Pirate Bay supporters ram Swedish IFPI website

Pirate Bay co-founder Peter Sunde has pleaded with fans to stop attacking official entertainment industry websites after the Swedish wing of the The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry’s (IFPI) site was hacked yesterday. Sunde, who is among four men facing prosecutors representing the likes of Sony, MGM and …

[Anonymous Coward]

ifpi

ifpi.se is back up - if a little slow.

[Anonymous Coward]

I still can't wait . . .

. . . until they succeed in destroying the content industry - and then hit the problem of any parasite that actually destroys it's host.

If they believed half the crap in their manifesto, they should be creating the new system, but like any revolutionary, or neo-conservative with a regime to otherthrow, it's much easier to be interested in 'the revolution' itself, than the hard work that comes after.

Personally - I foresee a world where the people controlling the purse strings will actually be asking for larger cuts of decreased revenues, rather than one that is fairer.

[Graham Marsden]

IFPI's Sweden MD Lars Gustafsson...

... lambasted the hackers motives. He told The Register: "It is deplorable that these saboteurs will go to such extremes as to infringe on our and others' freedom of speech on the internet."

ROFL! Isn't this more than a touch ironic coming from someone whose industry supports and promotes the infringement of the right of individuals to listen to music when and how they choose!

[Lionel Baden]

hang on !!

He asks please stop then i read further on

This is a declaration of war against anti-piracy outfits and the industry players behind them, and we urge the public to boycott and lynch those responsible. IFPI is just the beginning. To be Continued.

they were just doing as asked !

[al]

Do nihilists dream of anti-sheep ?

Pirate bay is a meta-site (index) for pete's sake! It just provides links. So does it mean I become a level-2 pirate if I provide a link to pirate bay ? I don't think soooo!

Hackers are a totally different breed.. or, do all anti-establishment people look the same ?

Paris, coz she may need some uploading.

[Pete James]

They're tossers

"This is a declaration of war against anti-piracy outfits and the industry players behind them, and we urge the public to boycott and lynch those responsible. IFPI is just the beginning. To be Continued."

Pathetic. Grow up.

Or as Charles Calthrop said so eloquently yesterday. "Oooh, you go you freedom fighter you"

[Scott K]

Damn the man

More power to them etc,

[Anonymous Coward]

@I still can't wait

"until they succeed in destroying the content industry"

Do you really believe the crap that you're typing?

I suppose you believed the "HOME TAPING IS KILLING MUSIC" mantra of the eighties too.

[David Hicks]

@AC

"I foresee a world where the people controlling the purse strings will actually be asking for larger cuts of decreased revenues, rather than one that is fairer."

Those currently holding the purse strings are just as parasitic. We'd do better without them or the pirates.

Distribution is now a negligible cost, often footed by the consumer themselves (esp. in a P2P model).

Advertising is pretty much only spent on the plastic act of the moment.

The only thing the labels can offer is production, and they overcharge for that in terms of taking the copyrights. Time for them to die. They were valuable when recording equipment was extremely expensive, they had their uses when distribution meant mass-produced physical items. Now, not so much.

[Anonymous Coward]

With friends like these...

...etc etc.

[dave lawless]

Wreckers wreck

The freetard mentality in action. We can so we will.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Graham M

Spot on...

As for "I still cant wait..." ...kind of see your point, but there are some fundamentals you seem to miss in this argument. We don't need record labels, producers, marketers, or any of these other men in the middle. The best art should be for passion, not money. Most of the music sold on major labels by `carreer artists` is fairly generic, formulaic shit, which I for one can live quite easily without. The more it needs marketing, the more worthless and meaningless it is. That's my take anyway. I'm not against paying someone for their art, if they created it from passion - but I do not believe someone who creates something once, deserves to profit from that one bit of work forever. They need to come up with something else. Just like someone who builds a table doesn't deserve to profit from that table forever, every time it is sold on, or if someone builds an identical table. The argument is more complex and long winded, and comes down to generics and the whole concept of what intellectual creation means, but I can't be arsed and probably don't have the character count remaining... and most people have probably stopped reading already... most people won't be moved on their opinion on this matter, one way or the other ;)

[Gareth]

"uncharacteristically"?

Bit of a smear that.

Illegal file sharing, hacking and DDOS attacks are all computer crimes, yesss.. But someone who commits one does not automatically condone the others..

[WonkoTheSane]

Conspiracy?

Is it really "l33t script-kiddie h4x0rz" wrecking the IFPI website?

Or MAFIA* hirelings attempting to make a better case for the prosecution?

* Music And Film Industries of America

[Mike Moyle]

@ Lionel Baden

Re: "hang on !!"

I think, if you read the article again, you'll see that that was paragraph 2 of the "NewGen" manifesto which appeared on the ifpi page before it was taken down altogether, not any of Sunde's comments.

[Nicholas Ettel]

@ Lionel Hicks

You didn't read very closely, did you? That "declaration of war" was posted by the hackers that commandeered the ifpi.se website. It was NOT a statement by Peter Sunde.

[blue]

re. Wreckers wreck

>Wreckers wreck - The freetard mentality in action. We can so we will.

Mirroring your flamebait comment back at you: The mentality of the ignorant in action: thinking is hard, so we won't.

Content cartels are hell-bent of retarding any technological (or techno-social) progress or development that undermines their current status (profits, control, importance); they use their power, wealth and contacts to exert disproportionate influence on governments and thereon to the populaces they manage and rule (represent? Ha!).

The delightfully ignorant term 'freetard' ignores the seismic change that current technological developments have unleashed - that low-to-no-cost distribution destroys the cartel's imposition of artificial scarcity and strangle-hold on distribution channels, and reveals their attempt to maintain that status quo as little more than a greedy deceit.

Change has to occur. Strangely enough, in societies less entralled by the extremely damaged intellectual monopoly concept, these changes are occurring. And what is more, people are making money doing it!

Just not the same, bloated, controlling middle-men.

For your consideration: Technobrega

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/7872316.stm

[Ben]

@I still can't wait...

Interestingly, after reading your first sentence I wasn't sure whether you were referring to the pirates or the IFPI. The rest of your comment used terms that suggest you meant the pirates, but I still found my initial reaction interesting.

/me is no fan of either side, to be honest.

[James]

@ I Still Can't Wait

". . . until they succeed in destroying the content industry - and then hit the problem of any parasite that actually destroys it's host."

Music was around long before the recording industries invented themselves. It would take a lot more than erasing them to stop people making and distributing music.

People want music, therefore people will make it.

In whatever way is appropriate to the times. Companies, corporations and organisations come and go but everyone else moves on to the next best thing.Although they have a habit of wanting to be around forever.

[Winkypop]

Laws, eh?

Wou'd a thunk it?

If it feels good (and it's free) do it.

[Heff]

Color me freetard, but

I'd rather spend CD money on gig tickets ; bands get more of my $$ that way anyway. as for the percieved loss of revenue, I think thats only coming up as an issue now because previously, with tapes, it was practically untrackable. all record compaies need to do now is log into piratebay and track how many seeders/completed downloads of a torrent there are, then cry foul.

I'd also love to see some comparison between record industry losses directly attributable to plummeting sales DIRECTLY CAUSED BY PIRACY, rather than backing of insipid and shitty artists, and carrying around massive legal firms on balls-deep retainers to fight pirazy lawsuits against people who dont have any money.

I guess thats just the economist and empiricist in me, the guy who wants to see cause and effect rather than label people Freetards and parasites, or slam record companies for being overzealous pricks.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Heff

Normal bands don't get that much for performing live, in many cases they can lose money - especially new unheard of bands. Gigging is incredibly hard work, touring much harder, there are people to pay, your noise boys, lampies, someone to sell the merchandise, the tour manager. You've got to get transport to and from a gig, insurance of your instruments, because they won't be covered on your house insurance and you're fucked if they get nicked. Then there is wear and tear on your instruments, all of this has to be paid for.

Then what about the bands that can't or won't perform live? There are many genres of music that are hard if not impossible to perform live without resorting to pretty much sampling an entire track and then you get towards the point where you may as well stick on a CD.

[Andus McCoatover]

What happens to the money?

What happens to the money the MAFIA* collect?

To the artists? To the lawyers? To the MAFIA?? (The latter would surely count as an anti-trust consortium/monopoly if the US gummint weren't in its pockets)

Just curious...

(Prohibition Icon, pse. Cup of tea would suffice...)

*Beautifully named above - kudos, "WonkoTheSane" - beats Recording Industry Ass. of America

[xjy]

Reproductions are unique works of art?

Funny all this fuss about copies of copies. Unique works of art: statues, paintings, etc are copied (forged) all the time - but the copies are considered to be worthless, unless they are incredibly rare (penny black etc). With music and poetry, the unique work of art is the live performance, and the same, historically, goes for story-telling. So the people exploiting the original art to profit from copies are only able to do this cos they artificially restrict access to the copies, as if these copies were the real thing. But they're not. They can help us get closer to and appreciate the real thing, but are really on learning tools, or crutches (like a lot of pop music is a crutch for dancing - we are the performance, the copy helps us dance, but the music is better live).

Artificially restricting access - using inaccessible technology or social force like the laws and cops etc - is monopoly: landlords do it, priests do it if they can, armies do it, governments do it, and so do publishers of copies/forgeries like software, books and music. Note that all these monopolizers are liars and crooks.

We're in a new world today, where the value of the original and its producer is more and more being recognized in the old-fashioned way - distinction, awards, reputation, private and public funding, etc.

The transitional period - between the bone-headed defence of monopoly and the free, full and open use of copies along with free, full and open public rewards for the creators - is painful and can take a long time - like a complicated birth. But eventually the baby emerges, and the mother forgets the pain.

So sod the monopolists and salute the free distribution and exchange of thought and culture, ideas and inventions. Everyone benefits except the few greedy bastards growing fat on the blood of others. Life-sucking never-not leeches. Gory-fanged vampires gorging on our glory!

(Paris because the performance is more fun than the portrayal!)

[Anonymous Coward]

@xjy

Art is copied all the time, more offen than not, these copies are called prints. Prints cost a lot, they make artists a lot of money and have a very real re-sale value. A forgery is a copy of an artwork that isn't authorised and is rightly considered worthless.

Also, as I previously mentioned, the live performance is not the original artwork in music simply because not all music can be performed live. Also, just because some music is used to dance to, doesn't mean that the person dancing to it is the performance, rather they are using the music for enjoyment.

[Slaytanic]

Did any one stop to think?

That the IFPI "hacked" their own website, or that they or other "interested" parties did it on their behalf? Having their website hacked doesn't make The Pirate Bay operators look like the good guys in their trial with their site being hacked. Even thou one of the members asked for this to stop, all it takes is the prosecution to accuse them of it in trial, and the jury hears it and thinks "Oh, those Pirate Bay guys must be in the wrong, they had their friends hack a website".

It's been done in America before, the RIAA/MPAA has had their cronies do some dirty work for them to help their cause and make make p2p a pain in the a$$

RIAA hired hackers to infect P2P users and websites

http://www.dmwmedia.com/news/2003/01/15/riaa-denounces-claim-it-hired-hackers-to-attack-p2p-systems [dmwmedia.com]

TorrentSpy says MPAA paid man $15,000 to hack and disrupt TorrentSpy's network

http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/7583.cfm [afterdawn.com]

[James Woods]

Slaytanic has said it best

Never ignore the obvious!

[Anonymous Coward]

@Slaytanic

Yep, you're right, also:

The moon landings never happened

9/11 was done by the US government

Tampax are made from glass fibre

There is a lightbulb that will last for ever

etc.

etc.

etc.

[wim]

@ Fraser

actually there is a lightbulb that will last (almost) forever

it is called the sun

too bad it is burning in the daytime when you have enought light and not at night when it is dark.

[Anonymous Coward]

@wim

Have you been reading Mort?

[darrin allen]

torrent site

is pirate bay the only site, in this case?