Pirate Bay founders lose appeal in file-sharing case

Fredrik Neij, Peter Sunde and Carl Lundstrom, the founders of infamous torrent tracker The Pirate Bay have lost their appeal this week, in a file sharing case that convicted each of helping millions of users break Swedish copyright law.

The Svea Appeals Court upheld the convictions on all three men, but reduced their possible jail time to 4-10 months, down from one year.

However, the appeals court raised the penalty the men will have to pay the entertainment industry to $6.5 million, up from $4.5 million in the lower court.

The Pirate Bay remains one of the top public torrent trackers, despite numerous attempts from different agencies and governments to shut it down. The site has 4.7 million registered users, and over 3 million torrents available, offering up unauthorized music, movies, games and software in the mix.

Neij, Sunde and Lundstrom have each denied any wrongdoing, claiming they cannot be held liable as the site does not actually host any of the pirated material.

The founders plan to appeal to the Supreme Court.

Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 27 Nov 2010 1:19

Notcow

What a shame, looks like they'll lose...

27.11.2010 01:39 #1

elbald90

what with the alleged charges facing the wiki leaks founder it looks like sweden has become the usa's new bitch ...shame i thought better of them

27.11.2010 05:42 #2

KillerBug

To be fair, they are the bitch of an international media cartel which just happens to have a lot of control over the USA government as well.

27.11.2010 08:29 #3

Zealousi

Good luck guys, stick it to the man. Pawn them noobs in suits, TPB will all ways be around.

27.11.2010 14:40 #4

mikeu62

Type your comments here

27.11.2010 16:07 #5

xnonsuchx

Sorry, but knowingly linking to pirated material is seen as almost the same as hosting it. If TPB actually removed torrents upon request due to copyright violations and had a notice asking users not to post copyrighted material torrents, they could say they just provide a service and any violations are users' faults. As-is, they KNOW what's on their site and pretty much brag about it.

27.11.2010 18:08 #6

lissenup2

Witch hunt

27.11.2010 18:56 #7

juventini

TPB is an inspiration to next gen....FORZA!

Forza Juve!!

28.11.2010 16:43 #8

ntense69

lol 1 down a zillion to go

28.11.2010 20:01 #9

lawndog

Yeah I remember ready this the day it happened. Almost brought me to tears. Been sharing through different avenues for awhile but truly enjoy Pirate Bay. I can only wonder who will replace them and truly hope they did as good a job as they did. Yes I know that there are those that say they "suck" "loaded with virus'" blah blah blah. But I for 1have never had a problem with them.
I'm sure it's not quite over for them yet though...............
"one site to rule them all"

28.11.2010 20:04 #10

xboxdvl2

even if they shut the pirate bay down there are over 4 million users.most the users have torrents hosted on multiple websites.anyone with a reputation for good torrents will be around when/if the pirate bay ever closes.chances are if they ever do close down they will just start a new website even bigger and better.

PS2 with 12 games.
pc-windows 7,intel core quad Q8400,4 Gb ddr2,WD 500 GB hdd,ATI Radeon HD 4550 graphics,AOC 22inch LCD moniter.

29.11.2010 08:30 #11

aldan

Originally posted by xnonsuchx: Sorry, but knowingly linking to pirated material is seen as almost the same as hosting it. If TPB actually removed torrents upon request due to copyright violations and had a notice asking users not to post copyrighted material torrents, they could say they just provide a service and any violations are users' faults. As-is, they KNOW what's on their site and pretty much brag about it. yup,they broke the law and bragged about it.i miss pb too but when you do this in such a public way you have to expect to get caught sooner or later.they are not the che gueveras of the friggen internet.

29.11.2010 13:15 #12

IguanaC64

@xnonsuchx: Sooooo...what about other indexing sites I can find links to pirated software, music, and video like Google and Yahoo?

The more the MPAA, RIAA, and ICE act like Big Brother...the less I want to support them with my income...Either by consuming less or finding alternate ways to consume that don't give them as much money (ie, Hulu or other free online legal alternatives). It also makes me have less sympathy for them when they want to violate the US Constitution to achieve their goals. Or...in the case of ICE, overreach their responsibilities (seriously...ICE enforcing online copyrights...how about focusing on guarding our borders)...or do we just continue to let the government spiral out of control all over our liberties for the sake of protecting big media company profits?

29.11.2010 18:00 #13

xboxdvl2

internet piracy doesnt physically harm anyone.Everytime i jump in my car there are people driving like maniacs i swear everytime i drive somewhere i see people doing stupid things.there are places and areas where people fight and get drunk and abusive (train stations,pubs,outside shopping centres).yet MPAA,RIAA & ICE want to destroy piracy & dont care about real crimes that cause real people problems.

@xnonsuchx yes they might be breaking the law.So is everyone that downloaded a copyrighted file without permission.lets come down hard on everyone that breaks the law.lets lock every single person up thats ever committed as crime.o wait that would be a few hundred million people in jail and no economy.

PS2 with 12 games.
pc-windows 7,intel core quad Q8400,4 Gb ddr2,WD 500 GB hdd,ATI Radeon HD 4550 graphics,AOC 22inch LCD moniter.

30.11.2010 03:33 #14

IguanaC64

In America, we already jail more of our population per capita than *any* other country in the world. We try and make as many actions as possible jailable crimes to store people in prisons. This is another Libertarian walk that Conservatives right now don't walk. We don't need to be warehousing (jailing) people for minor non-violent crimes (drug possession of relatively harmless drugs, prostitution, etc). It's a huge burden on society and just forces people into underground economies and keeps them from ever having a decent job for relatively minor past offenses. Then we expect these people to be contributing members of society. It's a crazy contradiction. In the past, you used to just be able to move and restart your life. That's nearly impossible now.

30.11.2010 10:04 #15

domie

do these 3 guys still run and own TPB ? I remember they tried to sell it for multi millions when this court case first started but that fell through - who has their paws on it now ?

1.12.2010 04:57 #16

KillerBug

All the prospective purchasers turned out to be conmen.

I wonder how this affects ipredator.

1.12.2010 05:25 #17

FredBun

As far as I know they are still here, nobody has an answer when they are or will be shut down.

I know rumers fly around all the time, I heard recently that they might be moving to Ukraine, I don't know what is true or not but I don't care where they would move or not as long as they keep up the good work, I also never had a problem with them, sure they have nitwits loading crap on thier site but so do others, all it takes is just common sense.

3.12.2010 13:21 #18

elitepunk

its a good decent site but what about all those stinkin advertisements on the side all the time? They should go advertisement free.

3.12.2010 14:19 #19

bogwart16

Originally posted by elitepunk: its a good decent site but what about all those stinkin advertisements on the side all the time? They should go advertisement free. So it's OK for you to steal copyrighted material but not OK for them to cover their server etc costs using advertising? What are you, 12 or something?

3.12.2010 17:13 #20

ldfszkv (unverified)

then how is their site still up...
i am sure they made tons of money from advertisements so 6million dollars isn't even that huge of a fine

4.12.2010 23:19 #21

alpaulo

Demonoid and Pirate Bay are my favorite torrents. I wish they couold win their appeal.

8.12.2010 03:44 #22

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