Operators of the The Pirate Bay stand trial

Posted on | February 13, 2009 | No Comments

The war rages on.

Slashdot writes: “Operators of The Pirate Bay stand trial on Monday in Stockholm. The four defendants from the popular file-sharing web site are charged with being accessories to breaking copyright law and may face fines or up to two years in prison if found guilty. The four defendants have run the site since 2004 after it was started in 2003 by the Swedish anti-copyright organization Piratbyrån. The Swedish public service television announced that they are going to send a live audio stream from the trial. It will be broadcast without editing or translation.”

If the Swedish authorities manage to close down the service, shite will hit the fan. Not only technically – a bit torrent meltdown – but also because bittorrent users will then scatter into cyberspace in order to find new ground. Bittorrent technology is evolution, not organized crime or copyright infringement and therefore will never halt. Using (out-of-date) legislation to prevent the use of bittorrent technology on a global scale would be similar to try to stop a tsunami using a bucket. The only outcome will be the proliferation of a myriad of new torrent search engines and trackers – only probably located on the Cayman Islands, Russia and other less regulated havens, out of reach of western hemisphere courts.

Entertainment industry moguls – drop the bucket and re-develop your business model…

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