As a fellow Kiwi I know what you mean. I don't want him to be extradited and feel the precedent of cooperation on something like copyright is a betrayal of our sovereignty, but at the same time, there's so much detail to this case and there is so much bullshit swirling that a (lengthy) trip to the supreme court in the US would seem to be worth the risk if it can establish some precedent which moderates the ever-strangling enforcement of IP legislation at the moment.

Extradition is not a violation of sovereignty; it's an affirmation of sovereignty. The US has to politely ask for the accused to be turned over and the NZ courts will decide whether the request is legally valid under New Zealand law.

From the outside, the whole process looks faulty and even corrupt. Regardless of how guilty a man can look or be made look, there are rights you cannot trample upon.

Looks like the US Grand Jury is trying to set an example, and it does so in their usual heavy-handed, cowboy fashion. Wilful copyright infringement (so far, alleged) is not a crime worth 50 years in the oven. As I read somewhere, killing Michael Jackson cannot be a 4y offence while allowing someone to put his songs for download is a 50y one. Not in a civilised country like New Zealand.

How is seizing his property even legal before trial? not talking about servers, but cars, houses, etc. I could go on for a long time because the list is long, but to sum it up it looks like they are doing their best to damage the guy as much as possible before trial.

Perhaps I'm mistaken, but it doesn't seem that farfetched to me for authorities to seize someone's assets when they are arrested for allegedly participating in a criminal conspiracy.

I'm on holiday here at the moment (lovely country, btw? :)) and it was nice to see that reaction on the news and radio. It's similar to the UK reaction to the kid the US started extradition against a few weeks ago.

It was interesting to see it "on the ground" as it were - I had not idea he was NZ based.