Researchers Launch The Survey Bay; Largest Database Of Information On Users Of The Pirate Bay

from the have-a-sift dept

A few years back, The Pirate Bay agreed to team up with the Cybernorms Group at Sweden's Lund University to do some detailed research on who uses The Pirate Bay, and look at the "habits and norms within the file-sharing community." Over the past few years, a few interesting pieces of research have come out of that collaboration. The research is based on data from 75,000 users of The Pirate Bay who were surveyed. The team behind this project have now launched The Survey Bay, an interactive website that provides access to this database of data and information.

It's fascinating to look at, and gives you an interesting way to explore what different people who use The Pirate Bay think about various topics. Some people talk about accessing content that isn't available anywhere else. Others discuss the importance of internet freedoms. Certainly some discuss how they use it to get free content, but many of the discussions are a lot more thoughtful and nuanced than that. Obviously, there are limits to the results of a survey. The data clearly has some level of bias to it, and no one is claiming that it's a comprehensive look at file sharers -- but it is a way to look at what many users of The Pirate Bay are thinking, and recognizing that the arguments are a hell of a lot more nuanced and thoughtful than "yay, free stuff," as the MPAA/RIAA's of the world insist is the driving force behind those sites. I'm looking forward to more interesting analysis being done on this information.

Filed Under: cybernorms, data, file sharing, lund university, research
Companies: the pirate bay