ThePirateBay owners, Hans Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, Peter Sunde and Carl Lundströmare set to appear in court on Monday and could face two years in prison and a fine as high as $180,000 each. The four owners of the very popular public torrent web site face charges of copyright infringement. The servers are located out of Sweden and out of reach of law enforcement, meaning the site will likely stay online if the owners go behind bars.The Swedish government is aiming its cannons at The Pirate Bay, but the torrent site's administrators say that they don't plan to abandon ship. The charges filed yesterday against The Pirate Bay by Swedish prosecutor Hakan Roswall (coverage at BBC, TorrentFreak) allege that four of the torrent site's administrators are guilty of participating in copyright infringement, and for profit. This filing comes over a year after fifty Swedish law enforcement agents seized The Pirate Bay's servers during raids at ten different locations.
The move was praised by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), which condemned The Pirate Bay as an "international engine of illegal file-sharing" in a statement, asserting that the site "facilitates access to many forms of copyright infringing material." The operators of The Pirate Bay contend that their activities are entirely permissible within the scope of Swedish copyright law and note that they do not host or supply to users any infringing content.
The Pirate Bay generally espouses a philosophy based on the principles of mutuality and reciprocity, broadly encouraging its users to share with each other. IFPI chairman Ludvig Werner takes a more cynical view of the site's practices and claimed that greed is the principle motivation behind The Pirate Bay's services. "The profiteers behind The Pirate Bay have no interest in free speech, and they are not running The Pirate Bay because they love music and films," said Werner in a statement. "They are totally mercenary and are driven by the desire for personal wealth."
IFPI describes The Pirate Bay as a "company" and claims that "[its] business model is based on selling advertising to brands that wanted to reach its 10 million users in more than 30 countries, while paying nothing for the content it uses to attract those users."
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The move was praised by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), which condemned The Pirate Bay as an "international engine of illegal file-sharing" in a statement, asserting that the site "facilitates access to many forms of copyright infringing material." The operators of The Pirate Bay contend that their activities are entirely permissible within the scope of Swedish copyright law and note that they do not host or supply to users any infringing content.
The Pirate Bay generally espouses a philosophy based on the principles of mutuality and reciprocity, broadly encouraging its users to share with each other. IFPI chairman Ludvig Werner takes a more cynical view of the site's practices and claimed that greed is the principle motivation behind The Pirate Bay's services. "The profiteers behind The Pirate Bay have no interest in free speech, and they are not running The Pirate Bay because they love music and films," said Werner in a statement. "They are totally mercenary and are driven by the desire for personal wealth."
IFPI describes The Pirate Bay as a "company" and claims that "[its] business model is based on selling advertising to brands that wanted to reach its 10 million users in more than 30 countries, while paying nothing for the content it uses to attract those users."
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