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Court Rejects Massive Torrent Damages Claim, Admin Avoids Jail (torrentfreak.com)
A former torrent site operator has largely avoided the goals of an aggressive movie industry prosecution in Sweden. Against a backdrop of demands for years in prison and millions in damages, the 25-year-old owner of private tracker SwePiracy was handed 100 hours community service and told to pay $194,000, TorrentFreak reported Tuesday. The torrent website in question is SwePiracy, and it has existed since 2006. Naturally, it became the target of many anti-piracy outfits. In 2012, the website was shut down in a coordinated effort with anti-piracy group Antipiratbyran. The report adds: Earlier this year its now 25-year-old operator appeared in court to answer charges relating to the unlawful distribution of a sample 27 movies between March 2011 and February 2012. The prosecution demanded several years in prison and nearly $3 million (25k kronor) in damages. During the trial last month, SwePiracy defense lawyer Per E. Samuelsson, who also represents Julian Assange and previously took part in The Pirate Bay trial, said the claims against his client were the most unreasonable he'd seen in his 35 years as a lawyer. After deliberating for three weeks, the Norrkoping District Court handed down its decision today. SwePiracy's former operator was found guilty of copyright infringement but it appears the prosecution's demands for extremely harsh punishment were largely dismissed. The torrent site operator avoided a lengthy jail sentence and was sentenced to probation and 100 hours community service instead.
That should be 25M Kronor - 25 MILLION.
Yes, it is. That is why people are going to jail. Wrong is a subjective term, and he who has the gold makes the rules.
Except for the obvious. (Powerful Hollywood got the laws they paid for).
Can anyone explain why copyright infringement is a criminal offense?
For contrast, note that Comcast was fined $2.3 million for ripping off customers with fraudulent charges.
Comcast's statement on the fines reads:
[Comcast's statement] "...also alleged that the FCC "found no problematic policy or intentional wrongdoing, but just isolated errors or customer confusion." When pressed about that phrasing, Comcast representatives clarified that "there was no finding or admission of liability in this Consent Decree."
(Emphasis mine.)
As someone pointed out, Comcast recovers $2.3 million in revenue in about 15 minutes.
Our government is completely against the people, and for the companies. This has to stop, whether by election or armed revolt is, at the point, immaterial.
he is more like the getaway car manufacturer or the contractor that made the road.
or in a more us example the gun manufacturer. lets see when was the last time any of them were held accountable!!
It's actually worse than that: "damages was dramatically reduced from millions to ‘just’ $148,000, payable to movie outfit Nordisk Film. On top, the state confiscated $45,600 said to have been generated by SwePiracy."
So nope, the guy is very broke I imagine.
popular file-sharing sites make tens of millions of dollars a year in advertising revenue. he can probably pay with cash :p
Do you want to buy a bridge?
it's in my head
You're giving him too much credit. If he made the car or gun, it would be like him making and distributing and profiting from the bittorrent client software.
He is more like a magazine ad for the gun show where someone bought a gun that was used in a crime.