back to article Google strips Pirate Bay homepage from search results

The Pirate Bay’s homepage and seven other pages relating to the BitTorrent tracker website have been removed from Google’s search engine, following a DMCA complaint. Anyone attempting to locate thepiratebay.org via Google will be greeted with some results to access the website, but none that point directly at its homepage. We …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    And now scam site piratebay.com gets Number 1 rank!

    Well done.

  2. nigel 15
    WTF?

    pointless + what has the USA got to do with owt?

    1- thepiratebay.org/browse is still linked. it's about 4th. the deletion is pointless

    2- i don't live in the US, thepiratebay.org isn't in the US, why am i effected by the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act?

  3. Germanjulian
    WTF?

    u sure?

    Cause it works for me... maybe US google only?

  4. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    really??

    it's still returned in my search results when searching for "pirate bay", "pirate bay org", "piratebay.org" etc..

    though as it's a DMCA takedown I guess the "real" world wouldn't pay any attention, and it'd just affect the septics..

    but i just jumped on one of my machines in the US and it's still getting them too..

    ??

  5. cannon
    Grenade

    Police Staet World

    the gatekeepers want to stop all avenues for release unless they get a slice of the pie + governments want to squash free speech.

    welcome to the new world order.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    ah! my bad..

    I'm a retard. It's not returning "thepiratebay.org" - only other pages under that. I really should learn to read.

    This DMCA thing is wonderfully effective. It appears what's happened here is that torrent n00bs who've heard about tpb are going now to look for it on google and, instead of being directed to the front page where the default option presented is to search for what you're looking for, they will be returned the "/browse" page from which presents them immediately with the ability to browse through all the available torrents and most likely will end up downloading items they didn't even know they wanted!

    *slow hand clap*

    (fail both for myself for not reading/thinking, and also whoever submitted the DMCA notice)

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Pirate

    pain in the ...... arrrrrr...se

    its gone from google.co.uk..

    so from that i assume america has now taken over the whole world and forces its laws on us in little old blighty....

    its pathetic anyway.... the fact it has made the news that they deleted it pushes the news stories regarding the pirate bay to the top of the search engine anyway... all its done is taken away a link,,, oh dear you have to type in the address manualy....

    and forgetting all that... the stuff people want on the pirate bay is best downloaded from usenet anyway.... the real home of the pirates...... arrrrr...

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Cutting own thoat dibbler

    So a search engine is stopped from letting people search for one of the most popular sites. Isn't this akin to telling a London Bobby he can't tell tourists where Buckingham Palace is?

    It just makes Google look stupid. Therefore the DMCA applicant must be;

    1) Personal Reality Distortion Field Steve Jobs

    2) Personal Reality Perception Disorder Steve Ballmer

    2) Personal Distortion in a Field Lily Allen

    Mine's got the Bow wow wow album in the pocket.

    C30, C60, C90 Go

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Perjury by RemoveYourContent.com

    I seem to recall it is perjury to file a false DMCA claim, and since thePirateBay.org website does not contain any copyright material of "Destined Enterprises", I look forward to someone going after them.

    Destined Enterprises seems to be the owner of RemoveYourContent.com

    http://www.copyright.gov/onlinesp/agents/r/removeyl.pdf

    Note that this also means that Google is OCR'ing PDF scans it finds on the web now, since I searched for that and Google had the text, but when I went there is was a scanned document not text.

  10. Evil Genius
    FAIL

    effective - not!!

    I can still see the /browse and /top/201

    No doubt it will keep The Lawyers busy.

  11. Ian Ferguson
    WTF?

    DMCA takedown?

    So a DMCA takedown can be enforced to remove a link from a site that links to a site that links to a file which does not contain any copyrighted information itself?

    I think the recording industry should just order the whole internet be shut down, it's the only way.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    Why is this >MERCAN< law...

    affecting results >outside< of the US? Last time I checked the US had no jurisdiction outside of its territories (Well, apart from the countries its illegally invaded or countries that have no backbone and have signed some bullshit extradition treaty with them!).

    Pah, what do I care anyway... America can go f*ck itself with a rusty razorblade! [Ooh, I better watch out now, I guess I'm on some "dangerous subversive" list for that!]

    Besides, a search for "The Pirate Bay" (when searching "the web") results with a link DIRECTLY to the site in the 4th result found, a search for "thepiratebay" results that same link only its presented as the second result this time! Its also not like anybody who knows about TPB isn't going to be able to find it anyway!

    F*ck you America! [Now they're preparing for one of their extra special rendition flights!]

    // Helicopter because they can't land a Gulf Stream in my street!

  13. Stef 2
    FAIL

    The 18th Century attacks the 21st

    I expect 99% of Pirate Bay users won't be stopped by removing a URL from search results - the other 1% might be dumb enough to use Bing.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    FAIL!

    DMCA are noobs

  15. Tony Paulazzo
    Pirate

    Hey content creators

    Will you please stop creating new (ie, rehashed old, copyright free) content, get a real job with a monthly wage that won't pay enough for your cocaine fuelled binges, and leave our internet alone. Thanks very much. A concerned netizen.

  16. Nebulo
    FAIL

    Very effective

    Just googled on a randomly chosen film name plus the word "torrent" (I always do it that way). TPB third one down. Nae problem.

  17. John Savard

    Google Outside America

    Google is owned by Americans who live in America. So laws that prohibit Americans from copying copyrighted material without permission also forbid them from helping foreigners to do it, since such copying also injures the (often American) owners of the copyrighted material. And, of course, unlike the DMCA specifically, international treaties mean that most countries do have some sort of copyright law.

  18. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge
    Coat

    Search Still Works in bing eh?

    But who uses Bing?

    Probably not enough volume to warrant a DMCA takedown request

    Mines the one with 'Bling' on the back

  19. Aaron 6

    Sigh

    Stupid USA law being used for takedown on the .co.uk as well sign, USA law's don't mean jack outside of the USA borders.

    Love the impact of this as well on the uk searching means I now have to use the number 2 result, oh the humanity of moving a few pixels down.

  20. Grozbat
    FAIL

    In Sweden too

    Even here in Sweden, using Google's swedish page, there's the same notice translated into Swedish about the US DMCA complaint.

    This look like the US has made Google impose a worldwide ban.

  21. twunt

    Who are these cretins..

    Who search for a webpage they already know the URL of?

    This affects only the braindead.

  22. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Yank bashing??

    Another crack at Yank bashing by the knuckle draggers on this site. What's so difficult to understand? An American service provider gets served with a notice under American law and so decides to comply with said notice rather than run the risk of breaking that American law (in America which is where they are). Everyone outside the US complaining about this overlooks the fact that Google - regardless of whether it's Google.com, .co.uk or even .venus is an American company - if you don't like that then use a non-American search engine, if there is such a thing.

    And no I'm not a Seppo - just think that having a go at them for this is remarkably ignorant.

  23. Dave 8
    Flame

    @Ian Ferguson

    Then, by extension, we can DCMA Google....

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    In a word...

    In a word .... censorship.

  25. Terry H

    Why UK (worldwide) searches affected

    There is a really quite simple answer to this from a US law perspective. It is because the google server physically sits in the US.

    I could rant for some long time about the evil of DMCA, but it would be preaching to the choir. My only comment will be:

    @AC: I seem to recall it is perjury to file a false DMCA claim, and since thePirateBay.org website does not contain any copyright material of "Destined Enterprises", I look forward to someone going after them.

    HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

    ROTFLMAO

    HAHAHA

    No please stop, I'm going to pee myself.

    Talk about hubris! This guy is actually planning on outliving the USA! Oh wait, if they keep printing money at the current rate, he might just do it!!

    OK, I feel better now.

  26. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    DMCA Effective as ever

    Learn 2 Internet DMCA, god these guys are just STUPID....

    Word of mouth will defeat anything you do anyway.

  27. PirateSlayer
    Flame

    Bring on the new world order!

    About getting that proper job, make sure it's not one related to the games, music, film or any other creative industry that has their material constantly ripped off by pirates seeing themselves as some kind of liberty bringers (rather than the lazy thieves they are!).

    While I don't want to live in a "Police staet[sic] World", I would LOVE a new world order which punished pirates with permanent disconnection from the internet...that would be fantastic! See where your specious, facile, ill conceived, smug arguments about free speech (I thought we were talking about freedom to rip people's work off...hey ho) get you with no internet...maybe you could buy a sandwich board with "why oh why was I punished for ripping people off? It's not fair" on it...

    As for banning the English bobby from pointing out Buckingham Palace, I think it is more like banning the London Bobby from pointing out the local stolen goods fence...or someone who knows him.

  28. Doug Glass
    Go

    Go Get What's Yours Boys

    What's the problem? The music is yours right? Just go to your local brick and mortar store and walk out with what's yours? I mean it is yours for that taking isn't it? So get yourself up and let people see who you are so they can admire your principles.

  29. The Indomitable Gall

    Calm down, dear, Google will deal with it.

    Google have clearly been cunning.

    They've received a DMCA takedown notice for "thepiratebay.org" and they have followed it -- literally.

    They've always made it clear that they're never going to blanket ban a site, and now they're taking the path of least resistance (compliance) yet simultaneously engaged in passive resistance (work to rule).

    If they receive a further DMCA notice stating that they take the whole site out of the index, they're going to tell the submitter where to go, stating (correctly) that they're overstepping the bounds of the DMCA by requesting takedown of pages that do not relate to their IP, which would be fraudulent, therefore thoroughly illegal. This will then be followed by Google telling the IP owner that they have to specify explicitly ever single *page* (not server) that they want excluded.

    The copyright owners give up.

    The thieves win.

    As do the advertising scum.

    Content creators lose.

  30. bill stiller
    Thumb Up

    Use Yahoo

    I stopped using google and went back to yahoo years ago. Yahoo has piratebay.org is at the top of the listings.

  31. Andy Enderby 1

    @terry h

    well sort of..... Don't forget the infamous case of DVD Jon.......

    DMCA==wrongheaded law

  32. Quickbeam
    Pirate

    @PirateSlayer

    @PirateSlayer: 'As for banning the English bobby from pointing out Buckingham Palace, I think it is more like banning the London Bobby from pointing out the local stolen goods fence...or someone who knows him.'

    Ha ha ha ha. And what did the forebears of the occupants of Buckingham Palace do if not steal the whole firkin country from its freeborn inhabitants, and hand it all out to their best mates to be leased back to householders.

    Do welders get paid royalties every time you ride a train they assembled? Does my dentist get paid a royalty every time I eat with my healthy teeth? Do software developers with their ageist career paths get royalties every time someone uses the application they developed for their employer? Its time 'artists' were paid when they actually play their instruments, and then this celebrity/star freakshow can be ended once and for all.

    .

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Err...

    Didn't google recently argue *in court* that they couldn't prevent specific pages appearing in search results?

  34. Henry Wertz 1 Gold badge

    DMCA is a crap law

    "So a DMCA takedown can be enforced to remove a link from a site that links to a site that links to a file which does not contain any copyrighted information itself?

    I think the recording industry should just order the whole internet be shut down, it's the only way."

    Oh yeah that's the "beauty" of the DMCA. Anyone can file a claim for anything no matter how stupid, and (to get safe harbour against lawsuits) the ISP, search provider, etc. who receives the notice, MUST yank down whatever they are told to. It's up to whoever got their stuff pulled to file a counterclaim (at which point the ISP must put the stuff back up.. but since no-one seems to ever file a proper counterclaim I don't know how often that happens.) There's penalties for false DMCA claims but that part also never seems to get enforced. Some abusers have even used the DMCA to pull public domain files, and in a few cases some file where they didn't even claim copyright, they just didn't like the contents. If the owner doesn't know their rights, that's that, it's down.

    It's stupid, and everyone told Congress that knobs would abuse the law as it was written, but they took their bribes and passed it anyway.

  35. Craigyboy
    Alert

    Who else was pulled?

    Anybody know what the other sites were that google pulled?

  36. chr0m4t1c
    Stop

    @Doug Glass

    You're making the exact mistake that the content owners wish you to. The "music" and the physical media are different things that are covered under different laws.

    Theft is what happens when you steal a CD, copyright infringement is what happens when you make a copy of it without permission from the copyright holder. One is a criminal matter the other is a civil matter.

    What you really wanted to suggest people do is go to their local music emporium and copy all of the music they want, but what is *really* happening is the equivalent of someone (either a friend or a complete stranger) allowing you to copy their music collection - some of which they have already copied from someone else.

    It's a complex issue that needs some thought to resolve appropriately, emotive arguments repeated ad-nauseum really don't help.

    Personally I thought the music industry was going to die out due to home taping some 30 years ago...

  37. Shane 8
    Paris Hilton

    searching for piratebay.org on search engine?

    Why would you need to search for piratebay.org in a search engine....just type it in the address bar.

    "Paris"...Now heres an interesting word to use in a search engine 8-)

  38. Anonymous Coward
    Terminator

    Google

    Google Search - your online thought censor overlord configurable according to the prejudices and political bias of your regions rulers.

    Sure they are just acting in compliance with the DMCA - a terrible Bush era corruption enacted to protect the interests of his wealthy pals - but opening this type of ad-hoc censorship opens a rotten can of worms. When private interest groups get to decide what appears or doesn't appear in the webs principle search index, when youtube pull videos of Tibetans protesting about human rights, when ISP's shape or filter traffic based on source or destination - it's a very bad situation for online freedom and fairness.

    > Didn't google recently argue *in court* that they couldn't prevent specific pages appearing in search results?

    Actually the main difference between a web crawler like google and a torrent index like pirate bay is that google comply with these futile takedown notices whereas those hilarious ballsy swedes simply told all and sundry to go fcuk themselves.

  39. Keith Doyle
    Thumb Up

    Oh, I don't mind the DMCA

    It just makes it easier to locate banned content-- I just google for "dmca takedown"...

  40. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @AC; RE: Yank Bashing??

    Knuckle draggers? Coming from a country opposed to health care reform but love to shoot shit out of each other (and anyone else in the way of your interests!). If >your< laws applied internationally then the boys from Cupertino wouldn't be allowed to use some sweatshop in Asia to produce items of which one probably costs more than a single employee earns in a year!

    Correct me if I'm wrong but does Google not have servers located in other parts of the world operated by (Google) companies registered locally in those parts of said world? Is Googles search facility not operated in several locations around the world both as a fallback and to distrubute the load? In which case DMCA takedowns only apply to servers located within US terrortories and I'm sure its not beyond Googles ability to seperate out searches based on geographical location.

    See that bit on a map that says "United States of America" (or "terrortories of..."), that right there is where YOUR laws apply. The rest is full of places that have their own laws and are not just there for the US to plunder whenever it gets the urge (in the name of whatever you're supposed to be scared of today!)

  41. Jeremy 2
    WTF?

    Maybe I'm missing something here but...

    ...just what material on TPB's front page is infringing somebody else's copyright?

  42. Budley.Sama
    FAIL

    Move on, nothing to see..

    Search result 1 - Google removes piratebay.org

    Search result 2 - fake piratebay scam site

    Search result 3 - piratebay on wiki

    Search result 4 - piratebay/browse

    Search result 5 - piratebay/top/201

    Well that was about as effective as... er.... all the other attempts at removing media from the web?

  43. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Driving nails in a coffin

    Too bad, so sad. Enjoy the Iron Bar Hotel TPB Boys.

  44. Alex 14
    Pirate

    Back up now

    It's the first result for pirate bay, the pirate bay and third result for pirate in Google UK now. Probably one of those 8 hour DMCA takedowns. Um...

  45. PirateSlayer
    WTF?

    :S

    "Ha ha ha ha. And what did the forebears of the occupants of Buckingham Palace do if not steal the

    whole firkin country from its freeborn inhabitants, and hand it all out to their best mates to be leased back to householders."

    That's definitely an astute and valid point, not at all a complete and utter simplification of the history of an entire great country. Congratulations on that point.

    "Do welders get paid royalties every time you ride a train they assembled? Does my dentist get paid a royalty every time I eat with my healthy teeth?"

    Welders and dentists get paid every time you use their services. Are you telling me your dentist reaches and touches as many people as a computer game or a music album? This also isn't a grossly contrived, specious, smug, facile argument which definitely takes into consideration the lives of creative people versus those who are paid to do a labour job (such as welding). I am sure that someone welding a bolt onto a train which is then manufactured by a robot deserves exactly the same renumeration as an artist whose work touches MILLIONS. Definitely. You have completely changed my perspective.

  46. blownhemi

    Still works for me.

    The home page is still showing for me as the top result when I use the string "pirate bay". At the bottom, it lists the DMCA notice, though.

    And as for the knuckly draggers comment, not all of us in the US have the same opinions as the country's policies. Some of us are well traveled and a little more open minded. Please, please don't group us all together.

  47. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Well, still up at least in the UK

    went to google.com

    typed in pirate bay

    top of the list? piratebay.org

    cheers google.

    Cant say im that arsed as i use usenet.

    But, hey, TPB has its uses!!

  48. losingthewill
    WTF?

    oh noooooos!

    cannon

    "the gatekeepers want to stop all avenues for release unless they get a slice of the pie + governments want to squash free speech.

    welcome to the new world order"

    Too True bud

  49. Quickbeam
    Go

    Information belongs to those who can use it

    Governments will control the Internet on the day they manage to prevent us sending ones and zeros to each other. That will also be that day that file sharing will stop.

    In the mean time (it could be along wait), and especially as Google has ceased to be a Search Engine and now become a Filtered-Search Engine I cannot recommend this alternative enough:

    https://eu.ixquick.com/

    They have servers in the USA and in Europe (the Netherlands to be precise). The above URL ensures you go to the European servers.

    The search page is https, along with the results page.

    And, the search criteria don't form part of the results page URL (are you listening Google?)

    Oh and they promise not to record your IP address.

    All together, this means that the UK Government's new system of snooping on everyone's URLs but not page content (because after all there is no personal information content in URLs is there?) starts to look, how shall we put it, a bit on the quaint side.

    Steering clear of snooping-government-friendly filtered-search companies like Google is a small part of reclaiming our lives.

  50. Ole Juul

    Google search works fine here

    A search for pirate bay on google.ca and google.dk both bring up TPB as would be expected. However, right now the link doesn't work because TPB seems to be down. What's up with that?

  51. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Search s, Finds, but wont access.

    Just tried this on Google, searching for specific content. Returns results on thier pages, but the links just hang up once clicked. So either the site is down, or they are ditching your connection from thier pages.

  52. Bill Cumming
    FAIL

    Looks like it's just a "Google Fail"

    ThePitareBay.org is back on top of the searches.

    Looks like the DCMA was against another party and TPB's domain name was in the request by mistake (or something like that) and some bright spark at google flagged PirateBay instead of the party listed in the DCMA request.

  53. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    @ AC 02OCT 1752

    Nice one - well said :)

  54. asdf
    Unhappy

    yank bashing

    Why does every other article here cause limey, patty, frog, kraut, pommy, merken bashing? Yes the USA is FUBAR but if you did a poll most Americans under the age of 50 find the DMCA unamerican and morally wrong (of course would have to explain what DMCA is to most of them as our education system sucks, but then again we get by through immigration and stealing talent from rest of world). Remember our country was founded by the jettison from England (religious wankers, carpet bagger capitalist etc). Also remember many of us know how screwed up our laws and our system is, but money talks and keeps most of us in line (that along with cops with hare triggers). Remember Capitalism: A Love Story is a film made by Americans about the USA so many of us do recognize our lifestyle is unsustainable and some of us such as myself have even lived in Europe so we know our way is not the only way. Be careful not to hate everyone in a culture due to the corrupt power elite because much like Africa %90 are slaves (ie poor unwashed masses, nobodys) with little recourse.

  55. Mark Jonson
    WTF?

    How sad...

    DMCA makes me ashamed to admit I live in the US. And as far as using the address bar, you'd be surprised how many people I see typing URLs directly into search engines, just to click on the results page link to that website. It scares me to think these people might actually attempt to drive a car, let alone simply use a computer.

  56. Matthew 4
    Pirate

    works for me

    must be US visitors only I guess?

  57. Forename Surname
    FAIL

    I am in the US and get results... what purge?

    I'm in the USA and the pirate bay site comes up in various searches. Must have been a very short purging.

  58. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    @indomitable gall

    Take this argument a step further. Google can't ban an individual page where the page has been generated on the fly as search results on The Pirate Bay because it has no permanent address or rather the address depends on the specific search and the results may change over time. Yep, you're right, Google needs to be banned too!

  59. Andrew Herron
    Pirate

    PirateBay...still googlable

    The Pirate Bay still seems to be found in searches I have just made...

  60. Jimmy 1

    Google schmoogle.

    The IP owners are entitled to take whatever legal measures they deem necessary to protect their property, and the big G explicitly states that it will honour any such legally served restraints. But what we are seeing here is a blatant attempt to suppress 'information' that should be freely available on the world's biggest search engine.

    The fact that it is trivially easy* to find this information elsewhere on the internet does not excuse Google's abject surrender to the floundering morons who have consistently failed to devise an effective business model for their industry. Bought and paid for politicians in the US and Europe are no substitute for a viable business strategy.

    .

    .

    *Try the excellent Clusty search engine for more structured results from its clustering technology. http://clusty.com/

    Or how about the cheeky lads from Yauba who provide anonymous links straight from the search results. http://yauba.com/

  61. Haku
    FAIL

    related search FAIL

    I just tried searching for simply 'torrent' and whilst there's no pirate bay links showing on the first page of results, but at the bottom of the page (.. added to separate the link text):

    Searches related to: torrent

    fxm torrents .. maxspeed torrents .. transformers revenge of the fallen torrent .. torrent trackers

    the pirate bay torrent .. p2p torrent .. bitcomet torrent .. azureus torrent

  62. Winkypop Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    Works for me

    Now, what is this PB all about?

    Hmmmm, free stuff !!!

    Thanks for the tip

  63. jon 72
    Coat

    Take Down Google

    Heck, Google will even suggest some less than legal websites to visit

    try the rubric ' Watch Movies...'

    I wonder if Googles home page could be made the subject of a similiar take down order, after all they do help facilitate the sharing copyrighted material

  64. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    @Mark Jonson

    "And as far as using the address bar, you'd be surprised how many people I see typing URLs directly into search engines, just to click on the results page link to that website"

    I'm not surprised that people do it, but I am surprised that you don't know why. I do it in IE at work, when I don't want the URL I want to visit appearing in the dropdown list of the address bar (where I can only remove it if I clear ALL the entries or hack it out of the registry, neither of which I particularly want to do).

  65. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    FAIL

    TPB still shows as the top result here for a lot of searches.

  66. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    @Reg

    I am in the US and it's working fine, it is indexed and it's the 1st result for pirate bay.

    I also checked its page rank:

    http://www.prcheck.net/?url=thepiratebay.org&Submit=Submit

    Result is 7.

    Clearly the DCMA noobs failed again, does anyone know what happened?

    /me politely requests the Reg to update the story :)

  67. Jeffrey Nonken
    Pirate

    Oh deary me

    How ever am I going to find thepiratebay.org now?

  68. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    @ AC 1701

    "Sure they are just acting in compliance with the DMCA - a terrible Bush era corruption enacted to protect the interests of his wealthy pals - but opening this type of ad-hoc censorship opens a rotten can of worms."

    While I'm all one for Bush bashing, the DMCA was a CLINTON era corruption, not a Bush one.

  69. Field Marshal Von Krakenfart
    FAIL

    Why is this an issue

    Don't use Google

    Of course the real issue is the way the copyright mafia, unable to actually close TPB, or get a successful conviction (well, in any way that acts as a determent) for the breech of copyright by downloading, are now engaged in censorship.

    It also shows how fucking stupid the King Canute MAFIAA are.

    OK, so suppose google get their act together and won't show *any* TPB links, people who download will not use google, eventually the MAFIAA will try and stop any search engine from displaying TPB links, and they will probably try and prevent ISPs for displaying TPB links as well.

    What are the MAFIAA going to do, bully ISPs into blocking access to search engine that show links to what the MAFIA consider “illegal” content? Is that the MAFIAA’s eventual goal, total censorship of the internet??????

    Meanwhile, everybody will stop using google et al, because, like IE, which search engine you use is more habit than anything else, and while all this is going on a lot more tracker sites are going to start up, probably in locations where the MAFIAA’s grubby little hands can’t reach, and downloader's start using more secure P2P methods.

    Net result: The MAFIAA fail miserably at protecting their monopoly control of the music business as they fail to reduce the amount of illegal downloading while that the same time they also damage a lot of legitimate businesses.

    Seems the MAFIAA don't care what damage they do to other legitimate business in try to protect their monopoly

    Fail, MASSIVE.

  70. Ray Simard
    Thumb Down

    Back to normal?

    At this moment a Google search for "torrent tracker" brings up the TPB top-level page third, after the Wikipedia article describing trackers and torrentking.org. The DMCA notice isn't there.

    As far as the original censorship goes, I frankly don't care if TPB is naughty or nice; it's not Google's place, on its own or under pressure, to play moral guardian to the world or any part of it. They might well nix clearly criminal enterprises (malware, kiddie porn, terrorism how-to, Crack Cocaine 'R' Us...), but despite its woes TPB is not in that class. I've got a problem with one industry telling another industry which is in no way violating any law what to do. Yes, Google runs its own shop as it sees fit and has the right to do this if it wants to, but it's a very bad idea, and a worse precedent.

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