1 00:00:04,400 --> 00:00:07,800 Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 2 00:00:12,160 --> 00:00:14,840 Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 3 00:00:14,960 --> 00:00:18,280 Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio 4 00:00:18,320 --> 00:00:22,360 Speaker 1: and the Love All Things Tech. And eighteen years ago 5 00:00:22,560 --> 00:00:26,520 Speaker 1: or so, a group of hackers and political activists calling 6 00:00:26,560 --> 00:00:32,080 Speaker 1: themselves the Bureau of Piracy in Sweden launched a website 7 00:00:32,280 --> 00:00:35,920 Speaker 1: that would become the target of numerous lawsuits and police raids. 8 00:00:36,440 --> 00:00:41,040 Speaker 1: And yet eighteen years later, the website, the Pirate Bay, 9 00:00:41,080 --> 00:00:44,040 Speaker 1: is still up and running. So today I thought I 10 00:00:44,040 --> 00:00:46,880 Speaker 1: would talk not just about the history of the site, 11 00:00:47,560 --> 00:00:50,199 Speaker 1: or the philosophy of the site's founders, or even the 12 00:00:50,200 --> 00:00:53,880 Speaker 1: battles fought between the established music industry and the pirate community, 13 00:00:54,360 --> 00:00:56,840 Speaker 1: but also the technology that underpins the whole thing in 14 00:00:56,840 --> 00:01:00,000 Speaker 1: the first place. But first, let's start with some under 15 00:01:00,120 --> 00:01:03,320 Speaker 1: lying facts of how we got here, which will involve 16 00:01:03,360 --> 00:01:07,000 Speaker 1: a quick discussion of the history of the music industry 17 00:01:07,080 --> 00:01:11,000 Speaker 1: and its issue with copying media, because that's really at 18 00:01:11,000 --> 00:01:14,160 Speaker 1: the heart of all this. Now, in the old old days, 19 00:01:14,680 --> 00:01:18,640 Speaker 1: before the the era of recorded media, so before you 20 00:01:18,640 --> 00:01:22,920 Speaker 1: could actually make a record of music other than like 21 00:01:23,040 --> 00:01:26,120 Speaker 1: sheet music or something. Making a living off music was 22 00:01:26,120 --> 00:01:30,200 Speaker 1: pretty darn tough. Um. You had your folk musicians who 23 00:01:30,240 --> 00:01:32,160 Speaker 1: would earn, you know, a bit of cash here, and 24 00:01:32,200 --> 00:01:36,080 Speaker 1: they're getting hired to play or maybe paid to go 25 00:01:36,120 --> 00:01:39,160 Speaker 1: away if they were really bad. You had your composers. 26 00:01:39,600 --> 00:01:42,000 Speaker 1: Many of those would work either in the service of 27 00:01:42,440 --> 00:01:46,960 Speaker 1: a monarch or nobility, or maybe the church. Bach did 28 00:01:47,000 --> 00:01:49,600 Speaker 1: a lot of work for the church, only if you 29 00:01:49,840 --> 00:01:52,520 Speaker 1: had a more public facing way of paying the bills. 30 00:01:52,560 --> 00:01:57,080 Speaker 1: Beethoven was one of those um and actually made money 31 00:01:57,120 --> 00:02:01,440 Speaker 1: by selling sheet music of his compositions. But it was 32 00:02:01,480 --> 00:02:05,520 Speaker 1: really the invention of recorded media like wax cylinders and 33 00:02:05,520 --> 00:02:09,400 Speaker 1: such that really opened up doors not just for musicians 34 00:02:09,440 --> 00:02:13,560 Speaker 1: but also for the companies that made the recordings. In fact, 35 00:02:13,800 --> 00:02:19,239 Speaker 1: it really opened up doors for those companies now. All 36 00:02:19,280 --> 00:02:23,400 Speaker 1: the way back in eighteen eighty nine, a guy named 37 00:02:23,760 --> 00:02:29,480 Speaker 1: Edward D. Easton founded a phonograph company called Columbia. It had, 38 00:02:29,639 --> 00:02:34,040 Speaker 1: you know, various different names, but Columbia Music, Columbia Pictures 39 00:02:34,080 --> 00:02:37,760 Speaker 1: all comes from this original company. In eighteen eighty nine, 40 00:02:38,240 --> 00:02:41,440 Speaker 1: it worked in tandem with Thomas Edison's company for a 41 00:02:41,480 --> 00:02:45,480 Speaker 1: few years, producing regional recordings of its own wax cylinders 42 00:02:45,480 --> 00:02:49,280 Speaker 1: in or to selling these brand new inventions of the phonograph. 43 00:02:49,440 --> 00:02:53,160 Speaker 1: But other companies started to come into being as well, 44 00:02:53,200 --> 00:02:56,280 Speaker 1: and some of them started to introduce new technologies like 45 00:02:56,760 --> 00:03:00,240 Speaker 1: recorded discs as in you know, record albums. They were 46 00:03:00,240 --> 00:03:03,400 Speaker 1: made out of shellac instead of vinyl for the first 47 00:03:03,440 --> 00:03:06,880 Speaker 1: several decades. But you know that meant that there was 48 00:03:06,960 --> 00:03:11,120 Speaker 1: a technological evolution beyond the wax cylinder. Well, the companies, 49 00:03:11,840 --> 00:03:13,240 Speaker 1: you know now that there were a few of them, 50 00:03:13,240 --> 00:03:15,920 Speaker 1: were eager to kind of corner a market, to offer 51 00:03:16,040 --> 00:03:18,919 Speaker 1: something to customers that the other companies could not offer, 52 00:03:19,600 --> 00:03:22,600 Speaker 1: and they began to work with various artists and we're 53 00:03:22,720 --> 00:03:25,600 Speaker 1: signing them to exclusive deals like this is where you 54 00:03:25,600 --> 00:03:29,760 Speaker 1: would get signed to a record label. Essentially, the artists 55 00:03:29,840 --> 00:03:32,320 Speaker 1: would get a chance to record their music and make 56 00:03:32,400 --> 00:03:35,160 Speaker 1: some money off of it, and the companies would establish 57 00:03:35,200 --> 00:03:38,160 Speaker 1: a roster of artists that they could promote and sell 58 00:03:38,240 --> 00:03:43,920 Speaker 1: to customers, and the music industry was effectively born. It was, 59 00:03:44,400 --> 00:03:48,120 Speaker 1: and to some extent still is, cut throat, with companies 60 00:03:48,200 --> 00:03:52,440 Speaker 1: jealously scooping up talents that are perceived to be a commodity, 61 00:03:52,600 --> 00:03:55,680 Speaker 1: and a whole business model came to form over time, 62 00:03:55,760 --> 00:03:58,560 Speaker 1: with companies determining how much to pay out to artists. 63 00:03:59,320 --> 00:04:02,080 Speaker 1: Generally speak, those musicians don't see a whole lot of 64 00:04:02,080 --> 00:04:04,680 Speaker 1: money from record sales. You know, you might get a 65 00:04:04,680 --> 00:04:07,800 Speaker 1: big advance as a record contract, but you don't necessarily 66 00:04:07,840 --> 00:04:10,680 Speaker 1: make a lot of money off of the record sales themselves, 67 00:04:10,920 --> 00:04:13,080 Speaker 1: unless you have a good royalty deal and you sell 68 00:04:13,240 --> 00:04:16,280 Speaker 1: a let's see, I think the technical term is a 69 00:04:16,320 --> 00:04:20,960 Speaker 1: metric crap ton of records. And nowadays that's even harder 70 00:04:21,000 --> 00:04:23,560 Speaker 1: to do, right because you've got things like streaming services. 71 00:04:23,640 --> 00:04:27,240 Speaker 1: That's a whole separate issue that I should really go 72 00:04:27,320 --> 00:04:29,960 Speaker 1: into at some point to talk about the music industry 73 00:04:30,040 --> 00:04:33,880 Speaker 1: streaming and how that affects artists. But let's get back 74 00:04:33,960 --> 00:04:36,760 Speaker 1: to talking about the music industry in general. So in 75 00:04:36,880 --> 00:04:41,080 Speaker 1: nineteen fifty two, way before the streaming days, several music 76 00:04:41,160 --> 00:04:44,440 Speaker 1: labels work to form an organization in America called the 77 00:04:44,560 --> 00:04:49,320 Speaker 1: Recording Industry Association of America or r I double A. Now, 78 00:04:49,360 --> 00:04:52,000 Speaker 1: the r I double A is a trade organization that 79 00:04:52,040 --> 00:04:55,200 Speaker 1: sets technical standards for the recording industry. You know, which 80 00:04:55,240 --> 00:04:57,320 Speaker 1: is important. You want to make sure that you're not 81 00:04:57,600 --> 00:05:02,040 Speaker 1: fragmenting the market to the point where customers get frustrated, right, 82 00:05:02,440 --> 00:05:05,239 Speaker 1: Like if it turned out I could buy a record 83 00:05:05,279 --> 00:05:08,840 Speaker 1: from Columbia and a different record from Victor, but they 84 00:05:08,839 --> 00:05:11,920 Speaker 1: would only play on their respective players, and I can't 85 00:05:11,920 --> 00:05:15,520 Speaker 1: afford both players. That would be incredibly frustrating. You know, 86 00:05:15,560 --> 00:05:18,120 Speaker 1: as a customer, I just want the stuff I buy 87 00:05:18,200 --> 00:05:21,600 Speaker 1: to work on the stuff that I have. Right. We've 88 00:05:21,600 --> 00:05:24,000 Speaker 1: seen it over and over again that when the the 89 00:05:24,040 --> 00:05:27,680 Speaker 1: market gets fragmented with different standards, it hurts everybody in 90 00:05:27,720 --> 00:05:29,559 Speaker 1: the long run. So that was one of the reasons 91 00:05:29,600 --> 00:05:32,640 Speaker 1: that are I Double A formed. But it also tracks 92 00:05:32,640 --> 00:05:37,280 Speaker 1: recording sales, and it's the organization that awards stuff like 93 00:05:37,320 --> 00:05:39,920 Speaker 1: gold records and platinum records. So if you hear about 94 00:05:40,120 --> 00:05:42,559 Speaker 1: a record going platinum, it was the r I Double 95 00:05:42,600 --> 00:05:46,599 Speaker 1: A that tracked those sales. And uh and you know, 96 00:05:46,720 --> 00:05:50,200 Speaker 1: essentially authorize that to say like, yes, this this activates 97 00:05:50,680 --> 00:05:54,120 Speaker 1: Again a weird thing in the streaming age, but it's 98 00:05:54,160 --> 00:05:57,320 Speaker 1: probably most famous for folks who are at least Internet 99 00:05:57,360 --> 00:06:01,520 Speaker 1: savvy as the organization that fights tooth and nail against 100 00:06:01,640 --> 00:06:07,240 Speaker 1: piracy and copyright infringement, sometimes to the point of well 101 00:06:07,400 --> 00:06:10,520 Speaker 1: beyond belief. I would say, one thing we've seen over 102 00:06:10,600 --> 00:06:13,960 Speaker 1: and over in the music biz and the entertainment business overall, 103 00:06:14,080 --> 00:06:15,839 Speaker 1: not just music. I mean, we've seen this in the 104 00:06:15,880 --> 00:06:19,120 Speaker 1: movie industry and TV as well. Is a reluctance to 105 00:06:19,160 --> 00:06:22,120 Speaker 1: support anything that would allow someone to make a copy 106 00:06:22,360 --> 00:06:25,520 Speaker 1: of a recorded work. So for a long time that 107 00:06:25,600 --> 00:06:28,400 Speaker 1: really was not an issue. There just wasn't an easy 108 00:06:28,440 --> 00:06:30,039 Speaker 1: way to do it. The average person had no way 109 00:06:30,040 --> 00:06:33,479 Speaker 1: to copy a recording. Then in the nineteen sixties we 110 00:06:33,800 --> 00:06:36,440 Speaker 1: had the development of the cassette tape, though it would 111 00:06:36,440 --> 00:06:39,000 Speaker 1: take a few more years for cassette tapes to reach 112 00:06:39,040 --> 00:06:42,800 Speaker 1: a quality suitable for music, but once that happened, we 113 00:06:42,839 --> 00:06:45,640 Speaker 1: saw the r I double A really take notice. It 114 00:06:45,680 --> 00:06:49,040 Speaker 1: would become something of a pattern. As tech companies developed 115 00:06:49,040 --> 00:06:52,960 Speaker 1: ways for consumers to copy media onto a format, we 116 00:06:52,960 --> 00:06:56,720 Speaker 1: would see a resistance to that in the industry and 117 00:06:56,839 --> 00:07:00,640 Speaker 1: lobbying activities that were aimed at extending copy right law 118 00:07:00,880 --> 00:07:04,599 Speaker 1: to protect copyright holders and to like try and strike 119 00:07:04,600 --> 00:07:07,240 Speaker 1: down technology before it could hit the public. And let's 120 00:07:07,240 --> 00:07:11,160 Speaker 1: do a quick aside about copyright holders, because this is 121 00:07:11,200 --> 00:07:15,120 Speaker 1: important not just for this discussion about the music industry, 122 00:07:15,120 --> 00:07:18,040 Speaker 1: but also about the pirate bay in particular. So in 123 00:07:18,080 --> 00:07:23,320 Speaker 1: the United States, copyright law is arguably pretty darn bonkers, 124 00:07:23,320 --> 00:07:27,520 Speaker 1: thanks largely to major corporations like Disney pushing for expanded 125 00:07:27,520 --> 00:07:31,920 Speaker 1: copyright protection over the years. So current copyright law provides 126 00:07:32,040 --> 00:07:34,760 Speaker 1: exclusive rights to the copyright holder for a term of 127 00:07:35,200 --> 00:07:39,640 Speaker 1: seventy years after the author of that works death, so 128 00:07:39,800 --> 00:07:42,880 Speaker 1: the entire life of the author plus seventy years or 129 00:07:43,280 --> 00:07:47,480 Speaker 1: nine years after publication if the rights are held not 130 00:07:47,680 --> 00:07:51,080 Speaker 1: by you know, an author, but rather say, someone else, 131 00:07:51,760 --> 00:07:55,120 Speaker 1: So holding a copyright gives the holder the exclusive right 132 00:07:55,240 --> 00:07:59,200 Speaker 1: to reproduce and sell those reproductions or copies of that work. 133 00:07:59,720 --> 00:08:02,760 Speaker 1: If you are not the copyright holder, then you do 134 00:08:02,840 --> 00:08:06,440 Speaker 1: not have the right to make copies, and yet that 135 00:08:06,520 --> 00:08:09,640 Speaker 1: you know, can be considered infringement. I should also mention 136 00:08:09,680 --> 00:08:13,200 Speaker 1: that frequently the copyright holder in this case is not 137 00:08:13,280 --> 00:08:15,920 Speaker 1: necessarily the person who wrote a piece of music or 138 00:08:15,960 --> 00:08:19,960 Speaker 1: the artist or group that recorded the music. It's typically 139 00:08:20,280 --> 00:08:23,600 Speaker 1: the music company that's the copyright holder. So that's not 140 00:08:23,640 --> 00:08:26,280 Speaker 1: the case everywhere, mind you, but for pretty much the 141 00:08:26,440 --> 00:08:30,600 Speaker 1: entire history of the music industry, music companies have dominated 142 00:08:30,680 --> 00:08:35,640 Speaker 1: the copyright space, and so defending copyright wasn't really about 143 00:08:35,679 --> 00:08:38,880 Speaker 1: standing up for the artists and writers out there, although 144 00:08:38,920 --> 00:08:41,600 Speaker 1: that's how it's almost always framed it was actually to 145 00:08:41,640 --> 00:08:45,640 Speaker 1: protect the financial assets of a company. However, there's also 146 00:08:45,720 --> 00:08:51,160 Speaker 1: a concept called fair use. This complicates matters. Now. Generally speaking, 147 00:08:51,400 --> 00:08:55,320 Speaker 1: there's some pretty narrow cases in which someone can make 148 00:08:55,720 --> 00:08:59,800 Speaker 1: an unauthorized copy of a copyrighted work and it won't 149 00:08:59,840 --> 00:09:04,600 Speaker 1: be considered copyright infringement. Typically, these restrictions fall into stuff 150 00:09:04,640 --> 00:09:07,839 Speaker 1: like if you're doing it for academic research, or you're 151 00:09:07,840 --> 00:09:11,360 Speaker 1: providing criticism of a work, or you're making a parody 152 00:09:11,559 --> 00:09:15,760 Speaker 1: of a work. But even within these restrictions, there's a 153 00:09:15,800 --> 00:09:18,280 Speaker 1: fairly narrow path you have to follow. So for example, 154 00:09:18,920 --> 00:09:22,160 Speaker 1: let's say that you wanted to critique the latest Stephen 155 00:09:22,240 --> 00:09:26,320 Speaker 1: King novel, so you include several chapters of that novel 156 00:09:26,440 --> 00:09:29,600 Speaker 1: in full as part of your critique. Well, you would 157 00:09:29,640 --> 00:09:31,840 Speaker 1: really be pushing your luck because you're using so much 158 00:09:31,920 --> 00:09:34,800 Speaker 1: of the original work. Now, fair use isn't a force 159 00:09:34,840 --> 00:09:37,880 Speaker 1: field or anything like. Even if you're following all the 160 00:09:37,960 --> 00:09:42,160 Speaker 1: rules and you're maybe you're criticizing something and you're using 161 00:09:42,160 --> 00:09:44,120 Speaker 1: a little bit of the original work in order to 162 00:09:44,120 --> 00:09:47,280 Speaker 1: make a point, and you've really got all your bases covered, 163 00:09:47,880 --> 00:09:51,480 Speaker 1: it's not like fair use is a preemptive strike. It's 164 00:09:51,480 --> 00:09:53,760 Speaker 1: actually something that only comes into play once you get 165 00:09:53,840 --> 00:09:56,920 Speaker 1: taken to court and you would present your case to 166 00:09:57,240 --> 00:10:00,360 Speaker 1: a judge and try to argue fair you and the 167 00:10:00,400 --> 00:10:02,840 Speaker 1: court would decide whether or not it was actually fair 168 00:10:02,960 --> 00:10:06,240 Speaker 1: use or not. You can't, you know, predeclare this is 169 00:10:06,280 --> 00:10:09,080 Speaker 1: fair use. No matter how many times you might see 170 00:10:09,120 --> 00:10:12,760 Speaker 1: something like that on say a social networking platform or 171 00:10:12,760 --> 00:10:17,280 Speaker 1: YouTube or whatever. It don't work that way. Also, the 172 00:10:17,280 --> 00:10:20,439 Speaker 1: whole thing of I only used ten seconds of audio. 173 00:10:21,000 --> 00:10:24,559 Speaker 1: That you know, the amount you use does factor into 174 00:10:24,559 --> 00:10:27,000 Speaker 1: decisions about whether or not something is fair use, but 175 00:10:27,080 --> 00:10:31,120 Speaker 1: there is no minimum amount that is magical anyway, even 176 00:10:31,120 --> 00:10:33,080 Speaker 1: if you're in the right, if someone takes you to 177 00:10:33,120 --> 00:10:35,400 Speaker 1: court and you defend yourself with an argument about fair 178 00:10:35,559 --> 00:10:38,880 Speaker 1: use and you win, it's still expensive. So unless you're 179 00:10:38,960 --> 00:10:42,800 Speaker 1: awarded some money in the process, you're gonna be out 180 00:10:43,120 --> 00:10:47,840 Speaker 1: some cash. It's it's tough well. Home reproduction of copyrighted 181 00:10:47,840 --> 00:10:51,600 Speaker 1: works is one of those sticky areas that sometimes gets 182 00:10:51,679 --> 00:10:56,400 Speaker 1: lumped in with fair use because while there's been discussions 183 00:10:56,400 --> 00:11:00,280 Speaker 1: about working in an exemption for home copying for for 184 00:11:00,440 --> 00:11:04,200 Speaker 1: like archival purposes or whatever, it's never been codified in 185 00:11:04,400 --> 00:11:07,760 Speaker 1: US law. So if you were to purchase an album, 186 00:11:07,800 --> 00:11:11,360 Speaker 1: whether you know it was on CD, your vinyl, or whatever, 187 00:11:11,440 --> 00:11:13,760 Speaker 1: maybe it's even digital. You know, maybe you purchased a 188 00:11:13,800 --> 00:11:17,360 Speaker 1: digital album and then you decide to make a backup 189 00:11:17,360 --> 00:11:19,600 Speaker 1: recording of it. And let's say that you know you're 190 00:11:19,600 --> 00:11:21,480 Speaker 1: going to old school, you're putting it on a cassette. 191 00:11:21,840 --> 00:11:25,600 Speaker 1: You make a cassette recording of the album. There are 192 00:11:25,640 --> 00:11:28,199 Speaker 1: some people who would argue that what you've done could 193 00:11:28,200 --> 00:11:31,400 Speaker 1: be fair use because you're creating an archive or backup 194 00:11:31,400 --> 00:11:34,480 Speaker 1: copy of work. You're not used making any commercial use 195 00:11:34,520 --> 00:11:38,000 Speaker 1: of it. You're not selling it, you're not publishing it. 196 00:11:38,679 --> 00:11:41,959 Speaker 1: You still have the original copy, so it's not like 197 00:11:42,040 --> 00:11:45,800 Speaker 1: you've given your original copy away. And you're generally thought 198 00:11:45,880 --> 00:11:48,120 Speaker 1: of to be in the clear as long as the 199 00:11:48,520 --> 00:11:50,680 Speaker 1: copy you have made is for your own personal use 200 00:11:50,920 --> 00:11:54,920 Speaker 1: and not for commercial purposes, even though again this is 201 00:11:54,920 --> 00:11:58,480 Speaker 1: not codified in law. It's just the interpretation that people 202 00:11:58,520 --> 00:12:01,400 Speaker 1: have made. But he's saw the R I double A 203 00:12:01,480 --> 00:12:04,040 Speaker 1: react in similar ways every single time a new consumer 204 00:12:04,080 --> 00:12:06,880 Speaker 1: tech with copying abilities appeared, with the R I double 205 00:12:06,920 --> 00:12:10,480 Speaker 1: A essentially saying this was doomed for the industry. We 206 00:12:10,480 --> 00:12:13,000 Speaker 1: saw that TV and movie studios do the same thing. 207 00:12:13,120 --> 00:12:16,800 Speaker 1: With the rise of the VCR, we really saw the 208 00:12:16,960 --> 00:12:19,400 Speaker 1: r I double A push harder. With the emergence of 209 00:12:19,440 --> 00:12:23,440 Speaker 1: digital audio tapes or debt formats. The big worry there 210 00:12:24,600 --> 00:12:29,200 Speaker 1: was that unlike you know, okay, so analog cassettes, analog formats, 211 00:12:29,200 --> 00:12:32,520 Speaker 1: cassette tapes are analog, uh, generally meant that you would 212 00:12:32,520 --> 00:12:35,240 Speaker 1: have a decline in audio quality, like the copy would 213 00:12:35,240 --> 00:12:38,880 Speaker 1: not sound as good as the original. So there was 214 00:12:39,160 --> 00:12:43,520 Speaker 1: a little bit of a relief in the industry because 215 00:12:43,520 --> 00:12:47,160 Speaker 1: the thought was, well, yeah, people can copy stuff, uh, 216 00:12:47,240 --> 00:12:49,120 Speaker 1: and we don't like that, not even if they're just 217 00:12:49,200 --> 00:12:52,000 Speaker 1: copying it for themselves. But at least the copies don't 218 00:12:52,000 --> 00:12:54,800 Speaker 1: sound as good as the originals, so we have the 219 00:12:54,920 --> 00:13:00,440 Speaker 1: edge there. Well, digital was different, right, Digital recordings can 220 00:13:00,480 --> 00:13:02,880 Speaker 1: go bit for bit and you can have a perfect 221 00:13:02,920 --> 00:13:07,480 Speaker 1: transfer of a file, meaning there's no decrease in audio quality. 222 00:13:07,520 --> 00:13:10,840 Speaker 1: The copy is just as good as the original. So 223 00:13:10,880 --> 00:13:13,920 Speaker 1: the quality you get would be dependent upon the playback 224 00:13:13,960 --> 00:13:17,200 Speaker 1: device you were using more than anything else. Well, the 225 00:13:17,480 --> 00:13:19,640 Speaker 1: R I double A did not like that, and they 226 00:13:19,720 --> 00:13:23,199 Speaker 1: lobbied very hard to head off issues with digital transfers, 227 00:13:23,600 --> 00:13:25,760 Speaker 1: the fear being that if it's easy to make perfect 228 00:13:25,760 --> 00:13:28,280 Speaker 1: copies of stuff, piracy will run rampant and the music 229 00:13:28,320 --> 00:13:30,959 Speaker 1: industry as a whole will collapse. Now I do not 230 00:13:31,720 --> 00:13:34,760 Speaker 1: totally by that argument, by the way, but the r 231 00:13:34,840 --> 00:13:37,320 Speaker 1: I double A was able to affect legislation enough for 232 00:13:37,440 --> 00:13:39,840 Speaker 1: the DAT format to be kind of dead on a rival. 233 00:13:39,920 --> 00:13:42,240 Speaker 1: I mean, it did exist, but there are a lot 234 00:13:42,240 --> 00:13:44,440 Speaker 1: of copy of protections that were built in place that 235 00:13:44,720 --> 00:13:52,000 Speaker 1: inhibited that particular technology from getting widespread adoption. Uh, the 236 00:13:52,120 --> 00:13:55,040 Speaker 1: compact disc would have much better success. And there are 237 00:13:55,080 --> 00:13:57,000 Speaker 1: other parts of that story as well, but that goes 238 00:13:57,040 --> 00:13:59,880 Speaker 1: beyond this episode. Anyway, you can only imagine that once 239 00:13:59,880 --> 00:14:02,960 Speaker 1: we reached the point where it became feasible to share 240 00:14:03,040 --> 00:14:06,280 Speaker 1: digital files over the Internet, how the r I double 241 00:14:06,320 --> 00:14:10,200 Speaker 1: A reacted. The trade organization is famous for its vigorous 242 00:14:10,360 --> 00:14:16,040 Speaker 1: defense of copyright, So we're gonna skip up to This 243 00:14:16,120 --> 00:14:18,480 Speaker 1: was a few years before the emergence of bit Torrent, 244 00:14:18,960 --> 00:14:22,640 Speaker 1: and a few years more before the Pirate Bay would launch. 245 00:14:23,160 --> 00:14:27,240 Speaker 1: So in nine, an American college student named Shawn Fanning 246 00:14:27,280 --> 00:14:31,960 Speaker 1: created a peer to peer network platform called Napster. Oh Napster, 247 00:14:32,120 --> 00:14:34,840 Speaker 1: what a Hornet's nest. You stir it up, all right. 248 00:14:35,160 --> 00:14:37,440 Speaker 1: Let's talk about peer to peer for a second. So 249 00:14:37,480 --> 00:14:40,240 Speaker 1: in the early days of the general public being aware 250 00:14:40,240 --> 00:14:43,000 Speaker 1: of the Internet, one of the really big limiting factors 251 00:14:43,600 --> 00:14:46,320 Speaker 1: was the download speeds. I mean a lot of people 252 00:14:46,320 --> 00:14:49,920 Speaker 1: were using dial up Internet. It was slow. Transferring large 253 00:14:49,920 --> 00:14:52,440 Speaker 1: files could take a really long time, and if there 254 00:14:52,440 --> 00:14:55,640 Speaker 1: were any network issues between the client, which is the 255 00:14:55,640 --> 00:14:59,680 Speaker 1: computer what's doing the downloading, and the server that would 256 00:14:59,680 --> 00:15:02,920 Speaker 1: be the peer that hosted the original file. If anything 257 00:15:02,960 --> 00:15:05,640 Speaker 1: happened between those two, it could take even longer to 258 00:15:05,680 --> 00:15:08,480 Speaker 1: download the file, right, like if a connection broke or something. 259 00:15:09,200 --> 00:15:12,720 Speaker 1: Peer to peer networks presented an alternative to your classic 260 00:15:12,920 --> 00:15:17,240 Speaker 1: client server system and appeer to peer network. Every computer 261 00:15:17,400 --> 00:15:21,040 Speaker 1: connected to that network acts both as a client and 262 00:15:21,240 --> 00:15:24,160 Speaker 1: a server. That's why they're called peers. They're all peers 263 00:15:24,200 --> 00:15:27,760 Speaker 1: of each other. Typically, you would designate a folder in 264 00:15:27,760 --> 00:15:31,840 Speaker 1: your computers directory for the purposes of downloading and sharing files. 265 00:15:32,440 --> 00:15:35,280 Speaker 1: Anything you put in that folder would become visible and 266 00:15:35,360 --> 00:15:38,800 Speaker 1: accessible to all the other computers on this peer to 267 00:15:38,840 --> 00:15:42,640 Speaker 1: peer network, and any downloads you initiated would go into 268 00:15:42,680 --> 00:15:44,680 Speaker 1: that folder. It didn't have to be that way, by 269 00:15:44,720 --> 00:15:47,600 Speaker 1: the way, you could actually direct stuff to a different folder, 270 00:15:47,640 --> 00:15:50,520 Speaker 1: and you could choose to share nothing. But it was 271 00:15:50,640 --> 00:15:53,160 Speaker 1: a pretty typical approach to do it this way. Now, 272 00:15:53,200 --> 00:15:55,560 Speaker 1: the big benefit of the peer to peer system is 273 00:15:55,600 --> 00:15:59,600 Speaker 1: that the files could propagate across networks fairly quickly. You'd 274 00:15:59,600 --> 00:16:02,320 Speaker 1: load up the P two P client, the program you 275 00:16:02,360 --> 00:16:05,840 Speaker 1: were using to access this network, and you would look 276 00:16:05,840 --> 00:16:08,400 Speaker 1: for servers that were hosting a file that you were 277 00:16:08,400 --> 00:16:11,720 Speaker 1: particularly interested in. And now, assuming that was a pretty 278 00:16:11,720 --> 00:16:14,520 Speaker 1: popular file, you would probably see a pretty good selection 279 00:16:14,560 --> 00:16:18,960 Speaker 1: of options and you could choose a server appear to 280 00:16:19,080 --> 00:16:21,440 Speaker 1: download from. You know, you could look to see about 281 00:16:21,480 --> 00:16:24,600 Speaker 1: signal strength or how far away it was. Like, if 282 00:16:24,640 --> 00:16:26,680 Speaker 1: you saw something that had a pretty good signal strength 283 00:16:26,680 --> 00:16:28,800 Speaker 1: and it was close to you, you could guess that 284 00:16:28,840 --> 00:16:31,000 Speaker 1: you were going to get that file fairly quickly, at 285 00:16:31,080 --> 00:16:35,040 Speaker 1: least as quickly as anything traveled on the Internet back 286 00:16:35,080 --> 00:16:38,680 Speaker 1: in the late nineties. Uh And if things were super slow, 287 00:16:38,720 --> 00:16:41,200 Speaker 1: you could always stop and switch to a different peer 288 00:16:41,320 --> 00:16:43,680 Speaker 1: on that network to see if maybe your connection to 289 00:16:43,800 --> 00:16:48,640 Speaker 1: that peer was faster. Napster became famous for being a 290 00:16:48,720 --> 00:16:53,080 Speaker 1: hub of pirated music exchanges. Some users were ripping music 291 00:16:53,200 --> 00:16:55,600 Speaker 1: from their CDs, just putting those in the shared P 292 00:16:55,760 --> 00:16:58,760 Speaker 1: two P folder on their machines and then searching for 293 00:16:58,880 --> 00:17:01,480 Speaker 1: files to fill out their collections while sharing their own. 294 00:17:02,040 --> 00:17:05,960 Speaker 1: And this totally bypassed the traditional model of purchasing music 295 00:17:06,000 --> 00:17:09,320 Speaker 1: from a retail establishment, and the music industry wasn't seeing 296 00:17:09,359 --> 00:17:13,000 Speaker 1: penny one from these exchanges, and it indeed seemed as 297 00:17:13,040 --> 00:17:16,040 Speaker 1: though the sky would fall. Keep in mind, this is 298 00:17:16,119 --> 00:17:20,240 Speaker 1: before iTunes. Uh, there weren't that many companies that were 299 00:17:20,359 --> 00:17:24,400 Speaker 1: directly selling digital files to customers. The ones that were 300 00:17:24,440 --> 00:17:27,200 Speaker 1: were kind of it was a pain in the butt 301 00:17:27,720 --> 00:17:30,480 Speaker 1: to navigate through all of them, um like, because there 302 00:17:30,480 --> 00:17:33,239 Speaker 1: weren't There weren't sort of centralized stores that you can 303 00:17:33,320 --> 00:17:37,280 Speaker 1: go to like iTunes, so people were making do with 304 00:17:37,359 --> 00:17:40,600 Speaker 1: what they had and using ways to get around that. 305 00:17:40,680 --> 00:17:42,520 Speaker 1: Now I should also add, like, there's some people who 306 00:17:42,640 --> 00:17:45,560 Speaker 1: use peer to peer networks and torrent sites and stuff 307 00:17:45,560 --> 00:17:47,320 Speaker 1: like that, and all they want to do is just 308 00:17:47,359 --> 00:17:49,920 Speaker 1: get as much stuff for free as they possibly can, 309 00:17:50,600 --> 00:17:53,000 Speaker 1: and that's their big thing. They just don't want to 310 00:17:53,040 --> 00:17:55,639 Speaker 1: pay for anything. There are others who are like, I 311 00:17:55,680 --> 00:17:58,000 Speaker 1: would pay for this, but there's not really any way 312 00:17:58,000 --> 00:18:00,280 Speaker 1: I can do it, at least not easy way to 313 00:18:00,440 --> 00:18:02,680 Speaker 1: do it, and so I have to do it this way. 314 00:18:03,080 --> 00:18:04,919 Speaker 1: And then there are yet others who are using it 315 00:18:04,920 --> 00:18:08,960 Speaker 1: as a statement against like late stage capitalism. Anyway, member 316 00:18:09,040 --> 00:18:11,959 Speaker 1: organizations in the r I double A went after Napster 317 00:18:12,320 --> 00:18:15,880 Speaker 1: as well as individual users, and we'll talk a bit 318 00:18:15,920 --> 00:18:19,080 Speaker 1: about what happened with that after we come back from 319 00:18:19,080 --> 00:18:29,760 Speaker 1: this quick break. Okay, So the r I double A 320 00:18:30,359 --> 00:18:36,000 Speaker 1: decides that Napster is a huge boogeyman, and also individual 321 00:18:36,440 --> 00:18:41,640 Speaker 1: users who were downloading UH files. They couldn't go after everybody, obviously, 322 00:18:41,960 --> 00:18:43,760 Speaker 1: but they could go after a few people and make 323 00:18:43,800 --> 00:18:47,879 Speaker 1: some real big examples out of folks and scare the 324 00:18:47,920 --> 00:18:50,440 Speaker 1: heck out of other people who had been pirting music. 325 00:18:51,119 --> 00:18:54,240 Speaker 1: There was a hail storm of lawsuits, with music companies 326 00:18:54,240 --> 00:18:59,400 Speaker 1: seeking huge amounts and damages, sometimes targeting extremely sympathetic individuals. 327 00:19:00,040 --> 00:19:02,520 Speaker 1: There were cases where it was a young kid who 328 00:19:02,560 --> 00:19:05,480 Speaker 1: was found at fault or grandparents or whatever. Not the 329 00:19:05,520 --> 00:19:07,960 Speaker 1: best way to win a pr battle, right, So the 330 00:19:07,960 --> 00:19:11,040 Speaker 1: whole affair really gave the r I double a black eye, 331 00:19:11,119 --> 00:19:14,679 Speaker 1: painted the organization as a greedy company or greedy organization 332 00:19:14,760 --> 00:19:19,640 Speaker 1: willing to financially ruin normal people for downloading a few songs. 333 00:19:19,960 --> 00:19:22,120 Speaker 1: Maybe if you added them all up, it would cost 334 00:19:22,160 --> 00:19:24,679 Speaker 1: a few hundred dollars to purchase, and yet they were 335 00:19:24,720 --> 00:19:28,160 Speaker 1: being hit by massive, massive fines. To call it overkill 336 00:19:28,520 --> 00:19:31,600 Speaker 1: would be an understatement. By the way, the arguments weren't 337 00:19:31,640 --> 00:19:34,879 Speaker 1: helped when the US Government Accountability Office or g a O, 338 00:19:35,560 --> 00:19:39,560 Speaker 1: would later investigate claims that piracy had a quantifiable impact 339 00:19:39,640 --> 00:19:43,119 Speaker 1: on the entertainment industry as a whole. So the g 340 00:19:43,320 --> 00:19:46,320 Speaker 1: a o s findings essentially said, there's no way you 341 00:19:46,359 --> 00:19:49,840 Speaker 1: can assess how much money was lost due to piracy, 342 00:19:49,880 --> 00:19:53,720 Speaker 1: because you can't just assume that for every illegal download 343 00:19:53,760 --> 00:19:57,240 Speaker 1: that existed you had a lost sale. Like that's the 344 00:19:57,280 --> 00:19:59,879 Speaker 1: only way in the classic sense, like if it's a 345 00:20:00,000 --> 00:20:03,200 Speaker 1: physical piece of media, if someone walks into a store 346 00:20:03,280 --> 00:20:06,639 Speaker 1: and like steal some CDs and walks out, Yeah, you 347 00:20:06,680 --> 00:20:09,040 Speaker 1: had a physical thing there a right, Like the store 348 00:20:09,119 --> 00:20:11,800 Speaker 1: could say, hey, we are inventory shows that we should have, 349 00:20:12,440 --> 00:20:15,080 Speaker 1: you know, twenty copies of this Billy Joel album, but 350 00:20:15,160 --> 00:20:18,439 Speaker 1: we only have fifteen and we can't account for the 351 00:20:18,440 --> 00:20:21,159 Speaker 1: other five. I mean that's those are lost sales, Like 352 00:20:21,240 --> 00:20:24,640 Speaker 1: someone somewhere is eating that loss. But with digital files, 353 00:20:24,720 --> 00:20:29,000 Speaker 1: it's obviously different, right, So in other words, I could 354 00:20:29,119 --> 00:20:32,760 Speaker 1: download an entire album or a movie or TV series 355 00:20:32,880 --> 00:20:35,920 Speaker 1: and maybe I'm not like super interested in it. I'm curious, 356 00:20:36,480 --> 00:20:38,639 Speaker 1: but not curious enough to actually go out and buy it, 357 00:20:38,760 --> 00:20:42,359 Speaker 1: So I just download it. I pired it. And in 358 00:20:42,400 --> 00:20:45,720 Speaker 1: other words, like if I had not illegally downloaded the material, 359 00:20:46,240 --> 00:20:48,720 Speaker 1: if I just ignored it, well, I still wouldn't have 360 00:20:48,760 --> 00:20:51,720 Speaker 1: bought the thing. So there was no loss sale because 361 00:20:51,720 --> 00:20:53,960 Speaker 1: it wasn't gonna buy it anyway. That was the g 362 00:20:54,080 --> 00:20:57,000 Speaker 1: a o S. Point. They said, you cannot say that 363 00:20:57,080 --> 00:21:00,000 Speaker 1: for every pirated copy you lost out on a sale, 364 00:21:00,200 --> 00:21:02,959 Speaker 1: because that's just not how the world works. Also, there 365 00:21:02,960 --> 00:21:07,280 Speaker 1: are plenty of instances where people have downloaded something illegally 366 00:21:07,359 --> 00:21:10,159 Speaker 1: to sample it, and then they've gone out and purchased 367 00:21:10,400 --> 00:21:15,440 Speaker 1: the actual thing. So you can't look at as apples 368 00:21:15,440 --> 00:21:19,399 Speaker 1: to apples, right because again, priortic copies and last sales 369 00:21:19,440 --> 00:21:24,200 Speaker 1: are not equivalent anyway. The trials of Napster, both literal, 370 00:21:24,280 --> 00:21:27,080 Speaker 1: literal and figurative, as well as similar P to P 371 00:21:27,240 --> 00:21:30,080 Speaker 1: services like lime Wire and kazab would set the stage 372 00:21:30,080 --> 00:21:32,320 Speaker 1: for what was to come next. And what was to 373 00:21:32,359 --> 00:21:37,840 Speaker 1: come next was BitTorrent. Now Napster had a relatively brief existence, 374 00:21:37,840 --> 00:21:39,879 Speaker 1: at least as far as peer to peer file sharing 375 00:21:39,920 --> 00:21:43,920 Speaker 1: services were concerned. Lawsuits pretty much forced Napster to shut 376 00:21:44,000 --> 00:21:46,920 Speaker 1: down by two thousand one two thousand two. The name 377 00:21:46,920 --> 00:21:50,000 Speaker 1: would persist and it became a brand, but it was 378 00:21:50,080 --> 00:21:53,560 Speaker 1: no longer associated with peer to peer file sharing. Several 379 00:21:53,600 --> 00:21:56,719 Speaker 1: critics viewed the whole thing as an injustice because Napster 380 00:21:56,800 --> 00:21:59,880 Speaker 1: had developed technologies to cut back on a legal distribution 381 00:21:59,880 --> 00:22:03,679 Speaker 1: of copyrighted files. In other words, Napster was taking steps 382 00:22:03,720 --> 00:22:07,399 Speaker 1: to try and prevent piracy across its platform, but the 383 00:22:07,400 --> 00:22:10,400 Speaker 1: courts were saying, well, unless it's a hundred percent effective, 384 00:22:10,800 --> 00:22:14,560 Speaker 1: then it's not enough. That led Lawrence Lessig to say 385 00:22:14,640 --> 00:22:17,280 Speaker 1: that the courts were condemning file sharing as a whole, 386 00:22:17,480 --> 00:22:21,640 Speaker 1: not copyright infringement in particular. Essentially, that the courts were 387 00:22:21,640 --> 00:22:26,000 Speaker 1: trying to shut down an entire technology without any regard 388 00:22:26,119 --> 00:22:28,960 Speaker 1: for what that technology can do. And that was a 389 00:22:29,040 --> 00:22:32,400 Speaker 1: legit criticism. You know, while Napster was best known as 390 00:22:32,440 --> 00:22:35,080 Speaker 1: a hub for prior to music, the fact was that 391 00:22:35,160 --> 00:22:39,199 Speaker 1: peer to peer architecture is content agnostic. It's just a 392 00:22:39,240 --> 00:22:42,399 Speaker 1: way to distribute files throughout the network without you know, 393 00:22:42,560 --> 00:22:46,920 Speaker 1: too much hassle. Many folks essentially equated file sharing with piracy, 394 00:22:46,960 --> 00:22:50,040 Speaker 1: and that's just not accurate. There are plenty of programmers 395 00:22:50,040 --> 00:22:53,240 Speaker 1: who have created files intended for free distribution and appear 396 00:22:53,320 --> 00:22:55,719 Speaker 1: to peer network is a really effective way to do 397 00:22:55,760 --> 00:22:59,480 Speaker 1: that at high speed these days, assuming you have access 398 00:22:59,520 --> 00:23:02,400 Speaker 1: to broad and it's not as big a deal as 399 00:23:02,400 --> 00:23:05,360 Speaker 1: it used to be. But back then, when download speeds 400 00:23:05,359 --> 00:23:08,080 Speaker 1: were a fraction of what you find in most places today, 401 00:23:08,560 --> 00:23:12,919 Speaker 1: it really mattered. And this brings us to another American programmer. 402 00:23:13,359 --> 00:23:16,560 Speaker 1: His name is Bram Cohen. He grew up in Manhattan 403 00:23:16,560 --> 00:23:19,120 Speaker 1: and New York. He and I are actually the same age. 404 00:23:19,119 --> 00:23:21,320 Speaker 1: We were born the same year. But while I was 405 00:23:21,400 --> 00:23:24,160 Speaker 1: drawn to English lit in the theater, only to find 406 00:23:24,160 --> 00:23:27,919 Speaker 1: myself professionally talking about tech, Cohen is in fact the 407 00:23:27,960 --> 00:23:30,960 Speaker 1: real deal. He was fascinated with computers as a kid, 408 00:23:31,000 --> 00:23:33,879 Speaker 1: got into programming early on, went to college just for 409 00:23:33,920 --> 00:23:37,400 Speaker 1: a couple of years before he dropped out in entered 410 00:23:37,400 --> 00:23:40,280 Speaker 1: the workforce and joined various dot com companies in the 411 00:23:40,320 --> 00:23:43,040 Speaker 1: mid and late nineties. Now this was in the days 412 00:23:43,080 --> 00:23:46,560 Speaker 1: when the dot com bubble was still in the inflation period. 413 00:23:46,680 --> 00:23:49,400 Speaker 1: It wouldn't burst until like two thousand and two thousand one, 414 00:23:50,320 --> 00:23:53,480 Speaker 1: he worked for one outfit called mojo Nation that had 415 00:23:53,560 --> 00:23:57,280 Speaker 1: an interesting product. It was a project that would allow 416 00:23:57,280 --> 00:24:00,520 Speaker 1: people to take a large encrypted file and break that 417 00:24:00,600 --> 00:24:05,520 Speaker 1: large encrypted file into smaller encrypted chunks. Then they could 418 00:24:05,840 --> 00:24:09,920 Speaker 1: transfer those chunks too different computers running the same software 419 00:24:09,920 --> 00:24:12,400 Speaker 1: on the network, So you sort of have an ad 420 00:24:12,440 --> 00:24:16,560 Speaker 1: hot computer network with different computers holding different pieces of 421 00:24:16,600 --> 00:24:19,560 Speaker 1: an encrypted puzzle. So if you wanted to download the 422 00:24:19,600 --> 00:24:23,520 Speaker 1: encrypted file, you would actually be downloading chunks from different 423 00:24:23,520 --> 00:24:27,439 Speaker 1: computers to put it all together. While Cohen was frustrated 424 00:24:27,520 --> 00:24:30,680 Speaker 1: with the older file transfer methods, that meant you were 425 00:24:30,720 --> 00:24:32,960 Speaker 1: in for a slow experience if you need to transfer 426 00:24:33,000 --> 00:24:36,000 Speaker 1: a file of significant size, and he saw the potential 427 00:24:36,119 --> 00:24:39,720 Speaker 1: to use the mojo Nation approach of breaking files into 428 00:24:39,800 --> 00:24:44,240 Speaker 1: smaller chunks, but instead of distributing the chunks to different computers, 429 00:24:44,760 --> 00:24:47,399 Speaker 1: you could use this method to make file transfers faster 430 00:24:47,920 --> 00:24:52,320 Speaker 1: through a peer to peer network. So BitTorrent relies on 431 00:24:52,480 --> 00:24:55,440 Speaker 1: web clients, which is, you know, kind of like a 432 00:24:55,480 --> 00:24:59,800 Speaker 1: web browser, So that's that's the easy way to think 433 00:24:59,840 --> 00:25:03,119 Speaker 1: of it. And also websites that act as a type 434 00:25:03,160 --> 00:25:07,480 Speaker 1: of index or directory So a torrent network has a 435 00:25:07,560 --> 00:25:11,200 Speaker 1: record of all the members of that network, like everyone 436 00:25:11,200 --> 00:25:15,800 Speaker 1: who's running that particular client software. These are peers in 437 00:25:15,880 --> 00:25:19,360 Speaker 1: other words, who have connected their machines to the system. 438 00:25:19,400 --> 00:25:23,359 Speaker 1: This record includes which files are on which peers machines. 439 00:25:23,880 --> 00:25:26,399 Speaker 1: So let's say we've got just twenty peers in this 440 00:25:26,480 --> 00:25:30,040 Speaker 1: network's very small network, and half of them have already 441 00:25:30,119 --> 00:25:34,000 Speaker 1: downloaded a particular file because it's pretty popular. The site 442 00:25:34,080 --> 00:25:37,520 Speaker 1: keeps track of that. It sees which of the peers 443 00:25:37,640 --> 00:25:41,240 Speaker 1: have that file available on their machines. So you search 444 00:25:41,320 --> 00:25:43,560 Speaker 1: for this file and you see it's on ten of 445 00:25:43,560 --> 00:25:46,680 Speaker 1: the peers in this network, and you initiate a download. 446 00:25:46,720 --> 00:25:50,200 Speaker 1: Now you're unlike you know, a napster, You're not downloading 447 00:25:50,520 --> 00:25:54,960 Speaker 1: from a specific peer. You're not targeting a peer that's 448 00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:58,239 Speaker 1: near you and saying I want the file from that person. Uh. 449 00:25:58,359 --> 00:26:01,240 Speaker 1: These files are in chunks, and you can actually download 450 00:26:01,240 --> 00:26:04,560 Speaker 1: different chunks from different peers at the same time. That 451 00:26:04,640 --> 00:26:07,639 Speaker 1: really speeds up the download process. You're no longer dependent 452 00:26:07,720 --> 00:26:10,399 Speaker 1: upon a single source to send all of a file 453 00:26:10,480 --> 00:26:13,960 Speaker 1: to you. You're grabbing bits and pieces from different peers 454 00:26:14,000 --> 00:26:16,280 Speaker 1: on the network. So it makes things go much faster. 455 00:26:16,760 --> 00:26:19,560 Speaker 1: So let's say you want to download a freeware program 456 00:26:19,760 --> 00:26:22,760 Speaker 1: that was a pretty large file. Traditionally, you would use 457 00:26:23,000 --> 00:26:26,080 Speaker 1: FTP to log into a server and transfer a file 458 00:26:26,160 --> 00:26:28,840 Speaker 1: from the server to your computer, and it would take 459 00:26:28,880 --> 00:26:31,760 Speaker 1: as long as the weakest connection between you and that server. 460 00:26:32,320 --> 00:26:35,080 Speaker 1: But with a bit torrent network, you would connect to 461 00:26:35,240 --> 00:26:37,639 Speaker 1: a peer to peer network and search for a torrent 462 00:26:37,880 --> 00:26:41,480 Speaker 1: or record of that particular file, And instead of downloading 463 00:26:41,480 --> 00:26:44,359 Speaker 1: the file directly from the website, you're connected to the 464 00:26:44,440 --> 00:26:47,800 Speaker 1: various peers in the network that have this exact file. 465 00:26:48,320 --> 00:26:50,800 Speaker 1: And since the file is now in pieces, your Torrent 466 00:26:50,840 --> 00:26:53,840 Speaker 1: client would grab some pieces from peer one, some pieces 467 00:26:53,880 --> 00:26:58,280 Speaker 1: from peer two, et cetera. This used way less bandwidth 468 00:26:58,359 --> 00:27:02,400 Speaker 1: than other methods of file transfers that sped things up considerably. Now, 469 00:27:02,480 --> 00:27:06,240 Speaker 1: upon being downloaded, the file becomes what is called a seed. 470 00:27:06,800 --> 00:27:09,040 Speaker 1: That means it would be a file that other peers 471 00:27:09,080 --> 00:27:12,639 Speaker 1: could access to download to their machines, and it's generally 472 00:27:12,680 --> 00:27:16,480 Speaker 1: considered good form to seed the files that you have downloaded. 473 00:27:16,880 --> 00:27:19,600 Speaker 1: You can take downloaded files and move them to another 474 00:27:19,640 --> 00:27:23,280 Speaker 1: folder and thus not seed the file any further, but 475 00:27:23,320 --> 00:27:26,919 Speaker 1: that's considered bad form, and some Torrent sites penalized users 476 00:27:27,200 --> 00:27:30,000 Speaker 1: who download as peers, but they do not seed files 477 00:27:30,040 --> 00:27:33,600 Speaker 1: after downloading. In fact, Cohen intended that to be a 478 00:27:33,640 --> 00:27:37,120 Speaker 1: feature from the very beginning to avoid what was called leaching. 479 00:27:37,600 --> 00:27:40,400 Speaker 1: Leaching is when you are in a network like this 480 00:27:40,800 --> 00:27:43,120 Speaker 1: and you're just in it to download stuff, you're not 481 00:27:43,359 --> 00:27:47,040 Speaker 1: offering anything in return. So the way bit toward works 482 00:27:47,119 --> 00:27:49,600 Speaker 1: is that it rewards people who offer up files for 483 00:27:49,680 --> 00:27:53,960 Speaker 1: others to download by making their own download speeds faster. 484 00:27:54,160 --> 00:27:56,960 Speaker 1: So the more you share, the faster your future download 485 00:27:57,000 --> 00:27:59,320 Speaker 1: speeds will be. And he called it a tip for 486 00:27:59,400 --> 00:28:04,200 Speaker 1: tatsis them And again, there's nothing about this methodology itself 487 00:28:04,200 --> 00:28:06,960 Speaker 1: that is legal. So as long as the content moving 488 00:28:07,000 --> 00:28:11,960 Speaker 1: across the networks isn't you know, copyright copyrighted and that 489 00:28:12,040 --> 00:28:15,960 Speaker 1: you're infringing on copyright, uh you know, or the creators 490 00:28:15,960 --> 00:28:18,800 Speaker 1: have allowed for the free distribution of those files, well, 491 00:28:18,840 --> 00:28:21,959 Speaker 1: then this is just an effective way to distribute files 492 00:28:22,000 --> 00:28:25,320 Speaker 1: across large numbers of people. The problem comes when people 493 00:28:25,359 --> 00:28:27,960 Speaker 1: start using this method to distribute stuff that they don't 494 00:28:28,000 --> 00:28:31,760 Speaker 1: have the authority to replicate and distribute. And in fact, 495 00:28:31,840 --> 00:28:36,280 Speaker 1: bit torrent itself doesn't index torrent files. Rather various websites 496 00:28:36,320 --> 00:28:40,880 Speaker 1: have hosted torrent directories instead. These sites depend upon bit torrent, 497 00:28:40,920 --> 00:28:43,720 Speaker 1: but are not part of bit torrent, and so when 498 00:28:43,720 --> 00:28:46,960 Speaker 1: the various entertainment industries started to come after this new threat, 499 00:28:47,320 --> 00:28:50,760 Speaker 1: they focused primarily on the index sites rather than the 500 00:28:50,840 --> 00:28:55,080 Speaker 1: protocol itself. A quick analogy, going after bit torrent would 501 00:28:55,080 --> 00:28:57,640 Speaker 1: be kind of like going after a company that makes typewriters, 502 00:28:58,040 --> 00:29:01,080 Speaker 1: because someone could use a typewriter to about copies of 503 00:29:01,120 --> 00:29:05,400 Speaker 1: copyrighted works without permission, but it's not the typewriter company's 504 00:29:05,400 --> 00:29:08,239 Speaker 1: fault that a consumer used its product to do that. 505 00:29:08,840 --> 00:29:11,240 Speaker 1: The same basic argument kind of applies to stuff like 506 00:29:11,280 --> 00:29:14,160 Speaker 1: bit torrent. So bit torrent hit the scene around two 507 00:29:14,200 --> 00:29:17,600 Speaker 1: thousand one. Two years later in two thousand three, that's 508 00:29:17,600 --> 00:29:21,320 Speaker 1: when we saw the anti copyright group called Pierre at 509 00:29:21,360 --> 00:29:26,560 Speaker 1: Biron or Bureau of Piracy launching the Pirate May. It 510 00:29:26,720 --> 00:29:29,240 Speaker 1: is one of those Torrent indexing sites I was talking 511 00:29:29,280 --> 00:29:32,520 Speaker 1: about just a moment ago. The founding of the organization 512 00:29:32,720 --> 00:29:36,880 Speaker 1: and the site followed the massive lawsuit against Napster as 513 00:29:36,920 --> 00:29:40,240 Speaker 1: well as a huge legal case in South Africa that 514 00:29:40,320 --> 00:29:43,000 Speaker 1: had nothing to do with music but everything to do 515 00:29:43,040 --> 00:29:46,720 Speaker 1: with intellectual property. In it the South African government was 516 00:29:46,760 --> 00:29:50,280 Speaker 1: pitted against the medical industry, Big Pharma, if you will. 517 00:29:51,080 --> 00:29:53,440 Speaker 1: At the center of that conflict was the practice of 518 00:29:53,520 --> 00:29:57,600 Speaker 1: importing patented AIDS drugs from other countries without first getting 519 00:29:57,600 --> 00:30:01,600 Speaker 1: permission from the manufacturing companies. So, in other words, South 520 00:30:01,600 --> 00:30:05,720 Speaker 1: Africa could order drugs from these pharmaceutical companies, but they 521 00:30:05,760 --> 00:30:09,080 Speaker 1: would charge high amounts. Or they could order the same 522 00:30:09,160 --> 00:30:13,200 Speaker 1: drugs from other countries, but they were doing so outside 523 00:30:13,200 --> 00:30:16,360 Speaker 1: of the permission of the pharmaceutical companies. They could do 524 00:30:16,400 --> 00:30:19,479 Speaker 1: it for cheaper. Also, they were starting to produce some 525 00:30:19,560 --> 00:30:22,920 Speaker 1: of the drugs within South Africa without the permission from 526 00:30:22,920 --> 00:30:26,960 Speaker 1: Big Pharma. Nearly forty pharmaceutical companies joined in a class 527 00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:30,800 Speaker 1: action lawsuit against the South African government, and you know 528 00:30:31,320 --> 00:30:34,760 Speaker 1: that was looking kind of rough, right, like this idea 529 00:30:34,880 --> 00:30:39,080 Speaker 1: of protecting intellectual property being somehow more important than the 530 00:30:39,160 --> 00:30:42,120 Speaker 1: lives of AIDS patients, right, That's that's how it was 531 00:30:42,360 --> 00:30:45,400 Speaker 1: being perceived. And in Sweden there was this growing group 532 00:30:45,440 --> 00:30:48,120 Speaker 1: of mostly young folks who solved these kinds of actions 533 00:30:48,160 --> 00:30:51,760 Speaker 1: as the height of capitalistic greed and oppression. The group, 534 00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:55,160 Speaker 1: which was loosely organized, was interested in the sharing of 535 00:30:55,200 --> 00:30:58,200 Speaker 1: information and culture. I actually don't want to try and 536 00:30:58,240 --> 00:31:02,280 Speaker 1: summarize what the believed because it seems to me as 537 00:31:02,360 --> 00:31:06,480 Speaker 1: though it was more like an ongoing conversation with several 538 00:31:06,520 --> 00:31:09,440 Speaker 1: people who all had slightly different points of view, So 539 00:31:09,600 --> 00:31:12,480 Speaker 1: it would be a misrepresentation to say that there was 540 00:31:12,520 --> 00:31:16,400 Speaker 1: a single, unified, coherent philosophy. But I do think it's 541 00:31:16,440 --> 00:31:19,520 Speaker 1: safe to say that most of the people involved felt 542 00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:22,440 Speaker 1: that copyright laws as a whole are kind of broken, 543 00:31:22,840 --> 00:31:26,360 Speaker 1: and the copyright system is broken, that they're more about 544 00:31:26,400 --> 00:31:30,240 Speaker 1: restricting access than guaranteeing a creator a chance to profit 545 00:31:30,280 --> 00:31:33,080 Speaker 1: from their work. In fact, some of the founders of 546 00:31:33,080 --> 00:31:36,160 Speaker 1: the Pirate Bay have said that they think less attention 547 00:31:36,200 --> 00:31:39,200 Speaker 1: should have been granted towards copyright and more should have 548 00:31:39,200 --> 00:31:42,520 Speaker 1: been granted towards how do we compensate artists for their art, 549 00:31:43,600 --> 00:31:47,000 Speaker 1: and that you know, copyright really is more about restricting 550 00:31:47,000 --> 00:31:51,120 Speaker 1: access rather than guaranteeing a creator a chance to make money, 551 00:31:51,400 --> 00:31:53,600 Speaker 1: particularly in a world where the party is holding the 552 00:31:53,640 --> 00:31:57,560 Speaker 1: copyrights tend to be these massive companies, not you know, 553 00:31:57,640 --> 00:32:00,240 Speaker 1: inventors or artists or musicians. In fact, a lot of 554 00:32:00,280 --> 00:32:04,200 Speaker 1: this could also apply to patents. Honestly. In fact, I 555 00:32:04,240 --> 00:32:07,120 Speaker 1: can even make this personal. I'll tell you a personal 556 00:32:07,440 --> 00:32:10,280 Speaker 1: version of this. Let's talk about tech Stuff for a second. 557 00:32:10,600 --> 00:32:13,960 Speaker 1: I co created this podcast, tech Stuff with my original 558 00:32:14,000 --> 00:32:16,360 Speaker 1: co host, Chris Pallette, and this happened way back in 559 00:32:16,400 --> 00:32:19,239 Speaker 1: two thousand and eight. But I do not and have 560 00:32:19,440 --> 00:32:23,560 Speaker 1: never owned tech Stuff the podcast. I've been on every 561 00:32:23,600 --> 00:32:27,000 Speaker 1: single tech Stuff except for one. I handed the microphone 562 00:32:27,000 --> 00:32:30,520 Speaker 1: over to Lauren Vogelbaum for a single episode, and the 563 00:32:30,560 --> 00:32:34,000 Speaker 1: owner of the podcast has changed over time, but it 564 00:32:34,040 --> 00:32:36,920 Speaker 1: was never me. It started as how stuff Works dot 565 00:32:37,000 --> 00:32:40,800 Speaker 1: com uh, and moved to Discovery Communications and then changed 566 00:32:40,800 --> 00:32:42,560 Speaker 1: hands a few other times before it became part of 567 00:32:42,600 --> 00:32:46,920 Speaker 1: iHeart Media. And yeah, I've written nearly every single episode, 568 00:32:46,920 --> 00:32:51,000 Speaker 1: and I've recorded nearly every single episode. It is my work, 569 00:32:51,120 --> 00:32:53,640 Speaker 1: it's my research, it's my point of view, and nearly 570 00:32:53,680 --> 00:32:57,200 Speaker 1: every episode that's published, But I do not own any 571 00:32:57,240 --> 00:32:59,800 Speaker 1: of that. I'm not the copyright holder for tech Stuff 572 00:33:00,440 --> 00:33:03,080 Speaker 1: that goes to the company. Now. To be clear, I 573 00:33:03,120 --> 00:33:06,160 Speaker 1: don't have a problem with this in my specific case, 574 00:33:06,600 --> 00:33:08,720 Speaker 1: because if it weren't for how Stuffworks dot Com, I 575 00:33:08,800 --> 00:33:13,240 Speaker 1: probably wouldn't have gotten into podcasting, certainly not at that time. Anyway, 576 00:33:13,320 --> 00:33:15,040 Speaker 1: I wouldn't have had the money to get together the 577 00:33:15,080 --> 00:33:17,320 Speaker 1: equipment back in two thousand and eight. I wouldn't have 578 00:33:17,320 --> 00:33:19,720 Speaker 1: had the time to learn all the editing tricks, and 579 00:33:19,920 --> 00:33:23,120 Speaker 1: I wouldn't know where to host it. At the very least, 580 00:33:23,160 --> 00:33:25,520 Speaker 1: my entry into podcasting would have been delayed by several 581 00:33:25,640 --> 00:33:28,360 Speaker 1: years had it not been for the company. And because 582 00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:31,680 Speaker 1: podcasting is my job and I work for a company, 583 00:33:31,720 --> 00:33:34,040 Speaker 1: I get a salary. There are tons of folks out 584 00:33:34,080 --> 00:33:36,880 Speaker 1: there who are into podcasting, and many of them are 585 00:33:36,960 --> 00:33:39,480 Speaker 1: lucky enough if they are able to cover expenses, let 586 00:33:39,480 --> 00:33:42,640 Speaker 1: alone make a living from it. Sure there's some superstars 587 00:33:42,640 --> 00:33:46,520 Speaker 1: out there who are making crazy bank on podcasting. I'm 588 00:33:46,560 --> 00:33:49,960 Speaker 1: not one of them, but maybe one day. But most 589 00:33:50,040 --> 00:33:52,800 Speaker 1: folks do it as a hobby. Right, So I don't 590 00:33:52,840 --> 00:33:54,880 Speaker 1: own the show tech stuff, But on the other hand, 591 00:33:55,000 --> 00:33:58,000 Speaker 1: I can earn a living through that show. That's a 592 00:33:58,040 --> 00:34:01,080 Speaker 1: trade off. So for tons of art the only way 593 00:34:01,120 --> 00:34:04,800 Speaker 1: to even get into the mix is to partner up 594 00:34:04,800 --> 00:34:08,319 Speaker 1: with an established media company. First, the artists might make 595 00:34:08,440 --> 00:34:11,200 Speaker 1: all their own work, they might be solely responsible for 596 00:34:11,239 --> 00:34:14,840 Speaker 1: how it comes out, but the copyrights, well, most often 597 00:34:14,840 --> 00:34:17,840 Speaker 1: those go to the company that the artist is signed with. Again, 598 00:34:17,840 --> 00:34:19,800 Speaker 1: it's a trade off. The artist is hoping for a 599 00:34:19,840 --> 00:34:22,520 Speaker 1: greater exposure and opportunities to make money and to make 600 00:34:22,560 --> 00:34:25,319 Speaker 1: whatever it is they make, and the company holds those 601 00:34:25,320 --> 00:34:28,480 Speaker 1: copyrights as part of company assets. It's part of the 602 00:34:28,520 --> 00:34:31,600 Speaker 1: stuff that makes the company profitable. But even when you 603 00:34:31,640 --> 00:34:34,040 Speaker 1: take all that into consideration, it's a bitter pill to 604 00:34:34,080 --> 00:34:36,520 Speaker 1: swallow to realize that the folks who are creating the 605 00:34:36,520 --> 00:34:40,800 Speaker 1: stuff we consume don't necessarily hold the rights to that stuff. 606 00:34:41,080 --> 00:34:43,280 Speaker 1: I mean, imagine walking up to a musician and saying, 607 00:34:43,760 --> 00:34:45,399 Speaker 1: I love that song you did, and I was kind 608 00:34:45,400 --> 00:34:47,960 Speaker 1: of hoping I could sample it for this song idea 609 00:34:48,080 --> 00:34:51,680 Speaker 1: I have. And maybe the artist loves your idea and 610 00:34:51,719 --> 00:34:54,440 Speaker 1: they think it's cool and they're they're excited by it, 611 00:34:55,040 --> 00:34:57,600 Speaker 1: But they don't actually own the right to their own music, 612 00:34:57,680 --> 00:35:00,840 Speaker 1: and they can't legally say, yeah, you can use my 613 00:35:01,040 --> 00:35:04,680 Speaker 1: work because they are not the one who owned the copyright. 614 00:35:05,280 --> 00:35:09,560 Speaker 1: For some folks, including folks in the Bureau of Piracy, 615 00:35:09,600 --> 00:35:13,239 Speaker 1: that was a big problem. We'll talk about it more 616 00:35:13,520 --> 00:35:24,160 Speaker 1: when we come back after this break. Okay, we talked 617 00:35:24,160 --> 00:35:26,400 Speaker 1: about the very tip of a huge iceberg when it 618 00:35:26,440 --> 00:35:30,240 Speaker 1: comes to copyright issues. There's also the problem that laws 619 00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:33,560 Speaker 1: very country to country, and that in countries like the US, 620 00:35:33,640 --> 00:35:37,239 Speaker 1: these powerful media companies have leveraged their influence on politics 621 00:35:37,600 --> 00:35:40,080 Speaker 1: to extend copyright protections to a point where it is 622 00:35:40,239 --> 00:35:43,920 Speaker 1: very difficult to make use of a previous work that is, 623 00:35:44,080 --> 00:35:47,880 Speaker 1: you know, still within memory and as relevant without getting 624 00:35:47,880 --> 00:35:50,399 Speaker 1: into legal trouble. And as many people have pointed out, 625 00:35:50,480 --> 00:35:53,239 Speaker 1: this can severely impact creativity. I mean, let's face it, 626 00:35:53,280 --> 00:35:55,800 Speaker 1: I mean pretty much every creative effort is at least 627 00:35:56,120 --> 00:35:59,560 Speaker 1: in part inspired by stuff that came before it. But 628 00:35:59,680 --> 00:36:01,960 Speaker 1: copy right could put a squeeze on that kind of thing, 629 00:36:02,280 --> 00:36:05,800 Speaker 1: especially if it extends too far. Now, whether the founders 630 00:36:05,840 --> 00:36:08,640 Speaker 1: of the Pirate Bay felt that they were crusaders against 631 00:36:08,719 --> 00:36:11,440 Speaker 1: an unfair system, or they just wanted to thumb their 632 00:36:11,480 --> 00:36:15,160 Speaker 1: noses at the establishment, or the healthy mixture of both, 633 00:36:15,320 --> 00:36:19,520 Speaker 1: I don't really know. I suspect there's a mix of 634 00:36:19,520 --> 00:36:22,480 Speaker 1: the two. But the Pirate Bay went online in two 635 00:36:22,560 --> 00:36:26,160 Speaker 1: thousand three and becomes a massive index for torrent files. 636 00:36:26,440 --> 00:36:29,160 Speaker 1: In fact, at certain points, the Pirate Bay was responsible 637 00:36:29,200 --> 00:36:32,480 Speaker 1: for around half of all torrent traffic on the Internet. 638 00:36:33,320 --> 00:36:36,239 Speaker 1: Media companies, particularly in the United States, were champing at 639 00:36:36,239 --> 00:36:39,840 Speaker 1: the bit to get the site shut down the site's founders, 640 00:36:39,880 --> 00:36:43,160 Speaker 1: which included Frederick I'm gonna butcher these names too. By 641 00:36:43,200 --> 00:36:45,919 Speaker 1: the way, they're all Swedish, so bear with me. Here 642 00:36:45,920 --> 00:36:51,799 Speaker 1: we go, Frederick nig Gottfried's vat Ho Varg and Peter 643 00:36:51,960 --> 00:36:57,640 Speaker 1: sunde Uh. They maintained that the site had no illegal content. 644 00:36:57,760 --> 00:37:00,640 Speaker 1: It was an index. It was not a depot tory. 645 00:37:00,800 --> 00:37:04,000 Speaker 1: It wasn't hosting those files. It was just hosting an 646 00:37:04,000 --> 00:37:06,839 Speaker 1: index of where you could find those files. Now that's 647 00:37:06,840 --> 00:37:09,520 Speaker 1: an important distinction because if you think of it that way, 648 00:37:09,560 --> 00:37:12,680 Speaker 1: the pirate Bay is kind of like Google search engine. 649 00:37:12,719 --> 00:37:15,399 Speaker 1: When you think about it, it's an index that keeps 650 00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:18,840 Speaker 1: track of where files are. You can search for certain files. 651 00:37:18,880 --> 00:37:21,160 Speaker 1: You can find a torrent that you know claims to 652 00:37:21,160 --> 00:37:23,319 Speaker 1: be the file that you want to download. That's an 653 00:37:23,320 --> 00:37:28,400 Speaker 1: important distinction to these sites can often include malware that's 654 00:37:29,120 --> 00:37:32,520 Speaker 1: posing as stuff you might want. But anyway, the pirate 655 00:37:32,520 --> 00:37:35,120 Speaker 1: Bay itself wasn't hosting those files. It was just keeping 656 00:37:35,160 --> 00:37:38,239 Speaker 1: track of where they all were. It was, however, also 657 00:37:38,320 --> 00:37:41,480 Speaker 1: using web advertising to pay for operations and to make 658 00:37:41,520 --> 00:37:44,280 Speaker 1: a profit. The pirate Bay was getting lots of traffic, 659 00:37:44,960 --> 00:37:47,919 Speaker 1: and that meant a lot of ad views, and that 660 00:37:48,200 --> 00:37:52,080 Speaker 1: really made the entertainment industry even angrier and gave them 661 00:37:52,320 --> 00:37:55,759 Speaker 1: what they felt like was an in road into their complaints. 662 00:37:56,120 --> 00:38:00,000 Speaker 1: So not only were these Swedish pirates facilitating the whole 663 00:38:00,120 --> 00:38:03,520 Speaker 1: sale theft of massive amounts of copyrighted material, they were 664 00:38:03,520 --> 00:38:06,799 Speaker 1: also making money off the whole darned thing. And that's 665 00:38:06,880 --> 00:38:09,200 Speaker 1: kind of what the media company's point of view was. 666 00:38:10,120 --> 00:38:11,920 Speaker 1: It was tricky for the companies to come after the 667 00:38:11,920 --> 00:38:14,840 Speaker 1: Pirate Bay though, because the site was hosted in Sweden 668 00:38:15,160 --> 00:38:18,000 Speaker 1: and US law, even the US law that's backed by 669 00:38:18,000 --> 00:38:21,759 Speaker 1: powerful media companies, doesn't have much authority outside of the 670 00:38:21,800 --> 00:38:25,040 Speaker 1: United States. But the companies kept pushing, and they were 671 00:38:25,080 --> 00:38:28,640 Speaker 1: pressuring the United States government to in turn put pressure 672 00:38:28,640 --> 00:38:32,080 Speaker 1: on the Swedish government, and in two thousand six, Swedish 673 00:38:32,080 --> 00:38:35,640 Speaker 1: police raided an Internet service provider in Sweden called PRQ. 674 00:38:36,680 --> 00:38:39,759 Speaker 1: This was the provider that hosted the servers running the 675 00:38:39,800 --> 00:38:42,840 Speaker 1: Pirate Bay website. From why I understand, the raid shutdown 676 00:38:42,880 --> 00:38:45,960 Speaker 1: not just the Pirate Bay, but other PRQ customers as well, 677 00:38:46,440 --> 00:38:48,840 Speaker 1: which at the very least seems like a gross overreach 678 00:38:48,840 --> 00:38:52,080 Speaker 1: of police authority. The raid shut down the Pirate Bay 679 00:38:52,120 --> 00:38:55,600 Speaker 1: for three whole days, just three days. The pirate Bay 680 00:38:55,640 --> 00:38:58,560 Speaker 1: returned just a couple of days later, and the group 681 00:38:58,600 --> 00:39:01,960 Speaker 1: at least server Space them a sympathetic service provider in 682 00:39:02,520 --> 00:39:06,320 Speaker 1: in Europe, and the activity continued. But for the three 683 00:39:06,360 --> 00:39:08,719 Speaker 1: co founders, the law was still eager to get hold 684 00:39:08,719 --> 00:39:12,400 Speaker 1: of them. In two thousand eight, the three Pirate Bay operators, 685 00:39:12,680 --> 00:39:15,800 Speaker 1: as well as a businessman named Carl Lundstrom who had 686 00:39:15,840 --> 00:39:18,360 Speaker 1: helped with servers and bandwidth and that kind of stuff 687 00:39:18,360 --> 00:39:21,160 Speaker 1: on the back end, they all faced charges of assisting 688 00:39:21,280 --> 00:39:25,720 Speaker 1: copyright infringement. The really was more like they were facilitating, 689 00:39:25,920 --> 00:39:29,040 Speaker 1: you know, other people being able to break the law 690 00:39:29,320 --> 00:39:32,799 Speaker 1: by having a website, I guess now. One of the 691 00:39:32,800 --> 00:39:35,240 Speaker 1: big arguments that the co founders made in the trial 692 00:39:35,400 --> 00:39:38,160 Speaker 1: was that their site was essentially just a blank slate. 693 00:39:38,800 --> 00:39:42,360 Speaker 1: They said, the content that shows up on the pirate Bay, 694 00:39:42,480 --> 00:39:45,160 Speaker 1: I mean, apart from the ads, only came from the 695 00:39:45,200 --> 00:39:48,880 Speaker 1: site's users. If the users were not seeding files for sharing, 696 00:39:49,160 --> 00:39:52,200 Speaker 1: there'd be nothing to index. The pirate Bay was truly 697 00:39:52,239 --> 00:39:56,560 Speaker 1: a user generated content site. They argued. They weren't the 698 00:39:56,560 --> 00:39:58,920 Speaker 1: ones putting the files up for sharing in the first place, 699 00:39:59,120 --> 00:40:03,000 Speaker 1: the users were, and that the demands from various copyright 700 00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:06,440 Speaker 1: holders should actually go to the people who uploaded those files, 701 00:40:06,480 --> 00:40:09,040 Speaker 1: not to the Pirate Day. You know, I said, you're 702 00:40:09,080 --> 00:40:11,839 Speaker 1: telling us to take this down, Well we can't. We 703 00:40:11,840 --> 00:40:14,320 Speaker 1: didn't put it up. We just have an index. You 704 00:40:14,360 --> 00:40:16,640 Speaker 1: should go after the person who put it up. The 705 00:40:16,680 --> 00:40:19,279 Speaker 1: trial went on for quite some time, actually really only 706 00:40:19,360 --> 00:40:22,759 Speaker 1: nine days, but it felt like an eternity, and all 707 00:40:22,880 --> 00:40:26,120 Speaker 1: three of the co founders were found guilty in April 708 00:40:26,120 --> 00:40:28,560 Speaker 1: two thousand nine. They each received a prison sentence of 709 00:40:28,640 --> 00:40:31,439 Speaker 1: one year and a fine that amounted to around three 710 00:40:31,480 --> 00:40:35,799 Speaker 1: point six million US dollars. They appealed that decision. That 711 00:40:35,880 --> 00:40:39,440 Speaker 1: appeal eventually led to a reduction in the sentence for 712 00:40:39,560 --> 00:40:43,200 Speaker 1: everybody but varg who was ill during the appeals process 713 00:40:43,200 --> 00:40:46,200 Speaker 1: and was unable to attend, so his sentence just remained 714 00:40:46,200 --> 00:40:49,040 Speaker 1: the same, but the fine was actually increased to around 715 00:40:49,040 --> 00:40:52,760 Speaker 1: six point six million dollars. The three co founders, all 716 00:40:53,239 --> 00:40:55,360 Speaker 1: you know, kind of left Sweden before they could be 717 00:40:55,360 --> 00:40:58,160 Speaker 1: taken into custody, but they were all three eventually arrested 718 00:40:58,440 --> 00:41:00,600 Speaker 1: and served at least part of their sentence says before 719 00:41:00,640 --> 00:41:05,799 Speaker 1: they were released. But while the founders were prosecuted or persecuted. 720 00:41:05,800 --> 00:41:09,080 Speaker 1: Depending upon your point of view, the Pirate Bay continued, 721 00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:14,120 Speaker 1: that doesn't mean it continued without further interest or interference 722 00:41:14,160 --> 00:41:17,640 Speaker 1: from the authorities. In two thousand and fourteen, Swedish police 723 00:41:17,760 --> 00:41:21,520 Speaker 1: rated a pirate based server room in Stockholm, Sweden, which 724 00:41:21,600 --> 00:41:25,600 Speaker 1: took a Pirate Bay portal offline temporarily. This was not 725 00:41:25,719 --> 00:41:29,120 Speaker 1: too long after hackers identifying themselves as the Guardians of 726 00:41:29,160 --> 00:41:34,000 Speaker 1: the piece, had infiltrated Sony Pictures Company computer network, and 727 00:41:34,320 --> 00:41:37,600 Speaker 1: the hackers had stolen an enormous amount of information, including 728 00:41:38,320 --> 00:41:42,799 Speaker 1: unreleased or recently released movies uh and then subsequently some 729 00:41:42,840 --> 00:41:45,520 Speaker 1: of those started to pop up on Torrent index sites 730 00:41:45,560 --> 00:41:47,719 Speaker 1: like the Pirate Bay, so there was at least some 731 00:41:47,800 --> 00:41:53,920 Speaker 1: speculation that the Sony hacks led to an increased investigation 732 00:41:54,200 --> 00:41:59,920 Speaker 1: and interference with Torrent sites like the Pirate Bay. Anyway, 733 00:42:00,400 --> 00:42:03,080 Speaker 1: the site was down, but it wasn't out. Administrators for 734 00:42:03,160 --> 00:42:05,760 Speaker 1: the site found other places to host it, eventually moving 735 00:42:05,760 --> 00:42:09,760 Speaker 1: to the Trabea network and making use of cloud Flares. 736 00:42:09,880 --> 00:42:14,120 Speaker 1: Reverse proxy product um. A reverse proxy describes the system 737 00:42:14,160 --> 00:42:17,800 Speaker 1: in which you using a client, contact a reverse proxy 738 00:42:17,880 --> 00:42:20,560 Speaker 1: server and you're asking for a file. Right. Let's say 739 00:42:20,560 --> 00:42:24,080 Speaker 1: that you're pulling up a file that's on this one server. Well, 740 00:42:24,080 --> 00:42:27,920 Speaker 1: the reverse proxy server doesn't actually host the file itself. Instead, 741 00:42:28,320 --> 00:42:31,040 Speaker 1: it pulls that information from a server that does host 742 00:42:31,080 --> 00:42:34,600 Speaker 1: the file. Then the reverse proxy server sends that information 743 00:42:34,640 --> 00:42:38,160 Speaker 1: to you, or more accurately, to your client. So from 744 00:42:38,200 --> 00:42:41,240 Speaker 1: the client perspective, it looks like the data is coming 745 00:42:41,280 --> 00:42:43,919 Speaker 1: straight from the reverse proxy server, like it lives there. 746 00:42:44,360 --> 00:42:47,120 Speaker 1: Because the client never has any direct content with the 747 00:42:47,239 --> 00:42:51,040 Speaker 1: server on the network that actually hosts that specific file. 748 00:42:51,200 --> 00:42:54,719 Speaker 1: It's it's a a level of protection for a network. 749 00:42:55,320 --> 00:42:58,239 Speaker 1: The pirate base still active today. Actually went on there 750 00:42:58,320 --> 00:43:01,160 Speaker 1: today to check out to see what kind of files 751 00:43:01,160 --> 00:43:03,520 Speaker 1: are in the top one. Uh, there's some stuff that 752 00:43:03,560 --> 00:43:06,560 Speaker 1: you would expect, like porn. There's a lot of porn 753 00:43:06,600 --> 00:43:09,719 Speaker 1: on the pirate Bay. But there were also big name 754 00:43:09,760 --> 00:43:12,760 Speaker 1: movies that were on there, like the Lace, James Bond 755 00:43:12,800 --> 00:43:16,239 Speaker 1: film The Eternals was on their shan Chi was on there. 756 00:43:17,320 --> 00:43:20,359 Speaker 1: I'm sure if Hollywood were more active right now, if 757 00:43:20,360 --> 00:43:22,400 Speaker 1: it weren't a pandemic, there'll be a lot more of 758 00:43:22,400 --> 00:43:24,799 Speaker 1: those kind of things popping up on that list. But yeah, 759 00:43:24,840 --> 00:43:27,560 Speaker 1: you get the idea. As for what I think about 760 00:43:27,560 --> 00:43:31,120 Speaker 1: all this well, I kind of am an agreement that 761 00:43:31,160 --> 00:43:35,279 Speaker 1: copyright law and the state of copyrights is broken. I 762 00:43:35,320 --> 00:43:38,880 Speaker 1: think way too much power falls into the hands of 763 00:43:38,920 --> 00:43:43,400 Speaker 1: big media companies. I realized that it's kind of interesting 764 00:43:43,440 --> 00:43:45,480 Speaker 1: for me to say that as an employee of a 765 00:43:45,480 --> 00:43:47,839 Speaker 1: big media company, but that's just how I feel like. 766 00:43:47,880 --> 00:43:51,239 Speaker 1: I feel like the folks who are ultimately responsible for 767 00:43:51,360 --> 00:43:55,439 Speaker 1: making the stuff we love uh end up having very 768 00:43:55,480 --> 00:43:58,520 Speaker 1: little ownership of that stuff in most cases. I mean, 769 00:43:58,560 --> 00:44:02,280 Speaker 1: you do hear about people going independent, going with independent 770 00:44:02,360 --> 00:44:05,200 Speaker 1: labels where they have more ownership of their stuff. That's great, 771 00:44:05,800 --> 00:44:08,960 Speaker 1: but you know, because of the way the world works, 772 00:44:09,560 --> 00:44:13,120 Speaker 1: these large companies have a lot of power and influence 773 00:44:13,120 --> 00:44:15,560 Speaker 1: in the ability to get stuff in front of people. 774 00:44:16,120 --> 00:44:20,200 Speaker 1: The Internet has gone a long way to undermining that, 775 00:44:20,320 --> 00:44:21,879 Speaker 1: which is one of the reasons why I think these 776 00:44:21,920 --> 00:44:26,480 Speaker 1: companies have gone so hard against you know, file sharing 777 00:44:26,520 --> 00:44:30,160 Speaker 1: sites and even individuals. It's because they perceive that that 778 00:44:30,280 --> 00:44:32,680 Speaker 1: is in fact a threat. And and it's also the 779 00:44:32,760 --> 00:44:35,920 Speaker 1: reason why, like the people behind the Pirate Bay were 780 00:44:35,960 --> 00:44:40,520 Speaker 1: interested in the first place, because it potentially is an 781 00:44:40,640 --> 00:44:43,640 Speaker 1: upset of a system that has placed an enormous amount 782 00:44:43,640 --> 00:44:48,000 Speaker 1: of power in a relatively small number of companies and 783 00:44:48,080 --> 00:44:52,040 Speaker 1: could rather distribute that power to the people who are 784 00:44:52,080 --> 00:44:56,280 Speaker 1: actually making the stuff and potentially benefiting folks who otherwise 785 00:44:56,280 --> 00:45:00,279 Speaker 1: would never be able to experience that stuff. Go to 786 00:45:00,920 --> 00:45:05,279 Speaker 1: the story about the AIDS medication in South Africa, Like, 787 00:45:05,360 --> 00:45:08,200 Speaker 1: it's hard to make an argument in support of the 788 00:45:08,200 --> 00:45:13,839 Speaker 1: pharmaceutical companies when the outcome of that argument is I'm 789 00:45:13,880 --> 00:45:16,000 Speaker 1: sorry that you can't afford to keep you the people 790 00:45:16,000 --> 00:45:19,160 Speaker 1: in your country alive, right, Like, that's that's kind of 791 00:45:19,160 --> 00:45:20,879 Speaker 1: how you can frame that argument. And I know that's 792 00:45:20,880 --> 00:45:23,560 Speaker 1: not how the pharmaceutical companies would frame it. Of course 793 00:45:23,600 --> 00:45:27,160 Speaker 1: they wouldn't. They would say, we have a product, there's 794 00:45:27,200 --> 00:45:29,239 Speaker 1: a price for it, and the way you get the 795 00:45:29,239 --> 00:45:32,399 Speaker 1: product as you pay the price. But you know, it's 796 00:45:32,480 --> 00:45:36,680 Speaker 1: you can't deal in that level of abstraction and ignore 797 00:45:36,800 --> 00:45:42,040 Speaker 1: the real world consequences. That's kind of my perspective on it. Um. 798 00:45:42,760 --> 00:45:46,320 Speaker 1: But you know that's that's again my opinion. And I'm 799 00:45:46,360 --> 00:45:51,160 Speaker 1: not even suggesting that my opinion is right. It could 800 00:45:51,160 --> 00:45:54,600 Speaker 1: be that I am completely off base. Moreover, like, you know, 801 00:45:54,920 --> 00:45:58,720 Speaker 1: my thoughts on this can change as my experiences change. 802 00:45:59,160 --> 00:46:02,320 Speaker 1: So if you are someone who is you know, staunchly 803 00:46:02,360 --> 00:46:06,239 Speaker 1: in supportive copyright. I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm saying 804 00:46:06,280 --> 00:46:08,560 Speaker 1: that I don't necessarily agree with you, but doesn't mean 805 00:46:08,560 --> 00:46:10,879 Speaker 1: you're wrong. It just means I have a different point 806 00:46:10,880 --> 00:46:14,359 Speaker 1: of view on this particular issue. If you're someone who 807 00:46:14,400 --> 00:46:17,959 Speaker 1: just pirates everything you don't buy anything, ever, I don't 808 00:46:18,080 --> 00:46:22,399 Speaker 1: agree with you either as someone who uh I mean 809 00:46:22,440 --> 00:46:26,719 Speaker 1: like goodness knows. Back in my my shady past, I 810 00:46:27,120 --> 00:46:29,400 Speaker 1: downloaded more than a few things that I didn't pay for. 811 00:46:29,920 --> 00:46:32,279 Speaker 1: In some cases it was because I literally could not 812 00:46:32,360 --> 00:46:34,400 Speaker 1: get access to it in the United States because it 813 00:46:34,440 --> 00:46:36,919 Speaker 1: wasn't for sale. And I did go back and buy 814 00:46:36,920 --> 00:46:40,719 Speaker 1: a lot of that stuff later. These days, I work 815 00:46:40,800 --> 00:46:43,719 Speaker 1: under the opinion that if I cannot afford it, or 816 00:46:43,760 --> 00:46:46,640 Speaker 1: if I cannot find it, I just have to deal 817 00:46:46,680 --> 00:46:49,520 Speaker 1: with that. Like, just because something exists doesn't mean I 818 00:46:49,560 --> 00:46:53,800 Speaker 1: have a right to access it. But it does also 819 00:46:53,920 --> 00:46:57,520 Speaker 1: tell me that, you know, there are better ways for 820 00:46:57,640 --> 00:47:00,400 Speaker 1: us to come to, ways to to make stuff pressible 821 00:47:00,840 --> 00:47:04,560 Speaker 1: and to compensate people for doing so, like both the 822 00:47:04,560 --> 00:47:06,480 Speaker 1: people who create the stuff and the people who make 823 00:47:06,520 --> 00:47:12,040 Speaker 1: it accessible. Um, and that copyright is probably not going 824 00:47:12,200 --> 00:47:17,239 Speaker 1: to be that way at least not forever so interesting 825 00:47:17,520 --> 00:47:21,160 Speaker 1: interesting story and if you have any suggestions for topics 826 00:47:21,200 --> 00:47:23,280 Speaker 1: I should cover in future episodes of tech Stuff, please 827 00:47:23,280 --> 00:47:25,120 Speaker 1: reach out to me. The best way to do that 828 00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:27,560 Speaker 1: as on Twitter. The handle for the show is tech 829 00:47:27,760 --> 00:47:31,120 Speaker 1: Stuff H s W and I'll talk to you again 830 00:47:31,840 --> 00:47:39,800 Speaker 1: really soon. Text Stuff is an I Heart Radio production. 831 00:47:40,040 --> 00:47:42,880 Speaker 1: For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the i 832 00:47:42,960 --> 00:47:46,200 Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to 833 00:47:46,239 --> 00:47:47,200 Speaker 1: your favorite shows,