Pirate Bay must be blocked, High Court tells ISPs.

[Jonnie Goodboy]

Pirate Bay must be blocked, High Court tells ISPs.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/9236667/Pirate-Bay-must-be-blocked-High-Court-tells-ISPs.html#disqus_thread
3:47PM BST 30 Apr 2012

'Broadband providers Sky, Everything Everywhere, TalkTalk, O2 and Virgin Media must block users from accessing filesharing website The Pirate Bay, the High Court has ruled.'




I've never used it, and when I did visit the site, I found it unresponsive and sluggish, but it was always less than I thought, in that PirateBay did not host any material, but was just a 'search-engine'. So does the UK High Courts' shutting down of PirateBay send a different kind of warning out? One that could pre-empt a massive clampdown on Search-Engines other than the ominpotent, ubiquitous Google Elite Squad!


'Mr Justice Arnold said that the process must begin in the next few weeks. It followed his ruling in February that both the operators and users of The Pirate Bay website infringe the copyright of music companies.

BT, who has also been named in the case, has requested more time to deal with the original complaint lodged by the record industry body, the BPI. The BPI has agreed, but sources expect The Pirate Bay to be inaccessible by BT customers in due course as well.

The Pirate Bay acts as a searchable index of links to allow users to download files from each other. All the most popular files are copyright films, music and software.

The website claims to be the largest website of its kind, with more than four million trackers, and according to record labels generated up to $3m in advertising in October last year. Some 3.7 million Britons are Pirate Bay users, according to ComScore, and Alexa consistently ranks it in the 100 most popular websites in the world.

Because it does not itself host copyright material, the Pirate Bay’s defenders have often argued that it works in a similar way to Google, but Mr Justice Arnold found its operators “actively encourage” copyright infringement.'

Related Articles
The Pirate Bay faces UK ban after court ruling.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet/9093902/The-Pirate-Bay-faces-UK-ban-after-High-Court-ruling.html
20 Feb 2012

'BT has already been required to block access to Newzbin2, another filesharing website, by the same judge. He said he regarded the case againstThe Pirate Bay as even stronger.

The BPI originally asked The Pirate Bay to take down music that infringed its members’ copyright in July 2011; after no response was received it asked internet service providers to block access to the site voluntarily. After they refused the BPI went to court in December. Mr Justice Arnold’s subsequent judgement ruled that The Pirate Bay “actively encourage[s copyright infringement] it and treat any attempts to prevent it (judicial or otherwise) with contempt”.

BPI Chief Executive Geoff Taylor said, “The High Court has confirmed that The Pirate Bay infringes copyright on a massive scale. Its operators line their pockets by commercially exploiting music and other creative works without paying a penny to the people who created them. This is wrong - musicians, sound engineers and video editors deserve to be paid for their work just like everyone else.”

He claimed that sites such as The Pirate Bay “destroy jobs in the UK and undermine investment in new British artists”, and urged users to pay for music via legal sites.

John Smith, General Secretary of the Musicians’ Union, added that “The individuals responsible for operating The Pirate Bay have total disregard for the rights of musicians. It is right that the High Court has followed other European courts and has ruled that it should be blocked in the UK.”

Some campaigners, however, questioned whether the action would work. Jim Killock of the Open Rights Group, claimed “Blocking the Pirate Bay is pointless and dangerous. It will fuel calls for further, wider and even more drastic calls for Internet censorship of many kinds, from ****ography to extremism. Internet censorship is growing in scope and becoming easier. Yet it never has the effect desired. It simply turns criminals into heroes."

A Virgin Media spokesman said that while the ISP would comply with the judgement, it “strongly believes that changing consumer behaviour to tackle copyright infringement also needs compelling legal alternatives, such as our agreement with Spotify, to give consumers access to great content at the right price."