News written by Matti Robinson (May, 2009)

As we reported in couple occasions last month, the judge Tomas Norström in the Pirate Bay case was allegedly biased for being a member of at least two copyright associations. According to TorrentFreak, the defense lawyer Per Samuelsson has now sent a letter to the Court of Appeal addressing the issue of unfair trial.

"I don’t want to say that the randomness of judge selection has been fixed, but the case has been handed to Norström mainly because he is considered an expert on copyright. That raises questions since this is a criminal case. A large majority of the young generation believes that what is going on here is a farce," commented Samuelsson to Swedish news agency, TT.

Usually in Sweden judges are chosen at random which wasn't the case here. Nordström was handpicked because of his expertise in copyright cases even though he has connections with several pro-copyright groups and is a board member of Swedish Association for the Protection of Industrial Property.

The software giant Microsoft has officially started distributing the Release Candidate version of Windows 7. As expected, today they expanded the distribution to all of us average Joes, who now get a hold of the future de facto operating system.

The release candidate is said to include the same set of features as the final product so it will provide a good glimpse into Windows 7. Microsoft however doesn't recommend this version for the beginners for it is still in development and therefore unstable and insecure.

You also cannot upgrade previous Windows installations to Windows 7 RC. You need to make a clean install which will also be the case when the final Windows 7 comes out. Beta or RC versions can neither be upgraded to final version.

Windows 7 RC is available in 32-bit and 64-bit versions for five languages - English, German, Japanese, French, and Spanish. The file is in ISO format so you will need a DVD burner and an appropriate burning software such as ImgBurn or Nero.