TorrentFreak

A new plugin for WordPress allows anyone to set up a fully functioning BitTorrent site in just a few minutes. Whether it’s a totally public torrent index or a private torrent tracker with strict ratio enforcement, WP-Trader supports it. The project was born when the developers recognized a huge demand for a simple script that even relative tech novices can set up.

Following the High Court ruling ordering UK ISP BT to block Usenet indexing site Newzbin2, it was only a matter of time before that momentum was capitalized upon by the movie and music industries. Today a coalition of companies led by the BPI demanded that BT also block The Pirate Bay, either voluntarily or by consenting to a court order.

It’s one of the longest existences in the entire file-sharing space and bar none it has been the most eventful. We’re talking about the life of The Pirate Bay, the world’s most resilient BitTorrent site. Today the site celebrates its 8th birthday, a massive achievement which may not ever be bettered in terms of longevity, sheer volume of members and material distributed.

With a new college year just around the corner, students will be expected to dig deep to pay for all the latest textbooks to accompany their chosen course. These books are not only crucial but also very expensive, a situation that hasn’t gone unnoticed by the administrator of a textbook-focused torrent site. His plan is to break up a publishing monopoly and educate the masses, regardless of how deep their pockets are.

A few months ago 21-year old Travis McCrea participated in the Canadian federal elections as candidate for the Pirate Party in Vancouver Centre. Aside from his political ambitions, McCrea also described himself as an entrepreneur. As with his political views, his business ventures are also focused on file-sharing related ideas, and most recently he started a torrent site to promote the distribution of movies.

Previously, representatives from the Finnish music industry filed a lawsuit against Elisa, one of the country’s largest ISPs, demanding that it should block subscriber access to The Pirate Bay. In a reply filed at the district court, Elisa has refused to comply, describing the blocking demands as “unreasonable.”

Today, exactly five years have passed since The Pirate Bay was raided by the Swedish police. At the time the entertainment industries hoped that this would silence the deviant BitTorrent site for good, but in hindsight we can conclude that they had actually awakened a monster. The raid and the ongoing battle that later unfolded reads like a script for an upcoming Hollywood blockbuster.