Anton Vickerman probably didn't want to enter the history books in this way. As the founder of surfthechannel.com, a website that provided links to TV and film content ? in a significant number of cases, unlicensed and illicit ? the 38-year-old last week became the first person in Britain to be jailed for running a site linking to pirate material. He was jailed for four years after a private prosecution brought by the Federation Against Copyright Theft, AKA Fact, funded by the TV and film industries.

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