The inception and early years of The Pirate Bay are an intriguing chapter of the Internet’s history.
While most pirate site operators hid in the shadows, Pirate Bay’s founders were public figures who openly taunted the entertainment industries.
This chapter didn’t end as planned for Fredrik Neij, Peter Sunde, and Gotffrid Svartholm, who were eventually sentenced to prison. By then, however, they had already sparked a digital and political revolution, the impact of which is still felt today.
Some have argued that without the meteoric rise of the notorious torrent site, the entertainment industries would not have embraced services such as Netflix and Spotify so easily.
Pirate Bay TV Series
A few years ago, news broke that The Pirate Bay story was being turned into a TV series. Written by Piotr Marciniak and directed by Jens Sjögren, who also made the “I am Zlatan” documentary, production was in the hands of B-Reel Films, working for the Swedish broadcaster SVT.
American distribution company Dynamic Television scooped up worldwide rights. As far as we know, international deals have not yet been announced. The Swedish premiere on November 8 is coming closer, however, and a few days ago SVT released an official teaser.
The founders of The Pirate Bay – Anakata, Brokep and Tiamo – are played by Arvid Swedrup, Simon Greger Carlsson and Willjam Lempling. The teaser doesn’t give away much, but it’s interesting that one of The Pirate Bay’s infamous responses to legal threats features prominently.
The teaser quotes from Anakata’s response to a letter from DreamWorks, written twenty years ago. The movie company sent a DMCA takedown notice requesting the removal of a torrent for the film Shrek 2, but the reply was not what they had hoped for.
“As you may or may not be aware, Sweden is not a state in the United States of America. Sweden is a country in northern Europe. Unless you figured it out by now, US law does not apply here,” Anakata wrote.
“It is the opinion of us and our lawyers that you are ……. morons, and that you should please go sodomize yourself with retractable batons.”
TPB Founders Not Involved
The response was public information and made it into the series. Whether there will be any new revelations has yet to be seen, however, as none of the site’s founders were actively involved in production.
Instead, the producers used interviews with other people involved, plus the vast amount of public information available on the Internet. That includes the infamous responses to legal threats.
Time will tell how the producers and director have decided to tell this story. Production took place in Stockholm, Sweden, but also ventured to other countries, including Chile and Thailand, where Fredrik Neij was arrested and paraded in front of the press in 2014.
Pirating The Pirate Bay?
One interesting side story is the fact that the “rights” to the Pirate Bay series are now being ‘sold’. As mentioned earlier, Dynamic Television has the global distribution rights but they have yet to announce any international deals.
For now, it seems that ‘pirate’ releases may beat the official channels in quite a few countries, as unauthorized copies of the series are likely to surface on The Pirate Bay this fall; if only to make a point.
This shouldn’t come as a surprise to the makers and rightsholders, of course. We don’t expect many complaints either. After all, The Pirate Bay’s notorious track record is why these rightsholders are generating revenue today. And to bring things full-circle, they’re not sharing any of the money.
From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.
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