# Sealand back in the news

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sealand-back-in-the-news/387988>\
**Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\
**Created:** [January 14, 2007, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sealand-back-in-the-news/387988 "2007-01-14T22:01:57Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![whitetho](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whitetho/32/1059_2.png) [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)\
**Post date:** [January 14, 2007, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sealand-back-in-the-news/387988/1 "2007-01-14T22:01:57Z")

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The “country” of Sealand was mentioned in Cecil’s 1990 column on [How do I go about starting my own country?](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_300.html) Sealand is currently for sale, resulting in an interesting roster of potential buyers, including a music-sharing service looking to get around copyright laws, as reviewed in [The Pirate Bay plans to buy island](http://www.thelocal.se/6076/20070112/).

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**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\
**Post date:** [January 15, 2007, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sealand-back-in-the-news/387988/2 "2007-01-15T01:32:48Z")

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The Pirate Bay guys looking to set up a data-haven? Shame that Sealand is nowadays in UK territorial waters.

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**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\
**Post date:** [January 15, 2007, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sealand-back-in-the-news/387988/3 "2007-01-15T12:58:16Z")

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Roy Bates once fired a cannon (old anti-aircraft gun?) at a British warship that entered “his” waters, and he got away with it! IIRC, this lead to the trial that ended with the Brish courts declaring that Sealand is outside UK jurisdiction.

Has Roy Bates died? The article says that his son is trying to sell Sealand.

What I’ve read was that Roy Bates was thinking of starting up a data-storage service that would be beholden to no laws but Sealand’s. Anything other than child pornography would be accepted. I suppose that music-sharing would be OK under those rules.

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**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\
**Post date:** [January 15, 2007, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sealand-back-in-the-news/387988/4 "2007-01-15T13:35:20Z")

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[QUOTE=Diceman]  
Roy Bates once fired a cannon (old anti-aircraft gun?) at a British warship that entered “his” waters, and he got away with it! IIRC, this lead to the trial that ended with the Brish courts declaring that Sealand is outside UK jurisdiction.  
[/quote]

A lot has gone on since the 60s with regards to Sealand’s claims: [Principality of Sealand - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealand#Legal_status) sums it up.

I’m pleased to see from the map there that I escape Sealand’s 12-mile claim, by a few hundred yards…