ThePirateBay taken down by the MPAA, and returns

[Zarxrax]

ThePirateBay.org Raided: http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1203

Video of the raid. The cameras are being covered up. I wonder why? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30HF-m_I6yY

The MPAA makes a gleeful press release: http://www.mpaa.org/press_releases/2006_05_31.pdf

Aftermath of the Pirate Raids: http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1205

The United States pressured Sweden for the closing of thepiratebay: http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1206

ThePirateBay Back Online :) http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1209

I can't believe this isn't being discussed :)

The gist of what happened is this: ThePirateBay, the worlds largest bittorrent tracker, and fully legal under swedish law, was raided, presumably after the swedish government was pressured by the United States, who in turn was pressured by the MPAA (nice to know who's in charge here, eh?). The raids were illegal, and not only was ThePirateBay taken down, but all servers in the datacenter were confiscated, knocking off hundreds of other websites, which were in no way related to ThePirateBay. This is currently a huge news story in Sweden, where it occurred, and there are currently organized demonstrations being held in the streets! ThePirateBay is already back up and running from another country.
The MPAA has certainly shot themselves in the foot this time...

[Doobie]

I can't believe this isn't being discussed :)

We were waiting for you to post it. :D

Doom9 isn't about bittorrent or piracy. So, The Pirate Bay has no relevancy here. Maybe that's why nothing was posted until now. Even relevant news often isn't discussed here.

[Zarxrax]

Well, in my view, its not so much about ThePirateBay, per se, nor is it about piracy. To me, this is an issue about the broad reach of copyright laws, and the grip that groups such as the MPAA and RIAA have on us all.

[shevegen]

Well _actually_ as far as I understood, and I add my interpretation:

- ONLY Torrent files were hosted. Hosting Torrent files ARE NOT AGAINST COPYRIGHT because THEY DO NOT VIOLATE copyright. They are more like indexers.
I highly doubt that even the RIAA can do anything about that, and I am sure that IF there will be a court ruling, it will be in favour of hosting services. Big companies dont like laws which are against them, thats why they try to avoid having lawsuits if they cant be sure the law will be changed to their favour (aside from the facts that law suits cost money... there is a reason why MS hated lawyers for a long time ;> )

- They also took down a server which had nothing at all to do with the torrent files nor with any remotely copyright thingy. And this is actually a very questionable thing to do for any police. What was the reason to take it down?
I think in the latter case, the state will have to compensate for this.

The Pirate Bay definitely has now reached more people than ever before, and while I dont use them to find anything, I often visited them to read their great letters. The polar bears running around on the street is my favourite. =)

[kumi]

They also took down a server which had nothing at all to do with the torrent files nor with any remotely copyright thingy. And this is actually a very questionable thing to do for any police. What was the reason to take it down?More than 100 unrelated servers were taken into custody, including 2 P4 servers of mine, valued at almost $5000. Still haven't gotten them back...

They took the whole ****ing server room, in other words.

[videomixer9]

The majority of torrents works again now on TPB and the raid basically hit only people that have nothing to do with the whole thing, all in all one big scandal and this will probably be very expensive for the swedish state, considering the action was taken in favor for some whining companies they should probably make them pay for everything instead of wasting swedish tax payers money. I sure hope the people that are responsible for this ruined there life, what was a big party for MPAA and RIAA and other companys probably turned into their biggest disaster, media coverage is also very high and they got many others angry. Looks like they messed with the wrong people. Maybe this will make politicians remember who's the ruler in a democratic country, it sure isn't some companies.

I hope everyone gets their servers back and will receive a compensation for this.

[foxyshadis]

- They also took down a server which had nothing at all to do with the torrent files nor with any remotely copyright thingy. And this is actually a very questionable thing to do for any police. What was the reason to take it down?
I think in the latter case, the state will have to compensate for this.
I can't speak for other national police, but the FBI does this all the time. When they raid a datacenter or business, they take anything electronic indiscriminately, and it usually takes years to get them back, if ever. That's even if they took systems wholly owned by someone innocent and unrelated to the company raided, and can't function without them. They also practically never get compensation even if cleared.

Pretty much has to be dealt with the same way a company would plan for theft (which in some ways is worse than fire or earthquake).

[Doom9]

Pretty much has to be dealt with the same way a company would plan for theft Although I believe there should be laws with excessively high fines enshrined to sue those that have wronged into permanent slavery.
Behavior like that can ruin ones existence, so there should be adequate protection that this cannot happen.

[videomixer9]

Collect money and bribe politicians before anyone else can do!

[Blue_MiSfit]

I second that.

This is how things really happen.

Except they call bribing lobbying, and instead of doing it BEFORE anyone else can, they do it MORE than anyone else can...