Last week we looked over a new way of doing video games by using cloud computing, and I'm growing more skeptical of how well the developers of OnLive will deliver on their promises because, frankly, what they say they can do and what we already have now is a considerable gap in technological progression. I'm still hopeful, but I'll hold off my full opinion until I see their finished product, hopefully by the end of this year.
This week, we have a huge trial outcome to cover: the guilty verdict of The Pirate Bay trial (dubbed “spectrial”) and what effect that might have on peer-to-peer piracy, and the site's service or operation. So, let's get started.

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The Pirate Bay trial highlighted an anticipated legal battle between record label giants and entertainment production companies (such as Sony BMG, Universal Music, Warner Bros., EMI, and other groups), and an openly defiant group that's in service of a popular online Bittorrent tracker index that allows anonymous and registered users to fileshare almost any sort of material, with or without copyright. Through a hyperlink on the site's homepage, you can view the legal threats that they receive (most through email) from production companies or the law offices representing them, followed by the group's responses through which they publicly ridicule the legal threats, most of which are based on American law rather than international or Swedish law.

The trial, of which you can read about in my earlier post found here, appeared to be one-sided by much of the media depicting it. When it comes down to the effort that the prosecution had made in explaining their case against The Pirate Bay defendants, you'd be hard pressed to say that, after nine days of court proceedings, they had really prepared for this or put their best effort into it. After dropping the majority of their charges against the four defendants (Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, Carl Lundstrom, and Gottfrid Svartholm), the prosecution then had difficulties in presenting unauthorized evidence to the court and they failed to prove their fundamental understanding of how Bittorrent networks actually work.
However, the defendants made their case by denying any leadership role in the operation of The Pirate Bay's indexing service and challenging the prosecution's evidence, understanding of Bittorrent, and also their arguments of filesharing's effects on the sale of copyright material. One argument, specifically on the interpretation of Swedish law in regards to The Pirate Bay's presence in court, which has become dubbed the “King Kong Defense”. In short, Swedish Law states that the perpetrator of a crime must have close ties with the defendant in order to find the defendant guilty, of which there are not physical ties between The Pirate Bay and its users, who upload and share the copyright material in lieu of The Pirate Bay defendants. This argument, presented by Per E Samuelson, Lundstrom's lawyer, was explained with an example of the user “King Kong”, whom Sameulson suggested “may very well be found in the jungles of Cambodia.”
Following the case and a considerable amount of time to review the court proceedings, a Swedish judge found the four defendants guilty and organized their penalties to be received evenly as a team. The official verdict was found that these four had not initiated the filesharing of copyrighted material, which has been attributed to the users of The Pirate Bay, but that these four assisted in these efforts, which is illegal under Swedish law. The defense has been sentenced to one year in prison, with payment of over $3.5-million (30-million SEK) divided evenly among the defendants. The four defendants had planned to appeal the court's findings in case of a guilty verdict, which could send this trial's ultimate outcome as many as six years into the future.

Ultimately, what does this mean? At this time, the Swedish court's findings make the future outcomes of legal proceedings with other online filesharing services less favorable for the peer-to-peer pirates. It appears that the operation of The Pirate Bay's services was not compromised immediately following the court's verdict, and in a TorrentFreak.com article defendant Peter Sunde was sourced in assuring that The Pirate Bay will continue on, explaining that the site itself was not found guilty in court.
Some executive members of production companies represented by the prosecution have made relieving comments in reaction to the trial's verdict. President of Universal Music in Sweden, Per Sundin, has been quoted in a Daily News article saying, “It is wonderfully gratifying. It is comforting for all of us who have fought in the last five years against the illegal downloading, against those who destroy the conditions for us to invest in talent.”
Meanwhile, in related news the National Museum of Technology and Science in Stockholm, Sweden, purchased a server originally used by The Pirate Bay, adding it to a collection of current social artifacts on display. The server, which was obtained from The Pirate Bay in a Swedish police raid of their operation back in 2006, was purchased from the Bureau of Piracy for roughly $220 dollars (2,000 SEK).