[Excerpt]
... It all began with old-fashioned content piracy in Sweden and a BitTorrent-based content sharing site called "Pirate Bay." Despite vigorous pursuit by the European authorities, Pirate Bay thrives to this day, now a nonprofit registered in the Seychelles and calling itself "the world's largest Bittorrent tracker." Anyone can download content; uploading requires free registration. The Website also hosts a useful and not unamusing history of legal threats encountered and, so far, survived.
So pirates continue to thrive. What's new? Pirates thriving on the political stage. Back in 2009, Internet Evolution's Jart Armin predicted that political organizations with roots in Pirate Bay could have an impact on European politics. It has taken a while, but results from local elections in Germany this week support his view.
By some quirk of fate, it was on September 19, International Talk-Like-A-Pirate Day, that members of the Pirate Party elected to the Berlin legislature lined up on the steps to the State Parliament to bid ahoy to the European press. The scene was jeans, overalls, t-shirts emblazoned with slogans, and at least one funny hat. This is a political group which is making the Green Party seem reactionary. ...
Read more at Internet Evolution.
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