And so my fellow Canadians, the day that we have been dreading in our hearts has finally arrived. A day when our freedoms and rights have been crushed beneath the festering heel of international corporations. We, the just and righteous have finally fallen. They have attempted to snuff us out.
But no. In the words of our immortal intergalactic savior. Never give up. Never surrender. Our beloved captains and fellow pirates Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm and Carl Lundström have finally succumbed to their trial.
That’s right. Oh what a cruel twist of fate for pirates everywhere.
Or is it?
Despite the guilty verdict issued by the courts in Sweden, Peter Sunde has promised that The Pirate Bay will continue to live on! Due to the precise (or not so precise, depending how you look at it) nature of the accusations brought against the 4, The Pirate Bay will continue to run. Only the 4 of them have been accused. And while I’m not saying that the one year sentence and roughly 900K (USD) each that they have to serve, it’s Sweden. Considering first time offenders, I’d say they’ll be out in 6 months. Add good behaviour? Probably closer to 4.
Still though, the case has been watched by all as the trial will surely hold sway over any future cases. The four, while holding no official positions at The Pirate Bay, were told that they worked as a team, and as such their “punishments” were handed out as such. What makes this so very different is that this is the first time charges have ever stuck.
Normally when tracker operators (more on the science behind torrents later) are legally pursued, it is a simple matter of shutting down the tracker. Or moving to a more legal-free zone such as Sweden. This has happened to TPB before. Their server farm was raided numerous times and they’ve moved to numerous locations. This time, rather than bringing charges against a website, the corporations involved chose to go after their owners.
However, because of certain “innocent bystanders” laws, ISP’s will be immune to this decision, so don’t worry about Rogers or Bell getting nailed for people hosting illegal websites. However, this should add some more fuel to the RIAA’s already pathetic fire bringing it up from smolder to candle.
At any rate, there will be an outcry among pirates. Pirates tend to be rather computer literate. And they don’t take well to their idols being messed with.
In response to the outrageous nonsense, I’m going to be writing up a couple posts on Torrents. How to get yourself up and running with them, how to optimize your connecting, and the best places for torrents.
GO FORTH AND PIRATE.
AR.
