Millions of people all over the world copy, download and share commercial software, movies, and music. The entertainment industry suffered historical losses. CDs weren't selling anymore. People were going to the movies less and less. The classic business era came to an end.

The companies saw themselves confronted with digital anarchy. To assume power, they entered into new territory. However, they were not driven by innovation. They wanted to win back, what they had already lost. Their way led to a place where a secret subculture had developed a fairly long time ago and they started a war.

They believed the inventors of the digital age were their enemies. This was not a war for territorial claims but for information and knowledge and it was a war the industry could not win. The story begins ... it begins a long time ago ...

The very first programmers calling themselves "Hackers" were mathematicians, engineers and scientists working at universities. In the 1950s, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston was the epicenter of a technological explosion. Those hackers were the heralds of the digital and technological revolution.

In 1959, two scientists, John McCarthy and Marvin Minsky, founded the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. In 1961, the first computer game was developed and in 1975 the world's first hacker club was established. Its members were Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, the founders of Apple Computer. Ed Roberts, creator of the first home computer. Douglas Engelbart, the inventor of the computer mouse. And Steve Dumpier, composer of the first computer music.

Their belief in sharing information and knowledge became the fundamental principle on which the digital culture was being formed.

Yet in the same year, Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, wrote an open letter to the members of the hacker club banning the copying of his software. The idea that sharing knowledge and information could be illegal created a new thought - the illegal copy. However, a quiet protest began ...

The young computer industry forged its way and grew rapidly. In the following years more software was sold than anyone would have imagined. 1980 marked the beginning of the computer era. It now became clear that software had finally become a mass product.

However, blinded by the idea that information had to be protected from sharing, the industry made a big mistake - it invented the copy protection.

First users started to crack the protection and cracking became a passion. In 1982, first crackers started to spread pirated software all over the world. In 1984, first cracking groups gathered, in 1986 the number of their members exceeded 20,000. Within a few years a secret scene developed, operating in the underground and calling itself "the Scene". Long before the invention of WWW, the Scene shared software in their own digital venues. The groups permanently competed for the first release of pirated software. In 1990, the first official meetings took place with 4,000 members of the so called "Scene" In the mid-90's its size reached 50,000 members.

In the 1990s, the Internet became a mass medium. With new possibilities crackers were able to establish new structures. Bound by the tradition of the hackers of the 1960's and the crackers of the 1980's a new, even bigger, and more powerful scene developed. Nearly every software program, every movie and every music album could now be downloaded from the Internet for free -caused by the Scene.

Finally, the Scene attracted the attention of the FBI. In 1994, MIT-student David LaMacchia got arrested and prosecuted for copyright infringement. In 1997, President Clinton signed the "No Electronic Theft Act" called NETAct allowing the FBI to fight the Scene more rigorously.

On December 11th 2001, FBI-Agents executed under codename Operation Buccaneer about 100 search warrants worldwide. In massive raids, more than 120 computers were seized. From March 16th to 18th 2004, several hundred apartments, computer centers and companies were searched. More than 200 computers and 40,000 data media were seized. As the police made the arrest, they confiscated 38 terabytes of pirated material - which equals the storage capacity of 60,000 CDs.

But just a few days after that, the Scene returned to its former strength. As the FBI finally admitted, the Scene could only be described as a "highly organized syndicate". With more than 200,000 Scene members worldwide, even the FBI seemed to be overextended.

Soon, the industry made its next fatal mistake. After the investigations failed, the industry seeked its chance in fighting the consumers. They declared war on millions of users and thus their own customers. In 2004 the industry started a campaign, labeling thousands of customers "criminals". Until 2006 the RIAA sued more than 16,000 music fans, who had downloaded MP3s for private use.

But all their attempts failed. The consumers stood up against the industry's campaigns. The idea of sharing knowledge and information now became more important than ever before. Free music platforms soon dominated the world of digital music. In these platforms, people shared music as cultural possessions. Free software as Linux and projects as Wikipedia became the cultural assets of a new digital world.

The entertainment industry started a war on two fronts. It started a war against a 25-year-old, organized underground subculture which the industry had created itself and could not stop. But their greatest hubris was to fight against the whole net culture.

As a protest against the industry's sanctions, millions all over the world now program free software, share data, information, and knowledge. Not only as a part of a subculture, not only in the underground but anywhere and with anyone. The age of free culture, the second Internet revolution begins, it begins now ...