geekosystem

Correlation is obviously not causation. That said, the suspicious series of events surrounding the arrest of Gottfrid Svartholm, one of the founders of popular torrent site The Pirate Bay, does give room to speculation. After his arrest, Sweden wanted to deport the man from Cambodia, but there's no standing extradition treaty between the two countries. The two apparently came to some kind of agreement, as Cambodia has since agreed to deport Svartholm. Fresh on the heels of this news, it's been announced that Sweden will provide a $59 million aid package to Cambodia for "causes of democratic development, human rights, education, and climate change for two years."

Gottfrid Svartholm, the internet's pirate king, was arrested in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, on Thursday. Svartholm, better known by his handle, Anakata, is the founder of everyone's favorite torrent provider, The Pirate Bay. Mr. Svartholm, age 27, has "technically" been on the run since he was sentenced to one year in prison in Sweden for his involvement in creating The Pirate Bay. I say technically because Svartholm hasn't really been running; he simply refused to return to his ancestral homeland after receiving his sentence. Svartholm did not return to Sweden for his trial due to an illness that kept him bed-ridden in a hospital.

This past February, Sweden's Supreme Court decided that, no, the the case outlining the prison sentences and total damages in regards to The Pirate Bay could not be appealed. This means that the prison sentences and 550,000 euros in damages will still hold for Peter Sunde, Gottfrid Svartholm, Fredrik Neij, and Carl Lundström. Due to the labels having trouble getting any of those funds, none of it will be distributed to the artists.

Sweden's Supreme Court announced earlier today that they would not grant leave to appeal in the now long-running trial that charged three The Pirate Bay founders with criminal copyright infringement. The sentences and fines against the trio of Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, and Gottfrid Svartholm, are now final. Fortunately for torrenters, The Pirate Bay website was not part of the trial, and was left unharmed and operational. However, with the trial against the three founders out of the way, and with the recent MegaUpload takedown, The Pirate Bay is now more vulnerable than ever, so the people currently running the torrent site quickly moved the address to a .SE domain, in order for it to be out of reach of U.S. authorities. That's right: Http://thepiratebay.se, and according to a new post on their blog, 2012 will be "the year of the storm."