Pirate Bay has lost the first round of trials in Sweden, in what is appearantly, and expectedly, a sham of a trial. IFPI has demonstrated that bullshit walks and money talks yet once again. By getting the results they quite simply purchased from corrupt, eager to please, politically controlled courts, they have shown us exactly what "democracy" and "rule of law" means.
In short: might makes right, and screw the common man.
Anyhow, this impotent ruling has no practical bearing on anything. Even if the appeals should uphold the ruling (and there will, presumably, be quite a few rounds of appeals), file sharing cannot be stopped by shutting down a single service. Worst Case scenario: it forces file sharing underground, and the four heroes behind Pirate Bay are sacrificed on the altar of corporate appeasement - casualties of war. To IFPI it's a pyrrhic victory, if that even. It's a demonstration of how much the capitalists are powerless before freedom of information, despite having the purchasing power to bribe Sweden's judicial ring leaders into submission. This powerlessness is even something they have themselves unwittingly unleashed and sponsored. Irony is a sweet fruit when it's doled out so poetically.
This entire farce has reminded me of how the internet was back in the olden days. Comercial content was shunned and using the internet to promote your products could result in mailbombing. It was a place for freedom, games, nonsense and underground groups, not just porn and online poker/shopping. People created content because they wanted to, not to spread your cookies and make money. While the internet has been largely appropriated by comercial interests since then, it's still a super highway for free thought. Thank you IFPI for reminding us just how much we have acheived, and fuck you very much. The internet isn't for you capitalists, conniving, parasitic thieves that you are, it's for us. Your filthy money can't change that.
Anyway, enough of this ranting, I have some inspiration I wish to share: I wish to point your eyes towards the Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace. 15 years ago, when the internet was still largely free from capitalists, a former acid rocker wrote this little piece of political clear sightedness, and it's still worth a read. If we can bring down the record companies and Hollywood, we can bring down the whole fucking house. Not over night, but it might still happen.
Information wants to be free, and as long as it's unfree so are we.
