Cough up $2.5 mil, Big 4 labels tell The Pirate Bay

p2pnet news | P2P:- The members of the Big 4 organised music cartel figure The Pirate Bay owes them $2.5 million (€1.6 million, 15 million kronor).
But Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG, “can go screw themselves,” The Local has TPB founder Gottfrid Svartholm Warg (right) saying.
The claim for compensatory damages was filed at the Stockholm District Court today, says the story, going on:
“In addition to Svartholm Warg, fellow Pirate Bay founders Fredrik Neij, Peter Sunde and Carl Lundström have been indicted for being accessories to breaking copyright law.
“The indictment covers 24 music albums, nine films, and four computer games.”
Svartholm Warg has been in touch with the others, “all of whom found the claim rather amusing,” says the post, adding:
“In calculating the damages claim, record companies counted the number times the 24 albums were illegally downloaded, according to a preliminary investigation. On top of that, the companies are demanding general compensation because the copyright owners didn’t give permission for the downloading.
The numbers are pure fantasy, says Svartholm Warg, who’s apparently wondering why the Big 4 announced the damages claim at this stage of the case.
“It doesn’t appear if the record companies have much of a strategy at all,” The Local has him saying.
Svartholm, “sees himself as so untouchable that he’s even set up his pirate HQ in the same building as Sweden’s anti-piracy agency,” said p2pnet recently, quoting an RT video.
“According to lawyers working on the case, Gottfrid along with three partners master-minds” a “multi-million-dollar” business with, “offshore accounts and trust funds all over the world”.
The Local - Record companies sue Pirate Bay four, March 31, 2008
p2pnet - The Pirate Bay’s Svartholm YouTube video, March 4, 2008
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March 31st, 2008 at 11:39 am
I believe that they want 2.5 million bullets and I am happy to anonce that we may be able to accomodate them.
March 31st, 2008 at 12:23 pm
Woah, man, you seen the price on shot recently? i think we should account for inflation here.
March 31st, 2008 at 1:34 pm
Record companies don’t stand a chance
March 31st, 2008 at 5:07 pm
How can the big 4 hope to win when they don’t own the copyrights for movies and games? I don’t get it.
March 31st, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Sounds like the same “pull a random large number from my ass” statement from the scientologists. Can I then sue the riaa for illegally representing the gaming industry in this random act of stupidity?
March 31st, 2008 at 5:54 pm
Seems like the media companies are trying everything they can to get the PB crew charged with *something* no matter how ridiculous. They must really really hate these guys, hahaha.
March 31st, 2008 at 7:13 pm
“Woah, man, you seen the price on shot recently? i think we should account for inflation here.”
So they owe us then?
March 31st, 2008 at 7:40 pm
By rights, the Pirate Bay ought to owe the MAFIAA nothing. Were
any of the 24 albums, 9 movies and 4 games downloaded directly
from the Pirate Bay’s servers?
No.
The pigopolists continue to insist that torrent site operators have the
copyrighted files. This is incorrect. It is the individual users that have
the pieces or the entire file of the content in question. The torrent
tracker just gives you a hash code that allows users to upload and
download the file from each other. It is never stored on the torrent
site’s servers.
March 31st, 2008 at 8:39 pm
‘Reader’s Write’, I’m sure many are well aware of that including the media companies, but as the article suggests they appear to be attempting to charge them with being “accessories to breaking copyright law”.
April 1st, 2008 at 5:02 pm
Look at the pirate bay as the yellow pages and the down loaders as ma bell customers. If the pirate bay is guilty then all the distribution systems are too.