Swedish Supreme Court Rejects Pirate Bay Appeal

[Andy Chalk]

Swedish Supreme Court Rejects Pirate Bay Appeal

It's game over for the founders of The Pirate Bay, as the Supreme Court of Sweden declines to hear their appeal.

Jail sentences and stiff fines now appear inevitable for Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm and Carl Lundström, the founders of The Pirate Bay who were convicted [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/91027-The-Pirate-Bay-Found-Guilty] of violating copyright laws in Aril 2009. At the time, Per Samuelsson, a lawyer for Lundström, described the verdict as "outrageous" and immediately announced that it would be appealed, saying, "This is the first word, not the last. The last word will be ours."

That prediction turned out to be somewhat less than accurate, however, as the final word actually came from the Supreme Court of Sweden and turned out to be nothing more than a rather anti-climactic "Pass, thanks." That dead-end at the Supreme Court means that the sentences handed down [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/105683-Swedish-Court-Rejects-Pirate-Bay-Appeal] by a Swedish Appeals Court in late 2010, which reduced the prison sentences but dramatically increased the fines, will stand. The defendants can, and in at least one case will, take the appeal to the European Court of Justice, but that won't prevent the sentences from being carried out.

Samuelsson once again had harsh words for the decision and the court. "The verdict is absurd," he said. "I am disappointed that the court is so uninterested in dissecting and analyzing the legal twists and turns of one of the world's most high-profile legal cases of all time."

It's possible that the four men may not actually go to jail, as it is apparently common in Sweden to knock a year off sentences in cases that are more than five years old, but that decision ultimately lies with the court. Sunde and Neij also no longer live in Sweden, adding another layer of potential complication. Whatever happens, Sunde remained defiant, accusing the courts and even the Swedish government of corruption while insisting that The Pirate Bay has consistently stood up for various worthy causes.

"TPB has been one of the most important movements in Sweden for freedom of speech, working against corruption and censorship. All of the people involved in TPB at some time have been involved in everything from famous leaks projects to aiding people in the Arab spring," he wrote on his blog [http://blog.brokep.com/2012/02/01/maintain-hardline-kopimi/]. "I'm not bragging - I'm saying this to make sure that people understand who's doing the right thing here. I haven't seen the entertainment industry help anyone but themselves."

"Even though the outcome is not favorable for my personal situation, the end goal that we fight for is so much more important than some people's personal struggles," he continued. "I'm just a pawn. But at least I'm a pawn on the morally right side. I'm proud as hell of what I've done and I would not change my involvement in any way. I actually think I could have done much more for the fight. And I will."

Following the rejection of the appeal, The Pirate Bay operators changed the site's domain from .ORG to the Swedish .SE in order to prevent U.S. authorities from seizing it. The Pirate Bay website itself was not part of the trial or appeal process, and thus remains operational.

Source: TorrentFreak [http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founders-prison-sentences-final-supreme-court-appeal-rejected-120201/]


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[Realitycrash]

It won't stop Piratebay, no matter what, and I doubt it will even put either of the defendants in jail. It might force them to pay a fine, but since they no longer live in Sweden...

 

[tmande2nd]

Inb4 All the people ranting about evil corporations trying to squash the little guy:
I really dont feel terribly sympathetic for guys who are basically running a black market on the internet for products.

Piracy is STILL a crime no matter how you twist your words, or try to claim your not a criminal for doing other helpful things. Al Capone did fund some schools yes, but he was still a criminal at the end of the day.

 

[Le_Lisra]

Inb4 All the people ranting about evil corporations trying to squash the little guy:
I really dont feel terribly sympathetic for guys who are basically running a black market on the internet for products.

Piracy is STILL a crime no matter how you twist your words, or try to claim your not a criminal for doing other helpful things. Al Capone did fund some schools yes, but he was still a criminal at the end of the day.

Inb4 all the people trying to chew you for this.

I won't because I really can't be bothered.


The tragic thing is the disinterest of the courts and lawmakers in something *really complicated*. it is not a "this is theft" issue.

 

[CM156_v1legacy]

Shame. As a legal student, I would have loved to see the SC weigh in on this issue.

I don't doubt the conviction would be upheld, however.

 

[Krion_Vark]

The tragic thing is the disinterest of the courts and lawmakers in something *really complicated*. it is not a "this is theft" issue.

Thats what bugs me most about this. Its like hey we don't care so fuck off and rot and pay a massive fine

 

[Meight08]

good riddance to them those fucking douchebags hiding behind free speech saying

TPB has been one of the most important movements in Sweden for freedom of speech, working against corruption and censorship. All of the people involved in TPB at some time have been involved in everything from famous leaks projects to aiding people in the Arab spring," he wrote on his blog. "I'm not bragging - I'm saying this to make sure that people understand who's doing the right thing here. I haven't seen the entertainment industry help anyone but themselves."

They say they are doing the right thing And are schreaming
"!!!!!!!!!!CORPORATE CENSORSHIP!!!!!!!!!"
No that is no corporate censorship, No i dont care what good things they did.
They are thieves and should be treated as such
Lock them up and throw away the key fuckers like him gave sopa the chance to exist.
Fuck any pirate website for giving a reason to censor the internet.
FUCK THEM ALL!

 

[DEAD34345]

-snip-

They are thieves and should be treated as such
Lock them up and throw away the key fuckers like him gave sopa the chance to exist.
Fuck any pirate website for giving a reason to censor the internet.
FUCK THEM ALL!

... What did they steal? Why blame internet censorship on them rather than the people doing it?

OT: I can't agree with that verdict. What they've done might cause certain large companies to make less money, but unless I'm missing something, they haven't actually been doing anything wrong. The thought that company losses are enough to bring legal action against people is a disturbing one indeed.

 

[MPerce]

I dunno about this high horse the Pirate Bay founders seem to be on, talking about the good they've done for the world (....you run what basically amounts to an Internet black market). But I would've loved to see the Supreme Court case on this.

They probably would've upheld the verdict, but it would've been interesting.

 

[Marik Bentusi]

Regardless of my personal opinion on the topic, I feel pretty safe in saying that piracy is an objectively complex and largely unexplored new problem in a new age. Comparisons with theft always fall short because you copy something and distribute it for free. Cracking groups don't get paid for what they do, so it's not that simple.

I think one of the biggest problems with this topic is that nobody is genuinely interested in asking "why?". Why do cracking groups go through so much effort, spend hours cracking some new DRM and uploading and mirroring it. Is it money? Probably not, if someone gets paid it's websites that direct people to download links, not the cracking group that tries to stay in the shadows for obvious reasons. Do they simply hate people in suits? Probably not, many readmes encourage people to buy the product if they liked it or even try to relieve the conscience of the pirates by making a little SETI-like programs analyze research data for cancer etc in the background with unused processing power. Do they simply believe you should be able to rip games like you record music from the radio?

And what about the pirates? Why do they not support what they like? Don't they want to see more of what they like? Do they think it's overpriced? Do they think their money is only gonna end up in the claws of some greedy asshole anyway instead of the hands of the creatives? Are they unsatisfied with the service surrounding the product like Valve implies again and again? Do they think it's the only way to find out if the buy is worth it, are they simply very careful customers? If piracy didn't exist, wouldn't they pull out their wallet or just forget about the title and not even consider buying it after the price drops to an amount where they are willing to buy it?

How do these people think? We obviously can't kill piracy, so what do we have to change? What's the driving force behind this movement? How can you convert a pirate and how can you keep your customers from becoming pirates? Should people do more demos? Jump on microtransaction models? Etc etc.

TL;DR
Trying to furiously eliminate a problem you don't even understand one bit has always proven to be a very stupid and ignorant move.

 

[The Pinray]

inb4 America hatred.

I think they had it coming, personally. Hopefully this can be a messages to pirates, but it won't. It'll only make things worse.

EDIT: Wow, that was fast.

 

[Meight08]

That said, I also think Pirate Bay specifically has done nothing wrong, because so far as I know, they themselves are not serving up any of the copyrighted material themselves.

They refused to remove a torrent of leaked photo's of an autopsy of 2 dead kids.
The co founder of piratebay Peter sunde Said this when the father asked them to remove the link.
"I don?t think it?s our job to judge if something is ethical or unethical or what other people want to put out on the internet"
Remember This is of a child murder case mind you and the parents personally asked for the removal.
Anybody who knowingly has torrents of an autopsy on 2 dead kids and refuses to remove is a fucking jackass.

 

[Sir Thomas Sean Connery]

And the site.... is still..........up

Fail.

I'm not going to voice my opinions on this, but I will say it's kind of stupid for the court to hit the creators, but not the site.
Not that it could be defeated anyway, but this seems like "Yeah, we are going to fine you and put you in jail for a few months, but you can keep all the stuff we say you stole"

 

[CCountZero]

They refused to remove a torrent of leaked photo's of an autopsy of 2 dead kids.
The co founder of piratebay Peter sunde Said this when the father asked them to remove the link.
"I don?t think it?s our job to judge if something is ethical or unethical or what other people want to put out on the internet"
Remember This is of a child murder case mind you and the parents personally asked for the removal.
Anybody who knowingly has torrents of an autopsy on 2 dead kids and refuses to remove is a fucking jackass.

My guess would be that they can't do it for legal reasons. They can't open up the floodgates to removal requests.

I seriously doubt they themselves like knowing that such material is on there, and I'm certain there's plenty of other things they would love to see gone, but once one starts censoring, it's a slippery slope, especially for a site that prides itself on an anti-censorship attitude.

And from where I'm sitting, with TPB being guilty, I don't see how YouTube isn't getting sued left and right, or why we were afraid of SOPA in the first place.