The Pirate Bay ruling

The entertainment industry scored another victory in its battle against online piracy Friday when a Swedish court convicted the operators of the Pirate Bay -- one of the Web's most popular tools for finding bootlegged movies, songs, software and games -- of aiding and abetting copyright infringement. The site operators had gleefully mocked copyright law, simultaneously making them prime targets for music and movie conglomerates and folk heroes to millions of Internet users who swap digital goods. Yet their extreme behavior made them seem more important than they are, and the court's ruling isn't likely to be as helpful in combating rampant piracy as the industry's improving efforts to make content available online.

April 18, 2009