A bit left field this but it does highlight the prolific growth of digital piracy and it's funny.
Apparently, the Pirate Bay - one of the largest file-sharing sites on the Internet - is trying to found a copyright-free nation.
Awesome
Here's a bit of background: back in 2006 Swedish authoristies raided the companies that hostel the portal's servers and shut it down. Pirate Bay popped up 3 days later in the Netherlands. The legal battle brought widespread publicity and - as you might expect - millions of new users to the site.
In January, the portal announced it's intentions to buy the principality of Sealand, a former WWII battle station in international waters off the coast of England. But the Sealand's owner - who declared the 6,000-sqaure-foot territory an independent country in 1967 - said he wouldn't sell because he doesn't support the flouting of international law.
So now the site's administrators are shopping for islands in the $50,000 to $10 million range, and they've already recieved $20,000 in donations.
Users on the site's forums have begun debating whether the new country should be an anarchy, a communist state or a monarchy.
"This is a social experiement," says Peter - one of the administrators.
I don't see this becoming a reality, but what a cool thing to campaign for.
More recently, the MPAA and the FBI have gone to Sweden to train six cops in the art of fighting copyright infringement. The Pirate Party arose in the wake of a raid on the PirateBay's ISP, instigated by a Member of Parliament. The MP acted illegally in ordering the raid, and he did so at the behest of the MPAA and the US State Department.
Wouldn't mess with these two.
This US meddling in domestic affairs so outraged Swedes that they sided with the Pirate Party in great numbers, throwing their lot in with local rogues in favor of American bullies.
Apparently, the MPAA hasn't learned its lesson: when you intervene in local politics in Europe, locals see you as an evil representative of American hegemony. It's like they want the pirates to win!
In an effort to help stamp out pesky Swedish pirates, FBI agent Andrew Myers and the MPAA have given a group of six Swedish police officers extensive training on how to effectively combat piracy and catch people who engage in illegal downloading from the internet...
Together, Agent Myers and the MPAA's instruction to this new Swedish anti-piracy unit ranged from rules and regulations governing copyright enforcement and piracy, to examples of anti-piracy initiatives in other countries that have already proven effective. The most shocking revelation is a report of a lecture given by the MPAA in which officers were shown the ins and outs of movie camcording, or "CAM-ing."
Wrighty
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