in bootleg software.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
The lesson to be learned here is that you can never win against the government, because they have the unique ability of coming up with cool-sounding names for things they just plain don't want you to do just because. "yeah, you can't share trackers without knowing what they're pointing to, because, because... because you can know, you just don't want to, so if you can know then you should know, you can't just choose not to know, because then you get what you want and we don't get to stop you. so I'll name this "willful blindness", because see, you're wanting to be blind to what you're doing, as in, you're choosing not to see the files... get it? pretty cool, I know. but anyway, back to the subject, yeah, you can't do that."
See what this phrase did to us? Free Software was about freedom, giving the users choice, and all those warm and fuzzies. Open Source can be hurt if the users decide what they want.
P.S. I've seen more trojans from Sony and retail games.
You are assuming the people were accustomed to, or at least had heard of the open source alternatives before turning to piracy. Usually that isn't the case. I don't think people accustomed to open source software turn to pirating their commercial alternatives that often.
The lesson to be learned here is that you can never win against the government, because they have the unique ability of coming up with cool-sounding names for things they just plain don't want you to do just because.
No, the lesson is that the law actually takes notice of the real world, and that shell games like the GP suggests only work until the laws are updated to reflect the reality...
Shell games and the like, which really do willfully ignore the copyright violation going on, feel unethical and are something I would rather not associate with. Not to mention the fact that narrowly technical claims ('not actually hosting copyrighted files', etc.) are disingenuous and, in effect, simply shift all of the blame, and criminality, to the file-shareres themselves.
If the spirit of the law says that you're not allowed to share copyrighted works, then the letter of the law should and will eventually reflect that.
The thing to do, IMNSHO, is continue working to change the spirit of the law. The goal should be to make the law reflect the fact that people should be able to share copyrighted works, as long as they aren't making money on it. Otherwise, the buck has got to stop somewhere, and someone - either the trackers, the users, or the network - will eventually have to take the blame for breaking the law.
The English word fart is one of the oldest words in the English vocabulary.
In the end, it just turns out to be a bunch of people scamming others so they get rich. So now can we get off this delusion that the owners of the pirate bay are heroes somehow out to protect our rights in the face of evil corporations?
Tesla was a genius. Edison however was a overrated hack who liked to torture puppies.
And that is bad why? The pirate bay may have swung the pendulum too far against copyright/IP law but that is a natural and just reaction to immoral laws. Most people would have respect for IP laws if they weren't so severely imbalanced. Yes some would still break the law but its hard to argue that a 5-7 year term for copyrights/IP with severely limited options to extend is immoral. While it's easy to call the current system of lifetime plus 20-70 years as immoral. When you might die of old age before the creative works made during your *grandparents childhood* is public domain, its easy to dismiss stupid laws like that.
The Goal: A long simple life filled with many complex toys.
I'd be concerned - if the 7th circuit wasn't a US court. TPB is not in the US, in case you didn't know.
Now one should bear in mind that the former partner have quite a grudge with Pandeya so while what is being said (Pandeya is a douchebag) do seem accurate the source is obviously very strongly biased and use quite a few "he did this he did that, check it out."
Pandeya may indeed be the douchebag he is described as with nothing but hearsay/gossip or quite possibly the anonymous former partner is engaging in some serious asshattery while masquerading as AC.
"I have downloaded hundreds and hundreds of records, why would I care if somebody downloads ours?" Robin Pecknold
sure, just as soon as you let go of your delusion that sharing is scamming
The idealist in me agrees. The cynic in me asks where the deep pockets to do that are. And the realist in me says that people will simply ignore an unpopular law.
cpghost at Cordula's Web.
We obviously have a different idea of honesty. They have used the legal system to protect what is essentially a political project, and disconnected themselves from it financially so it *cannot* be stopped, no matter what happens to them. They are quite open about it. They are not allowed to make any money from TPB and won't benefit personally from this sale.
The spirit of they copyright laws was to have works move into the public domain, not feed greedy companies and their hired politicians for all eternity. Just wait until that crappy disney mouse is about to expire again, the copyright period will be extended. Watch the Beatles material do the same.
It's time to rewind these copyright extensions and start seeing material coming into the public domain.
I don't really see how. At the end of the day, they're just promoting making unauthorized copies of digital media.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Are these 'shell games' ethical? Probably not. Is the piracy of copyrighted material ethical? Most definitely not. However, I still can't help cheering for these guys.
Rigging a trial with a judge who is on the board of a copyright industry lobby group pretty much takes the cake as far as 'feeling' unethical, reguardless of whether or not the courts hold that there was any actual bias.
The defendents accomplished one of thier major stated goals, they allowed the proceedings to take on the air of that of a kangaroo court, and in the process were able to sway public opinion in a signifigant, quantifiable manner.
I don't know what this most recent move in this bizzare game means as of yet, but it has certainly been interesting, and I very much doubt it is exactly what it seems.
I wouldn't hold Pidgin up to the same pedestal as Apache... I use XFCE as my preferred desktop, and went as far as to install parts of KDE so that I could use Kopete over Pidgin. On a Netbook... Pidgin sucks *that* much. Seriously. Try using some of the alternatives, and you'll see how badly designed its interface is, and how limited its features really are.
how many features do you need? I think that's WHY I like Pidgin. It has nothing that I personally would consider fluff.
But it's always fun to try something new so what alternatives would you recommend?
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
Not the first time either.
Anyone remember I think it was Loki torrent or something where he asked for donations to fight an RIAA court case but instead just took the money and ran?
The movement for change to copyright, or the piracy movement or whatever you want to call it doesn't need idols for exactly the reason P2P works so well - it's decentralised.
Similarly I think the guys purchasing TPB are idiots, no one in their right mind would trust a torrent site that is corporately owned and says it wants to turn into a legitimate service (not that it wasn't technically legitimate under Swedish law anyway).
Another site will step up and take it's place, the TPB guys will have traded this deal for public support, and no one will frankly care now if they end up going to jail. P2P will continue, with a new site, or perhaps even an existing one - BTJunkie already had a bigger userbase afaik and TPB will be a site no one uses anymore.
Ultimately TPB guys are human, but that doesn't mean this is a stupid move. Even if as they say it is to get money to continue the fight it's a severe blow to their credibility. The best they can do now is be 100% transparent and provide evidence of where every penny goes, if not it's only fair people assume it's gone into their pockets.
Easy, if someone wants crop/scale/adjust some images, then they want some sort of image manipulation program. Say 3 options they run across are:
Photoshop clearly has more features, but the average person also won't use most of them and would not pay $700 for it. Obviously it would make sense to use GIMP or Paint.NET. Now, when piracy comes into the equation, the comparison becomes:
Paint.NET and GIMP kind of lose their appeal, don't they? Piracy hurts both free and proprietary software.
Even if TPB isn't hosting the actual files themselves, they are still providing direct access to the files, essentially assisting many in alleged illegal activity. The fact is in many cases the files are there but one can only get to them THROUGH TPB. It's criminal assistance and questionable motive. That's what gets these guys in trouble.
For lack of a better signature...
The thing to do, IMNSHO, is continue working to change the spirit of the law.
Enough said.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
In no other industry would this sort of business model be legitimized ...
Well, not quite. There are hundreds of perfectly legitimate Chinese manufacturing companies out there who regularly rip off competitors' products and manufacture clones for pennies on the dollar. Does this hurt the "real" legitimate businesses who spend years and lots of money developing products only to have them ripped off and copied within a month of release? Possibly, probably, but the point is this type of behavior is accepted and not against Chinese law at all.
Be careful in labelling a business practice as "illegitimate" before considering that acceptable behavior varies greatly between different regions and cultures. Hell, just consider that in the U.S. alone there is a sizeable number of people who don't see anything wrong with copyright infringement. Some even call for copyrights to be abolished altogether, or at least heavily limited. The fact is when you have a law that is being violated on a regular basis by a sizeable percentage of the population, the law is simply wrong and should be modified or struck down altogether. I don't think anyone can really stand on a moral high ground and point fingers at TPB for being "illegitimate" when the law is doing more harm to people than copyright infringers are.