The Pirate Bay Sells to the Global Gaming Factory X

June 30, 2009 by · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events, File-Sharing Programs, Networks & Services 

Attention all file sharers in the world! The Pirate Bay will be acquired by the Global Gaming Factory X for $7.8m (SEK 60 million).

the-pirate-bay-sells-to-the-global-gaming-factory-xNo, this is not another April Fool’s Day prank – a rather surprising news emerged today on Businesswire – according to the site, the software company, Global Gaming Factory X will acquire the much debated Pirate Bay and the technology company Peerialism, specialized in next generation file-sharing technology.
The acquisition comes with a new marketing plan as GGF wants to launch new business models which would solve the problem of legality the site has always had by compensating the content providers and copyright holders.

“Content creators and providers need to control their content and get paid for it. File sharers’ need faster downloads and better quality,” said Hans Pandeya, CEO GGF.
Details of the transactions have been also given:
GGF acquires domain names and related web sites, including http://www.thepiratebay.org. The consideration for the purchase amounts to MSEK 60 consisting of at least MSEK 30 in cash and up to the equivalent of MSEK 30 in the form of newly issued shares in GGF (according to valuation in connection with the completion of the acquisition). The stock share of the purchase price is expected to be equivalent to a maximum of three per cent of the total number of outstanding shares of GGF after the acquisition. In the case that three percent of the shares is not equivalent to 30 MSEK, the major shareholder of GGF has declared that he will contribute the equivalent in cash.

GGF is also set to acquire file-sharing technology company Peerialism for a total of SEK 100 million, of which at least SEK 50 million will apparently be in cash. The company intends to use Peerialism’s newly developed P2P distribution technology on The Pirate Bay. Although not yet certain some say the technology is backwards-compatible with BitTorrent.

The taking over is due in August, this year. Currently The Pirate Bay is one of the 100 most visited websites in the world.

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Limewire Goes Political, Fights Iranian Regime’s Censorship

June 30, 2009 by · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events, Digital Media, Mobile Phones, P2P technology, File-Sharing Programs, Networks & Services, Legal P2P News & Issues 

limewire-goes-political-fights-iranian-regimee28099s-censorshipLimewire has followed the recent trend of many p2p networks and file sharing sites which have become involved with distributing information about the protests against the Iranian election. After videos of the demonstrations together with the aggressive response against protesters have surfaced on BitTorrent, and then the Pirate Bay has even set a web forum to declare their support for the opposition in Iran, now Limewire comes forward with its own political statement.

Towards the end of last week Limewire introduced a splash screen asking users to share videos related to the protests in Iran. The company explained the request:

“Iran has been limiting its own citizens’ and the world’s access to coverage of the post-election protests by blocking sites distributing such material. Peer-to-peer software, like Lime Wire, provides access to critical information and coverage of the events in a manner that the Iranian government cannot effectively block.”

Clicking on the splash screen in question triggers a download of a zipped 110 MB archive of videos from the much debated country. This Zip file originates in the company’s servers, and users are encouraged to unzip it and put it for share afterwards.

This movement from Limewire is meant as a firm stand against current Iranian government’s policy of concealing any detail regarding the recent events in the country:

“The Iranian government has been limiting the free flow of information in the wake of their presidential elections. Lime Wire takes no stance on the election itself, but we strongly believe in internet and information freedom.”

Below we posted a video shot by the BBC, one of those which people were asked to share (Note: some of the images may contain violent scenes!) :

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The Pirate Bay to Launch Highly Anticipated Video Sharing Site

June 29, 2009 by · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events, Digital Media, Mobile Phones, P2P technology, File-Sharing Programs, Networks & Services 

The much expected video sharing site that The Pirate Bay team was talking about back in 2007 if I remember this correctly is finally about to be revealed.

Last week Peter Sunde appeared over Skype at the Open Video Conference in New York, and reportedly said that he and his colleagues were preparing to launch a brand new service. A bit of checking out and you could see The Video Bay is the novelty waiting to go live.

“To stay in the spirit on which TPB was founded and using the Latest Technology, TVB aims to use the new HTML5 features, more specifically the and tags with the ogg/theora video and audio formats. This site will be an experimental playground and as such subjected to both live and drunk (en)coding, so please don’t bug us too much if the site ain’t working properly.”

Once the site goes live, users will be able to upload content limit-free and censorship-free. As rumors have it, the service will also include full streaming movies (and no need to tell that these will not be released with the media companies’ permission).

Click here for a sneak peak:

Note: to check out the sample a browser that has HTML5 support is required (Opera 10, Chrome 3, Safari 4, or Firefox 3.5 beta 4).

the-pirate-bay-to-launch-highly-anticipated-video-sharing-site

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Top 10 Most Downloaded Movies via BitTorrent

June 29, 2009 by · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events, File-Sharing Programs, Networks & Services, Movies, MP3, Digital Audio & Games, Tops 
top-10-most-downloaded-movies-via-bittorrent2

'Knowing' tops the chart for the second week in a row

TorrentFreak has published the data they collected with the top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent for the week ended June 28th. All the films included in this chart are DVDrips (unless mentioned otherwise).

The taste for Sci-Fi thriller is unspoiled as ‘Knowing’ production starring Nicolas Cage proves with its No. 1 position this week (as well as last week). The passion for thrills goes on as next comes ‘The Haunting in Connecticut’ and ‘Angels and Demons’ but the ultimate ‘thriller’ is the entrance of Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker in the chart. P2POn covered on Saturday the pop legend’s death in a post about the impact the news had on the Internet world.

Besides ‘Moonwalker’ there are two other new apparitions on the list.

Rank Last week Movie Rating/Trailer
1 (1) Knowing 6.7 / trailer
2 (…) The Haunting in Conneticut 5.8 / trailer
3 (2) Angels and Demons 6.8 / trailer
4 (…) Transformers 2 (Cam) 6.9 / trailer
5 (…) Michael Jackson – Moonwalker 4.9 / trailer
6 (4) Night at the Museum 2 (R5) 6.1 / trailer
7 (3) Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li
 4.1 / trailer
8 (7) He’s Just Not That into You 6.5 / trailer
9 (10) Push 6.4 / trailer
10 (5) The Last House on the Left (R5) 6.9 / trailer

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Michael Jackson Dies, the News Almost Brings Down the Internet

June 27, 2009 by · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events 

While this may not have too much in common with p2p, we cannot overlook either the tragic event itself or its impact on the digital world.

Yes, the ‘King of Pop’ is dead but just turning on the TV or, better yet, checking a while on the Web, even on the p2p networks , one will only see a flame that has long ago surpassed its creator and which is still burning thanks to millions of people who have loved this artist for his music and dancing and will continue to do so from now on as well.

Michael Jackson Dies, the News Almost Takes Down the Internet Within hours since the announcement of his death was made, the Internet was so overwhelmed by the massive searching for anything related to Michael Jackson, that first it got very slow as people all over the world rushed to check out news accounts of Michael Jacksons death and ultimately saw lots of websites crash. Even Google admitted that it went down for 14 minutes. BitTorrent networks also saw countless file-sharers downloading Michael Jackson albums.

On the popular micro-blogging website Twitter, phrases like “RIP Michael Jackson” soon climbed to the top of as trend topics due to tributes made by numerous celebrities (here are some of the messages):

Ice T: Rest In Peace Mike. People can say what they want but you were 100% original. WE will always love , miss & remember your GREATNESS.

Eddie Van Halen: I am really shocked; as I’m sure the world is, to hear the news. I had the pleasure of working with Michael on ‘Beat It’ back in ‘83 — one of my fondest memories in my career. Michael will be missed and may he rest in peace.

Diddy: Michael Jackson showed me that you can actually see the beat. He made the music come to life!! He made me believe in magic. I will miss him!

Ludacris: If it were not for Micheal Jackson I would not be where or who I am today.His Music and Legacy will live on Forever.Prayers to the famR.I.P.

Slash: Really sad news about Michael, he was a talent from on high.

MC Hammer: I have no words.. I loved Michael Jackson… RIP…

Ashton Kutcher: Rip Sending love and light to family and friend but especially his kids.

Shanna Moakler: The hard thing about getting older is watching all those who inspired you pass, love to the jackson family..

Further on we find out from Torrentfreak that “At the time of writing the three most active torrents in the music section on the largest torrent indexer, Mininova, are all compilations or discographies from the “King of Pop”. On top is a torrent listing 30 Michael Jackson albums, The Jackson 5 and The Jacksons, totaling 1.94 GB of music.”

Below you can read the Top Ten on Amazon at 21:45pm on Friday 26th June:

1. Michael Jackson 25th Anniversary of Thriller - Michael Jackson

2. Off the Wall – Michael Jackson

3. Bad - Michael Jackson

4. Michael Jackson: The Ultimate Collection - Michael Jackson

5. Number Ones - Michael Jackson

6. Dangerous - Michael Jackson

7. The Ultimate Collection - Jackson 5

8. The Essential Michael Jackson - Michael Jackson

9. Michael Jackson – Vol. 1-Greatest Hits History - Michael Jackson

10. Invincible - Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson was taken to the UCLA Medical Center on Thursday afternoon following a cardiac arrest which it is suspected to have been caused by a Demerol overdose and which ultimately killed him.

This song (because of the lyrics) had many YouTube users wonder if this was either a fatal prediction or a plan. It starts with these lyrics: “He got flat baby/ Kick in the back baby /A Heart Attack Baby…” and in the chorus the word Demerol is repeated several times…

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