The Pirate Party, one of Sweden's many small political parties whose main platform addresses file sharing and digital rights, achieved monumental success in last night's EU elections - gaining over 7% of the Swedish vote and actually winning a seat in the European Parliament.

If you think it sounds similar to Sweden's famous file-sharing site, The Pirate Bay, you are not far off base. Although not directly affiliated, the Pirate Party does share at least one of the ideals of the infamous file-sharing site:  free file-sharing. They also believe in abolishing the patent system in Europe, reform of copyright law and outlawing digital rights management, which inhibits the ability to copy computer files.

The news hit CNN, and there is also good info at The Local.