Proving that they are not at all concerned about the protests against the SOPA and PIPA bills, the members of the British music industry are pushing hard for a block on the site by the British internet service providers (ISPs), including BT and BSkyB.

According to Mr. Justice Arnold, who presided over the case, “In my judgment, the operators of [The Pirate Bay] do authorise its users’ infringing acts of copying and communication to the public. They go far beyond merely enabling or assisting. I conclude that both users and the operators of [The Pirate Bay] infringe the copyrights of the claimants … in the UK”.

The High Court’s ruling on whether the ISPs should prevent their customers from accessing the website is expected to come this June. If the ruling comes in favor of the music industry, 3.7 million users in the UK will be prevented from visiting the website.

Do you think that those numbers are big? According to available info, The Pirate Bay has 30 million users worldwide and earned up to $3 million in advertising revenue just in the month of October last year by creating 4m copies of music and films.

It will be a huge hit to the freedom of the Web in the UK if the site ends up being blocked. And the fact that a legal ruling could bring the curtains down on a site as big as The Pirate Bay should be noted by all those who make a living from a website.

As for all those who are pushing for a ban on The Pirate Bay, you all should stay prepared for what might arrive later on.

The post The Pirate Bay May Go Down In The UK appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

The way it works is that you’re on the hook for a $24.95 monthly subscription fee. With that fee, you can request one product from the catalog and it gets shipped to your door for free. You use that new gadget — be it a Keurig coffee maker, an iPad 2, or a Sous Vide Water Oven — for 30 days. After that, you can choose to ship it back (for free) or you can choose to buy it, less the $24.95 you’ve already paid. It sounds like decent enough of a concept, since YBUY can effectively rent out the same product again and again, only to sell it for (nearly) full price to the final consumer.

It’s such a compelling idea that YBUY recently received $750,000 in seed funding. This makes it sound like you’re not really buying new products, but it gives manufacturers “an easy-to-use sales channel… to offer refurbished products to consumers without the added cost of marketing and sales,” according to YBUY CEO Stephen Svajian. Some purchase prices are discounted, but items like the iPad 2 are still selling at full retail price.

Or, as one clever commenter mentioned, “For $50/yr you can get a Costco membership. Similar setup but you also get cheap gas!”

[ source ]

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