Intellectual Property Law

Defiant Pirate Bay Crew Evokes Churchill

By David Kravets

The Pirate Bay managed an end-run around the Swedish courts and is back online Tuesday.

The site’s four cofounders each face a year in prison and millions in fines following their April convictions in a Stockholm court for facilitating copyright infringement. They remain free pending appeal.

As part of the case, Hollywood studios demanded the court shutter the site. On Monday, the Pirate Bay’s primary bandwidth provider complied with a court order to deep-six the buccaneers, rendering the site unreachable most of the day.

But the Bay is back, apparently hosted by the Stockholm-based DCP Networks, which is owned by convicted Pirate Bay financier Frederic Neij. At the top of the site, in place of the usual pirate-ship logo, there’s now a black crew-neck shirt reading, “I spent months of time and millions of dollars to close down The Pirate Bay and all I’ll get is this beautiful t-shirt.”

To mark the occasion, the Pirate Bay crew also posted a defiant message on their blog, inspired by Winston Churchill’s historic June 4, 1940 speech during World War II:

We have, ourselves, full confidence that if all do their duty, if nothing is neglected, and if the best arrangements are made, as they are being made, we shall prove ourselves once more able to defend our Internets, to ride out the storm of war, and to outlive the menace of tyranny, if necessary for years, if necessary alone. Even though large parts of Internets and many old and famous trackers have fallen or may fall into the grip of the Ifpi and all the odious apparatus of MPAA rule, we shall not flag or fail.

We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the ef-nets and darknets, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Internets, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the baywords.org, we shall fight on the /. and on the digg, we shall fight in the courts; we shall never surrender, and if, which I do not for a moment believe, the Internets or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our Empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the Anon Fleet, would carry on the struggle, until, in Cerf’s good time, the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old.

How inspirational! As a reminder, on Thursday the Pirate Bay’s owners are set to finalize the site’s $8.5 million sale to Swedish software concern Global Gaming Factory, which plans to turn the Bay into a pay outlet for licensed music and movies.

See Also:

• Court Tries to Kill Pirate Bay; Cat-and-Mouse Game Begins ? Update …
• ‘Brokep’ Quits Pirate Bay
• The Pirate Bay Guilty; Jail for File-Sharing Foursome
• Studios Demand Court Shutter Pirate Bay
• Pirate Bay Buyer Says Deal Nearly Done

Full post as published by Threat Level on August 25, 2009 (boomark / email).