A Kopimist or Kopimist intellectual is person who has the philosophical belief that all information should be freely distributed and unrestricted. This philosophy opposes copyrights in all forms and encourages piracy of all types of media including music, movies, TV shows, and software. The term kopimist originates from the root word, kopimi, meaning copy me.[1]
Kopimists have primarily been involved in computer piracy, distributing copyrighted materials through peer2peer networks such as through the use of bittorrent files, but they initially started their involvement in piracy on BBS and IRC
The term Kopimist has gained recognition in part through publicity surrounding thepriratebay.org's desire to buy Sealand, a man-made island, and form a sovereign micronation, unrestricted by copyright laws. Thepiratebay is a bittorrent site that receives over 4 million hits a day. Thepiratebay made the announcement, “With the help of all the kopimists on the Internet, we want to buy Sealand. Donate money and you will become a citizen and nobleman.", on their new website, http://buysealand.com/. The beginnings of Sealand shared some philosophic beliefs with Kopimists when they started a pirate radio station. Sealand still remains free of any copyright laws or internet restrictions aside from a ban on child pornography. [2] Thepiratebay so far have have raised over 20,000$US, however the goal ultimately failed. On interview on the CBC's The Hour, Royal Highness Prince Michael of Sealand stated that buying Sealand is probably a good way to circumvent international copyright law, but that he won’t sell sealand to the Pirate Bay [3] [4]
See Also edit
Sources edit
- How the Kopimists Conquered Internets – and Launched a War - Includes a definition and history of Kopimists
- The Pirate Bay Wants to Buy Sealand
External Links edit
- http://thepiratebay.org/
- http://buysealand.com/ thepiratbay.org's site to attempt to buy Sealand
- http://www.sealandgov.org/
- International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA)
- http://freenationfoundation.org/