The hosting site MegaUpload was raided by police today, on orders by US federal authorities. MegaUpload’s owner, New Zealand based Kim ”Dotcom” Scmitz, and three associates were also arrested. The Swedish Pirate Party strongly condemns this action.
- MegaUpload was well-known to act in accordance with the law, says Anna Troberg, the Pirate Party’s leader, but was still a thorn in the side of American business interests.
Rick Falkvinge, the founder of the first Pirate Party, has been honored as a Top 100 Global Thinker by the magazine Foreign Policy.
The magazine, which specializes in international high-level politics, presents the award annually to the thinkers whose ideas shape our future the most. Other people on this year’s list include Wael Ghonim, Bill Gates, and Mikko Hypponen. Foreign Policy comments on Falkvinge’s accomplishments, in part, with these words (on place 98 in the list):
När vallokalsundersökningen presenterats i Berlin står det klart att det tyska Piratpartiet tagit plats i delstatsparlamentet. Piratpartiet får 8,5 procent i den undersökningen, och är därmed klart över den tyska femprocentsspärren.
– Taket lyfte hos Piratenpartei här i Berlin när undersökningen presenterades, säger Rick Falkvinge som är på plats. Stämningen är fantastisk och påminner mycket om valnatten för den svenska piratsegern i EU-valet 2009.
The Swedish Pirate Party has long claimed that the copyright industry’s statistics about lost revenue are made up. However, the party has discovered that the sums are real and significant. With the saved funds, the party has plans for hiring and buying a vacation resort.
– I’m happy to announce that we are hiring more than six million people, says Anna Troberg, party leader for the Swedish Pirate Party. With our strengthened economy, we are looking forward to securing civil liberties in Sweden and elsewhere with all our new colleagues.
Today, several servers belonging to the Swedish Pirate Party have been the target of so-called DDoS attacks. The attacks began early morning at 3 AM, after the party had set up a Swedish mirror copy of the WikiLeaks website. The party’s reason for doing so is that WikiLeaks, whose leaks to the media are in the limelight, has been attacked from multiple vectors and needed help to stay online.
Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, and Carl Lundström were convicted today in the Stockholm Court of Appeals for their part in operating The Pirate Bay, which is a search engine for torrent files and one of Sweden’s most recognized brands.
– This was a political trial from the start and it must be resolved politically, says Rick Falkvinge, leader of the Pirate Party. The public has lost all confidence in the justice system in these matters, and it is beyond sad that the courts still persist in running special-interest justice.
