A music only torrent indexer, Coda.fm stands out from other sites with its clean design and innovative features. One of these features is a link to buy the various albums on Amazon, after downloading them on BitTorrent and enjoying the sample. Surprisingly enough, Amazon objects to getting business this way and has taken action.
The immensely popular BitTorrent client uTorrent recently added a Google powered torrent search engine to its website. This added search capability used Google’s custom search program and allowed visitors to search for .torrent files on Google. For reasons unknown, Google appears to be blocking the use of its search technology on the site.
A poll carried out by a major Swedish newspaper predicts that the Pirate Party will grab around 5.1% of the votes in the upcoming European Union elections. This means that the movement, which has gathered huge momentum due to the Pirate Bay ‘guilty’ verdict, will get a seat in the EU Parliament.
Until recently, the recording industry were committing publicity suicide by routinely issuing legal threats to file sharers. Now, they seem to have changed the routine, going for fewer, but bigger targets. The goal is clear: if you own the Internet, you don’t have to worry about pirates — or anyone else.
Swedish MP Karl Sigfrid is very much against the recently implemented anti-piracy law (IPRED). A member of the Moderate Party, Sigfrid has written to his ISP asking them to no longer keep records associated with the activities of its customers, in order to neutralize IPRED. So far the ISP has refused, saying they need to keep their customers ‘safe’.
A handful of studies have shown that those who download music illegally actually buy more through legal channels. But why? Are pirates really this generous or could it be that this is just a side-effect of the failing music industry?
Radical Software have just launched the latest version of their media web browser, Wyzo. The newest version has been a long time in the making and is one of the few web browsers supporting BitTorrent downloads straight out of the box.
Just recently the police in Hungary conducted raids on various torrent and warez sites, but few will have sympathy for those arrested. The site operators charged users for access via premium SMS, many of them unsuspecting kids. The police seized an impressive amount of equipment and also took some impressive photographs.
TV-shows are some of the most wanted files on BitTorrent, and according to some, it’s becoming the modern day TiVo. But what are all those people sharing?
While all eyes were on the Pirate Bay trial, Swedish parliament passed the IPRED law, making it easier for copyright holders to go after illicit file-sharers . The law has only been in effect for one month and anti-piracy outfits are already facing problems using it, as ISPs take measures to protect their customers.
The island of Taiwan has just approved new legislation which effectively bans the use of P2P technology to facilitate the distribution of copyrighted works online. The legislation also requires ISPs to start a ’3 strikes’ regime for file-sharers.
The developer of a new Windows-based first person shooter game is leaving comments on torrent sites via the actual torrent uploader in attempt to reach out to those thinking of downloading the game. ACE Team, the developer of Zeno Clash, acknowledges that people might like to ‘try before they buy’ and says they will not try to stop piracy.
The top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent, ‘Fast & Furious 4’ tops the chart this week followed by ‘Paul Blart: Mall Cop’.
The Pirate Bay recently got a new range of IPs and to everyone’s surprise they are now linked to several movie and music industry lawyers involved in the TPB trial. According to the Pirate Bay’s Wikipedia entry the change was due to a hostile takeover, but most people know better.
Earlier this week we reported that the LeechersLair tracker had been closed down by its host under orders from the Malaysian government. Now SuperFundo, another long standing torrent site, has been closed down too.
During the Pirate Bay trial Monique Wadsted represented several major movie studios and called for a “very significant” prison sentence for the defendants. This didn’t go down particularly well with some Pirate Bay supporters and now, in a retaliatory move, a few of them have now taken down her law firm’s website.
In Germany, the file-hosting service Rapidshare has handed over the personal details of alleged copyright infringers to several major record labels. The information is used to pursue legal action against the Rapidshare users and at least one alleged uploader saw his house raided.
As a government owned corporation the BBC has a duty to educate, and be evenhanded in its dealings with subjects. Yet in a recent segment on their long-running ‘Film’ program, currently hosted by Jonathon Ross, the BBC ran a biased segment straight from the MPAA. The BBC on the other hand, believes it was fair and balanced.
In 2008 a Danish court ruled in favor of the IFPI, and ordered the ISP Tele2/Telenor to block all access to The Pirate Bay. Now a petition from the ISP against the decision has been accepted, which will see the appeal go Supreme Court.
Gary Lightbody from Snow Patrol has criticized the sentences received by the crew of The Pirate Bay, branding them as “way over the top”. The band’s frontman also says if you’re a file-sharer and you know how to get music for free, “f**king go for it.” Meet you at The Pirate Bay then?
The victory for the entertainment business was Pyrrhic, although this initial success is dampened by a possible mistrial. Nevertheless, four Swedes have been martyred. Yet content creators and consumers are no closer to new business models that solve the problem.
When the Pirate Bay verdict came in last Friday, many feared that the copyright holders would use it as ammunition against other sites. Indeed, Antipiratbyrån – the Swedish anti-piracy office – is now going after BitTorrent trackers with that verdict in hand. They demand that the trackers stop their activities, threatening them with legal action.
One of the biggest cases in file-sharing history ended last week with The Pirate Bay Four sentenced to huge fines and jail time. Today it is revealed that far from being impartial, the judge in the case is a member of pro-copyright groups – along with Henrik Pontén, Monique Wadsted and Peter Danowsky. There are loud calls for a retrial.
New users of uTorrent may shortly have the option of something extra with their BitTorrent client. In a move to try and generate extra revenue, some of the of new installs will have the option to include the Ask.com browser toolbar in addition to the most popular torrent client in use today.
Media Markt/Saturn is Europe’s largest retailer of consumer electronics. The outlet is known for its funny, but crude advertising campaigns – its main slogan is “I am not stupid!” In the Saturn store in the Rivas H2Ocio shopping mall, Madrid, they use pirate Blu-ray rips to sell Apple hardware. Stupid – or not? You decide.
TV-shows are some of the most wanted files on BitTorrent, and according to some, it’s becoming the modern day TiVo. But what are all those people sharing?
Today the Malaysian government ordered prominent webhosting provider Shinjiru to close down BitTorrent site LeechersLair.com. The order came from the Content, Consumer and Network Security Division of the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission.
Several UK mobile broadband providers have started to block access to The Pirate Bay as part of a new voluntary code of practice. The reason for the block is not related to copyright infringement, but most likely due to the fact that there are ‘adult’ torrents hosted on the site.
The top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent, ‘The Uninvited’ tops the chart this week followed by ‘Fast & Furious 4’.
Several private BitTorrent trackers including Nordicbits, Powerbits, Piratebits, MP3nerds and Wolfbits, have closed down after the Pirate Bay verdict came in last Friday. Other trackers are set to follow this example in what could be the greatest voluntary tracker collapse ever.
The website of the music industry lobby group IFPI is suffering from an organized DDoS attack and has been unresponsive for the past few hours. The attack was organized by Pirate Bay supporters who don’t agree with the sentences handed out to the four defendants.
This brand new episode of TorrentFreak TV is a Pirate Bay trial special covering the verdict and its implications. Aside from the latest file-sharing news we review the Tribler BitTorrent client and introduce a new segment called Your Words!
The recently implemented IPRED legislation in Sweden makes it easier for copyright holders to identify and go after alleged illegal file-sharers. Up until now the same hasn’t been easy in Norway, but all that is set to change as the country’s telecoms regulator says that file-sharers identities can be given to copyright holders.
There are many ways for ISPs to manage the increased load BitTorrent traffic places on their network. Some choose to interrupt BitTorrent transfers like Comcast did, but there are more ‘consumer friendly’ alternatives too. An Israeli Internet provider is adding local web-seeds to speed up torrent transfers and reduce the amount of international traffic.
More than thousand people have gathered in the streets of the Swedish capital Stockholm today, to protest against yesterday’s Pirate Bay verdict. The demonstration was organized by the Swedish Pirate Party that is campaigning for the European Parliament elections in June.
After sentencing The Pirate Bay Four the District Court has now asked the police to investigate their own people, as the verdict in the case leaked to the public hours before it was officially announced. Whether or not the leak will have implications for the sentence is unknown.
The Pirate Bay verdict is being criticized by the Swedish public and protests are being planned. Opposition to the decision is widespread, indicated partly by the surge in new memberships to Sweden’s Pirate Party. It has seen its ranks grow by 20% in the handful of hours since the verdict and the number of members is increasing by the minute.
Just minutes ago the verdict in the case of The Pirate Bay Four was announced. All four defendants were accused of ‘assisting in making copyright content available’. Peter Sunde: Guilty. Fredrik Neij: Guilty. Gottfrid Svartholm: Guilty. Carl Lundström: Guilty. The four receive 1 year in jail each and fines totaling $3,620,000.
According to Pirate Bay spokesman Peter Sunde, he has been given information which suggests that the crew have lost their case in Sweden. A “trustworthy source” reportedly leaked the verdict from the court.
When The Pirate Bay was raided by police in 2006 they confiscated the site’s servers. Now one of those servers has been bought by a Swedish museum, which will display the machine as a device that has impacted people’s lives. In another development, damning CAM footage of the upcoming TPB movie has leaked showing the crew calculating their huge earnings.
Support for The Pirate Bay doesn’t stop at the Swedish border, nor it is limited to blogs and forums. Today, a group of Russian Pirate Bay supporters will throw a street party at Pushkin Square in the center of Moscow, with the full approval of the Russian government.
Last week a 22 year-old was sentenced to 6 months jail for running a file-sharing site carrying links to copyright works. On the surface it appeared that court ruled that due to placing advertising on the site, the admin had profited from infringement and therefore committed a crime, but all is not as it seems.
If anti-piracy lobbyists are to be believed, all content creators hate The Pirate Bay and other torrent sites. The truth is obviously more balanced. In fact, some of the most creative minds are BitTorrent users themselves, including best selling author Paulo Coelho, who offered to travel to Sweden to testify in favor of The Pirate Bay.
BitTorrent is already an important tool for millions of people who prefer their television on-demand, but integration with traditional TV-sets is still lacking. This is about to change though, as the Tribler team announces version 5 of its next generation BitTorrent client.
A recent draft of the controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) surfaced on Wikileaks this weekend. Among other things, the draft aims to strengthen the power and rights of the entertainment industry and other copyright holders, by letting them choose how they want to be compensated for copyright infringements.
It’s normal for BitTorrent users to be a tiny bit paranoid, since their activities aren’t always popular with everyone. But imagine musing via Twitter that your favorite movie isn’t on torrent sites yet and the next thing you know the studio is in direct contact with you, asking you not to pirate the movie – and giving you a free ticket in return.
The top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent, ‘Fast & Furious 4’ tops the chart this week followed by ‘Taking Chance’.
The MPAA isn’t known for wasting opportunities to obtain information about BitTorrent sites and their users. In 2005 the MPAA paid around $15,000 to a hacker who obtained emails from TorrentSpy and The Pirate Bay. The case was heard in court and won by the MPAA, but this decision will soon be appealed.
In a few days the verdict in the Pirate Bay trial will be announced, a decision that could have far reaching consequences for fellow BitTorrent trackers and file-sharing in general. Through this poll we’d like to hear what the public believe the verdict will be. Generally in favor of The Pirate Bay Four – or against?
Mininova, one of the world’s most visited BitTorrent sites, broke another download record today. Just a few hours ago the download counter displayed a staggering 8,000,000,000 downloads. That’s enough for everyone on planet earth to have one – and then some.
A 22 year old man who ran a site which offered links to copyright works has been fined and sentenced to 6 months jail in Spain. While non-commercial file-sharing sites are legal in Spain, the judge decided that because the site had advertising and therefore profited from copyright infringement, this constituted a criminal offense.
Tough anti-piracy laws in Denmark have notably caused some serious problems for The Pirate Bay, as ISPs there were forced to block the world’s largest tracker. The law allows outfits such as IFPI to shut down sites with relative ease but this imbalance towards rights holders will be addressed in a new report due soon.
Today the BBC published the first episode of R&DTV, a Creative Commons licensed show that users are allowed to remix, redistribute and share. The first episode of the monthly technology show features Digg’s Kevin Rose, among others. The BBC hopes to use BitTorrent for the distribution of future episodes.
Last week, the French Parliament passed a new law requiring Internet service providers to cut off Internet access for persistent copyright offenders. Since the parliament voted in favor of the law, everyone – including the most fanatical critics – believed that it would easily pass through Senate and the National Assembly today – but it didn’t.
Despite plenty of protests, the French Parliament passed a controversial new law last week that will see alleged copyright infringers disconnected from the Internet. Now, a new survey reveals that 60% of French Internet users are against the so-called HADOPI law. 69% say they believe it will fail.
At the end of March The Pirate Bay added new functionality to reach out to millions of Facebook users. Just over a week later and the world’s largest social networking site has blocked all links to torrents on the world’s largest and most infamous BitTorrent tracker.
Another brand new episode of TorrentFreak TV. This week’s episode covers the X-Men leak, the French three strikes law, Mininova’s new partnership, Hulu’s advertisement crisis and a whole lot more.
The big brother of the MPAA has Newzbin, the world’s most prominent newsgroup indexer, firmly in its sights. Newzbin, which indexes Usenet and offers its members NZB files, is being sued by the MPA, the global lobby group for the movie industry. The pair are set to fight it out in court, possibly before the end of the year.
TV-shows are some of the most wanted files on BitTorrent, and according to some, it’s becoming the modern day TiVo. But what are all those people sharing?
During recent years technology has evolved up to a point where the rebroadcasting of TV-signals in high quality can be done with a few clicks. This poses an increasing threat to broadcasters of live sporting events, who have now joined the ‘war on piracy’ by hiring BayTSP to track down illegal live streams.
The unfinished workprint of ‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine’ that leaked just a few days ago has already made its way to the computers of more than a million BitTorrent users. Unsurprisingly, the film leads our weekly chart of the ten most downloaded movies on BitTorrent.
Earlier this week an unfinished copy of the highly anticipated “X-Men Origins: Wolverine” movie leaked online. Fox is expecting a financial disaster and has called in the FBI to find out where the leak originated. We’re wondering if the leak will actually hurt the film’s success, or might the opposite be true?
During recent months Australia has become a hot source for camcorded movies. Now, an Australian man accused of ‘camming’ movies and supplying the copies to well known ‘Scene’ group PreVail has been found guilty and convicted. However, the MPA is very disappointed as the court let the man go with just a slap on the wrist.
Radiohead, the band that made millions of dollars by giving away their music for free, has very little to complain about when it comes to piracy. On the contrary, in a landmark file-sharing case, Radiohead has responded positively to a request to testify against the RIAA.
Despite public protests the French Parliament has passed a controversial new law that will see alleged copyright infringers disconnected from the Internet. In addition, France’s Minister of Culture Christine Albanel has stated that under the new law, ISPs may be ordered to block The Pirate Bay.
Just two days after Sweden’s new anti-piracy law came into force, two men have been arrested for sharing copyrighted files and administering a rip-box. The arrests were part of an international operation headed by Europol, and the suspects are alleged to be part of an international network.
Following the departure of founders Randy Saaf and Octavio Herrera, the future for MediaDefender looked even more uncertain than it did previously. However, those concerned that their favorite anti-piracy spoofing company might drift away, fear no more. MediaDefender’s parent company just acquired everyone’s favorite anti-piracy tracking company, MediaSentry.
MPAA chairman Dan Glickman is currently searching for another job. The Clinton-era cabinet minister has been head of the MPAA for the last four and a half years, but will be replaced in 18 months time because of his lacking performance. By contrast, Glickman’s predecessor, Jack Valenti held the office for 38 years.
A new law designed to make it easier for copyright holders to go after illicit file-sharers came into force in Sweden yesterday. Interestingly, it looks like the IPRED legislation, which will also increase penalties and ultimately criminalize large scale infringement, has already resulted in a major drop in Internet traffic – for now.
While discussing a softer approach to anti-piracy PSAs in the UK, the president of Universal Pictures noted that campaigning needs to evolve and carry an “appropriate message” for today. Noting that piracy is going out of fashion, he says that ISPs will be held accountable – like those who run brothels and drug houses.
April 1st is a very tough day to report big, controversial news – if you want to be believed that is. Fact: The new X-Men movie has leaked to BitTorrent and Fox won’t be laughing. The movie is unfinished with many special effects yet to be added. Fingers are already being pointed toward the possible source of the leak and downloads are already more than 75,000.
After years of hostility, lawsuits, police raids and heated invective between the two groups, the Pirate Bay has today announced they have settled their differences with US media conglomerate Warner Bros. The largest BitTorrent tracker has sold out to Hollywood and the two have agreed a deal.
Anyone familiar with BitTorrent will know that this protocol provides some of the best excitement to be found anywhere on the Internet. During the last few hours, up to 100 previously unreleased Michael Jackson songs were leaked and the battle is now on as his representatives try to put the genie back in the bottle.
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Left Quote“The Pirate Bay has been one of the most important movements in Sweden for freedom of speech, working against corruption and censorship.
Peter Sunde Left Quote
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