FIGHTING THE POWER: Kim Dotcom: the internet cult hero spoiling for a fight with US authorities.

After spending almost a month in prison in early 2012, Dotcom and his co-accused were awarded bail – the first of a series of court victories that have left the prosecution case looking increasingly wobbly. With any hearing for extradition to the US to face criminal copyright charges having been pushed back, it is hard not to see the extravagant unveiling of the new site as a two-finger gesture aimed at US authorities. . . .

The series of setbacks to the prosecution case has prompted speculation that the extradition hearing itself may never be heard – a scenario that Dotcom, who turns 39 next week, says he would regret. “We want to expose what has happened here. We have a lot of information that shows the political interference. We feel that what happened here was manufactured to destroy Megaupload, and we want to show that. . . . I have a much better understanding now of how the US government operates and how much spying is actually going on, how much privacy intrusion is the reality today.”

Overreaching at the DOJ seems to be producing some blowback.