According to reports, October 2007 saw the arrest of a 23 year old man, allegedly caught trying to record or ‘cam’ the new movie, ‘Dan in Real Life‘. He was also in possession of equipment to directly upload the movie to the internet and was likely to have been apprehended by police and theater staff wearing night vision goggles.

The man from Quebec is among the first to be charged under the new legislation which, according to Slyck.com, was rushed through in record time after intense lobbying by the MPAA in the United States.

If convicted, the man faces up to two years in jail. However, should his actions be considered part of a commercial operation, the term jumps to five years and could include forfeiture of assets.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Cap’n Slappy: So long as these pirate parties of which ye speak center around the two pillars o’ pirattitude; Rum and Roistering – they have me full support!

TF: Do you feel they’re ‘stealing your thunder’ a little?

CS: Thar be plenty o’ thunder to go around – we’re not greedy! One o’ the charms o’ International Talk Like a Pirate Day is that it doesn’t cost anyone anything! Sure, we sell t-shirts on our site – but there are many other web sites that sell Talk Like a Pirate Day t-shirts and we don’t begrudge ‘em that! We put the day out thar for all to play with as they please – so, if they want some thunder, they be more than welcome to whatever they can handle. (We do hope thy buy our books, though.)

TF: Any views on historical parallels between letters of marque and recent RIAA/MPAA actions, such as those regarding the Pirate Bay?

CS: Ye have to understand, I’m an old pirate who has naught but a weak-ass computer-box what can barely download a picture o’ me nephew balancin’ a banana on his nose! So RIAA/MPAA be just letters to me – but a letter o’marque be a nice reminder o’ the ol’ sayin’ “The enemy o’ me enemy be me friend – at least till a better offer comes around.”

TF: How long do you envisage TLAPD going for?

CS: I’m surprised it’s gone on this long! But each year its roots seem to run deeper – I think thar be somethin’ about the pirate personae that resonates with folks. So, I’m thinkin’ it’ll last until 2241. That’s me best guess.

Our thanks to Cap’n Slappy, and happy TLaPD.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

After The raid on the popular BitTorrent tracker “The Piratebay“, the Pirate Party has transformed into the largest party without parliament seats. In Sweden, you get seats in the parliament if you get four percent of the votes. The Pirate Party has arount the same member count as the Green Party, which is a party that supports the current government, and without them, the current government can’t maintain their majority This leads the Pirate Party to believe that if they get into the parliament they can fill such a vital role, and thereby make a big difference. Worth noting is that some unofficial gallups from various sources indicate that the Pirate Party is the most likely party for a Swedish first-time voter to choose on election day.

Here is a translation of the introduction. If you happen to read Swedish, the manifesto can be retrieved in PDF here.

The Pirate Party Election Manifesto 2006

Preface
The election program of the Pirate Party consists of various nautical charts, describing what we want to do in each of the areas within the Pirate Party policies. These charts are divided in sections based on deadline and what is to be done on a Swedish and on a European level.

As an introduction to these charts, we describe our ideology and our main policies.

Protected integrity in an open society
The development of technology has made sure Sweden and Europe stand before a fork in the road. The new technology offers fantastic possibilities to spread culture and knowledge all over the world with almost no costs. But it also makes way for the building of a society monitored at a level unheard of up until now.

In no time, the monitoring state has advanced its positions strongly in Sweden. This development threatens equality and safety before the law, and nothing indicates that it even adds to security. The Pirate Party believes this is the wrong way to go.

The right to privacy is a corner stone in an open and democratic society. Each and everyone has the right to respect for one’s own private and family life, one’s home and one’s correspondence. If the constitutional freedom of information is to be more than empty words on a paper, we much defend the right for protected private communication.

The arguments for every individual step towards a monitoring society may sound very convincing, but we only have to look at the recent history of Europe to see where that road leads. It is less than twenty years since the fall of the Berlin wall, and there are numerous other terrible examples. To claim that it’s only those with something to hide that has anything to fear is simply lacking knowledge of history, and lacking courage.

We have no problem with police monitoring and spying on suspected criminals. That is exactly what the police is suppose to be doing. But routinely monitoring ordinary citizens hoping for something suspicious to turn up is not only a gross violation of the privacy of honest people. It is also a waste of valuable police resources.

We have to pull the emergency break on the train running towards a society we don’t want. Terrorists can attack our open society, but only governments can disband it. The Pirate Party wants to ensure that this doesn’t happen.

Private communication and file sharing
A driving force behind the current monitoring hysteria is the entertainment business, which wants to prevent people from file sharing copyrighted material. But to achieve this all private communication must be monitored. To know what ones and zeros make up a movie, the ones and zeros has to be analyzed. It is the same sort of ones and zeros that is sent, regardless of if it makes up a piece of music, or a letter to a doctor or a lawyer.

Therefore society ha to choose: do we want a possibility to trustingly communicate over the Internet to exist?

If your answer is yes, it means that also those that shares copyrighted material can use these possibilities.

If you answer is no, it means that you abolish the right of information, the right to mail secrecy and the right to a private life.

There are no other answers.

It is not possible to claim that society should allow mail secrecy for certain purposes, but not for others, since it is impossible to separate the different cases without breeching the secrecy. It is the same types of ones and zeros being used, and only by opening the message, it is possible to see what it contains.

The current copyright legislation can not be combined with freedom of information and protected private communication. Since the fundamental principles of the open, democratic society is more important than conserving old business models within the business of entertainment at all costs, copyright has to fold.

But this is not negative. A reformed copyright legislation, expressing a balance between different interests in society instead of being an order form from the large media companies, has its own benefits. It is a possibility for Sweden and Europe, not a threat.

The spreading of culture and knowledge is a positive thing
Thanks to the Internet it is today possible for everyone with a computer to take part of a fantastic treasure of culture and knowledge.

Instead of being limited to a cultural canon decided from above, the youths of today has access to the music, theater and pictures of an entire world. This is something we should embrace, not something we should try to forbid. File sharing is good for society and its people.

All non-commercial acquiring, using, bettering and spread of culture should be actively encouraged. The Internet is filling the same function today as popular education did a hundred years ago. It is something positive and good for the development of society.

The copyright legislation must be changes so that it is made perfectly clear that it only regulate use and copying of works done for commercial purposes. To share copies, or in any other way spread or use someone else’s work, should never be forbidden as long as it is done on an idealistic basis without the purposes of commercial gain.

Unfortunately, the legislation has developed in quite the opposite direction. On July 1, 2005, a million ordinary Swedes were suddenly turned into criminals over night, simply because they download movies and music. This doesn’t only hurt our possibilities to take part of culture. In the long run it undermines the trust of our entire judicial apparatus. This development has to end.

In a similar fashion, patents are used to inhibit the spread and use of knowledge, which hurts society as a whole.

Medical patents make people in poor countries die for no reason. It twists the priorities in research and makes the costs for medications a problem in every health care budget.

Software patents inhibit technical development within the info tech area and presents a serious threat against small as well as mid-sized businesses and individual developers. They run the risk of putting the power over the Internet completely in the hands of a small number of multi national businesses.

We want to release knowledge, and have specific suggestion on how to avoid the negative consequences that the patent system means.

Sweden and Europe has everything to gain from choosing the path of openness.

No other issues
The Pirate Party does not have any policies on issues that traditionally concerns the left-right scale, or any other issues outside of our program of policiies.

We particularly does not concern ourselves with the division of wealth. We are not after dividing money between different groups in society. None of our propositions costs any money for the state, and several of them may potentially save money in the budget. Because of this, we can place ourselves outside of the struggle concerning the budget, with good faith, and leave it to the old parties.

We are ready to support a social democratic as well as a non-socialist government, we claim that both Göran Persson as well as Fredrik Reinfeldt are well capable of taking the role as the head of government in a satisfactory manner. We do not believe that the differences between them are that big, in reality, and every one of us are ready to live with any of them as our prime minister.

The only thing that concerns us, is the protection of our open society and democracy, that the march towards a controlled society is cancelled, and that culture and knowledge are set free.

Our goal is to reach the parliament and being in a position where we can tip the scale. If we succeed in this we will talk to both Göran Persson and Fredrik Reinfeldt alike. We will explain what we want, and point out that our policies in no way differs from either traditional social democratic policy or traditional liberal/non-socialist policy.

After that, we will support the person aspiring to form a government, who is ready to make the best deal with us on our policies. On any matter outside of our policy statement, we will support and vote for the current government, no matter what we believe individually on different matters.

Due to the fact that we do not have a view on everything on this earth, but concentrate completely on the issues where we have formed a policy, we can promise a result if we make it to the house of parliament in a scale-tipping position. That makes us unique in Swedish political history.

We are the only party that will never deal away our free and open society for the benifit of any other issue or interest.

More on the Pirate Party tipping the scale
The Pirate Party does not take a stand in issues generally associated with the right or left, or any other issues that are not part of our declaration of principles. We are ready to support a socialdemocratic as well as a non-socialist government. The only thing that concerns us is that the march towards a controlled society is cancelled, and that culture and knowledge in society are set free,

On of the factions within Swedish politics has really anything to lose in reality by satisfying more or less all of our demands. Neither Persson nor Reinfeldt have any personal interest in keeping the absurdity that is current copyright legislation. The fact that things look like they do, is primarily due to lack of interest in the area, and that they have therefore allowed the ‘experts’ (i.e. the lobbyists of the entertainment industry) have their way.

In a situation where they can gain position of forming a government by striking a deal with us in an issue that they, themselves, believe to be less important, there is every reason to believe that they will be eager to find a solution.

But in either case, there are three possible scenarios:

1) One of the factions agree to our demands, and the other does not. Then we will choose the faction that agree with us. Whether this is the red faction of the blue faction is of no concern for us. As long as we see that they are doing their best to seriously run our issues, we will support the government in all other issues as well, without questioning.

2) Both the factions agree to our demands. If there are differences of nuances making one faction looking slightly better than the other, we will choose this faction. If both are exactly as good, we will support the faction with the more votes. This way we won’t influence the balance between the factions in Swedish politics. As long as the government is running our issues, we will support them in all decicions, just as in the first scenario.

3) Both the factions refuse to meet our demands. This is the more complicated case, but we can handle this one too. Initially we will support one faction, and make a government possible. Most likely this will be the ones with the less votes, so that the others, the ‘victors’, will feel that they have lost power they were entitled to. They can, however, not do much about it, since we will support the government without questioning in anything that does not involve our principles.

When the “victors” are safely placed in the penalty box of opposition, we start our businesslike, low-voiced conversations with them, until they realize that our proposals are not, in fact, that dangerous, and that they can only win from working with us. When they have seen our arguments in the glow of the miraging governmental position for a while, there are good reasons to believe they will agree with us. This is when we will call for a vote of non-confidence and change the government. After that, the Pirate Party with support the new government without questioning, in all issues, as long as the government runs our issues forcefully, just as in scenario 1 and 2.

This is our entire strategy. This way we can guarantee that our policies will have a break-through.

Questions and answers about our scale-tipping strategy
- How do we handle parliamentary votes that do not include any issues that the Pirate Party runs?

We will support the government in office, no matter what our personal opinions might be.

- Will the party try to make deals with other parties (“if you vote for us on issue “X” and “Y” we will help you with “Z”)?

No, we will talk to the party in office. As long as they do as we want in our issues, we will support them in all other matters. We do not wish to try shopping a la carte from different parties (if we do, we will only be shoved aside). If the government stops this manner of cooperation, we will change the government, but as long as we tolerate a government, we are completely loyal to them in all other issues, those not in our program.

- …or not vote?

If the government needs our support in the parliament it can count on it. We will not cancel our votes if this would affect the turnout against the government.

- …or let the individual MPs decide for themselves?

Under no circumstances. The day we start voting after personal preference, we have nothing more to offer the other parties in a negotiation. If this happens, we can no longer benefit from our position, and have no longer any means to influence the policies that is the closest to our hearts.

- But in the third scenario (that is if none of the factions wants to offer anything at all, even though we are tipping the scale), why would we want to support the government? We should obviously be able to offer them to vote, from their perspective, in an unseemly manner? It seems a bit awkward to give them what they want first (by support) and then trying to negotiate.

The idea in the third scenario is that we help a government form, that we ourselves aren’t happy with, but who we choose to support indefinitely anyway. Principally only to tease the opposition, in other words. When the opposition has spent a few months being grumpy because they can’t form a government even though they think they won the election, they have two alternatives to choose from. They can either stay grumpy for the next four years, or they can start talking to us to find out if they can “talk sense in to us” and have our support.

The big prize is the government, both for the left and the right, and they have nothing to lose from having a dialogue with us. With that, we’ve managed to initialize a discussion with the opposition concerning these issues. Since our proposals does not, in any way, clash with the basic values of neither the left wing nor the right wing block, and since they are good proposals, objectively, for Sweden, there is no reason to believe that they would prefer to stay grumpy for the next four years instead of making a deal with us.

But until they have done so, we will consistently vote with their opponents (i.e. the government that we support even if we think they are no good). That way the opposition will have an even bigger reason to strike a deal with us, even more so than if we voted without a clear direction. The more votes the opposition loses concerning health care / education / taxes / disbanding of military units, the more eager they will become to have a change of government.

The government that is in power even though we think they’re no good will perhaps feel happy to be able to carry through whatever they want without giving us anything in return. But they will know that all it takes for them to lose office is one word from the opposition. So the joy they’re feeling will hardly be very deep or long lasting.

The point of helping a government to form even if none of the players gives us what we want is that we want to add to stablity and let things calm down a bit. One can’t postpone negotiations about the government more than a couple of weeks after the election. If we can’t have a government that we want because it promises to see our points and work for them, it’s still better to help a government we don’t like. The country needs a government.

Parliamentarism is such an ingenious system because the parliament can throw out the government in office whenever a majority of its members wish. The leader of the opposition will know this, no matter if his name is Persson or Reinfeldt. So why would he not talk to us to see if he can create a majority for a vote of no confidence? And why would he not meet our demands when he has had time to think about them, and realize that they do not oppose his own ideology or any core party issues in any way?

If we make it to the parliament, but can not tip the scale
Even if we would not reach a position where we can tip the scale, we can still do a lot of good in the standing committees. Much of the malfunctioning legislation that is voted through is often voted through because the established parties do not understand the Internet and all the new technology. They have not thought through the consequences of building a controlled society to conserve the old instead of embracing the possibilities we have in our time.

They often blindly trust what lobbyists and civil servants at the departments tell them to think. They do not see these issues as important enough to put down time getting an informed opinion.

We can hopefully change this, simply by being part of the committees, pressing the fact that these are important issues. Neither social democrats nor moderates really want to make it illegal for small businesses to develop new software, after all, or put all Swedish youths in prison. The fact that they still make or argue for laws that has these consequences is mostly due to lack of knowledge. We can supply the standing committees with a well needed competence and a valuable perspective.

- If we can’t tip the scale, will we try to negotiate about individual issues?

In this scenario, negotiations will hardly be our most important tool, simply because we wouldn’t have much of a negotiation position. If they can create a majority without us, they won’t need to negotiate with us at all.

But this does not mean that all would be lost. We could still add a lot, simply by being constructive in our committee work. Much of the worst legislation is due to the fact that the established parties lack knowledge and interest in our issues.

- …or will we simply cancel our votes?

In a situation where there is a parliamentary majority without us, it wouldn’t matter how we voted, and then it doesn’t make a difference. The simplest thing would be to simply not vote.

- …or do we present bills that are promptly turned down?

We might want to present bills as part of our work to clarify the choices our society has, but the purpose then would only be to raise these issues. We would probably have to spend more time discussing the pros and cons of the bills that are about to be clubbed.

- …or should we simply stay home with our kids?

Participating in the committees in a constructive manner aside, there will be much work to be done on the European level. Some of the decisions we want carried through can only be made in Brussels. Therefore we have all reason to do what we can to support our sister parties in other countries, and help them get started. So there might not be much time for vacation, even if we don’t get to support a government.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

In this documentary you’ll hear it straight from the Piratebay admins. How the raid went down, what happened after the raid, how the MPAA was involved, how the US had threatened to put Sweden on WTO’s black list, the Pirate demonstration, and how they were harassed by police officers and more.

But there’s more, there are comments on filesharing and copyright issues in general by the Piratbyran staff, from a healthy viewpoint obviously.

A must see, if you want to know more about the background of the piratebay raid. You might also want to read this post if you’re interested in how the raid changed Sweden.

On stealthisfilm.com we read:

We wanted to make a film that would explore this huge popular movement in a way that exited us, engaged us, and most importantly, focused on what we know to be the positive, and optimistic vision many filesharers and artists (they are often one) have for the future of creativity.

There are several versions of the film available (Ipod, DVD). You can download (steal) it over here, via BitTorrent of course

StealThisFilm

The download speeds was OK ;)

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Prior to this year’s festival, the online community connected to Sweden’s largest gay movement magazine, QX, started a project where members could put the logo of the party they supported on their presentation. A bit surprising to many, the party with the most logos on presentations was not the Social Democrats, who has ruled Sweden almost without stop from the beginning of the 20th century. Nor the largest opposition party, the Moderates. But it was the Pirate Party. Around 20% of all presentations with logos had the Pirate party logo.

The Pirate Party had decided long ago to participate in the festival, but this was even more a reason. So, they rented a spot on the festival area and put up a tent, where they handed out information folders, flyers, sold t-shirts and other stuff. The reaction was, according to the party members present, very positive. Many parties were critized because they show up on the Pride festival with tailor made material and voicing policies specific to the gay, bi and transsexual community, to portray themselves as the most “gay friendly” for the elections. Many representatives of the gay community have argued that this makes them feel like voters and not a group needing the support of these parties.

The Pirate Party, however, openly said to everyone that they have no points related to the gay, bi and transsexual community interests. Instead, they claimed that their aims to change copyright legislation, guard privacy and patent opposition are questions that benefit everyone, regardless of such things as sexuality. Many of the visitors to the Pirate Party tent liked this attitude,. The Pirate Party claims that every individual has the need to have their privacy defended. The gay community, who has often been subjected to oppression, threats and violence, understands this need for privacy. If the Pirate Party had a slogan on the festival, it would have been, ‘Being gay, bi or transsexual should not be an issue. But no one should be forced to declare their sexuality either, should they choose not to.’

The aftermath, rounded up on a Pirate Party meeting I attended this thursday, was alot of positive reactions, probably a bunch of votes, public goodwill and alot of sold t-shirts and baseball caps.

posted by Mathias

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The term was coined by tech pioneer and journalist Oscar Swartz (founder of Swedish ISP Bahnhof) in a blog article from December 15, 2005, called “Bodströmsamhället pÃ¥ väg: Europaparlamentet sa ja.” (“The Bodström Society is on its way: the European parliament said yes”).

From now on I will use the term ‘Bodström society’ instead of “Big Brother society” or similar terms. His visions are infernal and consistent and are aimed at communications being saved, so that authorities can later check it out. Yes, the ideal would be that all operators simply upload their data to a central data base where authorities can lurk around, instead of requesting the data from the operators. And they will also have far reaching possibilities to bug – even against individuals not suspected of a crime. He also suggests that authorities are going to be able to secretly install keyboard loggers, troyans and other stuff on people’s computers. Sure, it’s to fight crime. But all this is very explicitly motivated with the argument of making crime investigations more ‘efficient’.

Swedish wikipedia says this about the Bodström society: “What differs the Bodström society from other forms of Big Brother systems is the fact that Thomas Bodström is working in a time where communications over the Internet has just received a central position, and that the government that Bodström is part of is participating in the US war on terrorism. The latter fact is a breach against the former social democratic standing doctrine that is taking a distance to the US foreign agenda.” (Source) There is alot of criticism against the US policies on domestic self defense post 9-11, such as the Patriot act and various implementations, as well as other things that leads to monitoring and control, both internally and externally. The same thing is true about the British policies. British policies are often described in Swedish debate as a mix between tender nursing of the population, combined with sometimes harsh methods of discipline, as well as a more and more far-reaching control over what people are doing, in order to protect the population from itself and others. Much of this is of course due to the aftermath of the July 2005 terror attacks.

When Sweden is moving towards more monitoring despite the lack of terror attempts – a strict policy of neutrality almost as dogmatic as the one of Switzerland kept Sweden outside the battles of WWII as well as the Cold War – many seek other explanations. One often described is a ‘follow your leader’ tendency, Sweden is by many perceived as politically moving towards the US and the UK, and major trends in said countries will have a large impact on other Western countries. Sweden is not exception here. Sweden is also a part of the European Union, and if the European Union walks in one direction, Sweden will follow it.

But there are also those that claim that Sweden is not only walking in the same direction as the European Union is walking. They point out that Sweden in many apects is leading taking charge in pointing the direction out.

In June, 2006, Oscar Swartz, the person to have coined the term, published a report named “Marschen mot Bodströmsamhället – Hur justitieministerns dubbelspel hotar vÃ¥ra grundlagsfästa fri- och rättigheter.” (The March towards the Bodström society – How the double-dealings of the minister of justice is threatening our basic freedoms and rights). The report has spun alot of attention in the Swedish blogosphere, has inspired various Swedish groups, such as the journalist trade union, to challenge tendencies in government property, and has given a strong reference collection for those that criticize the government for going towards more monitoring. It can be downloaded in PDF if you read Swedish.

The report concentrates on propositions and government documents concerning the storing and monitoring of communications, primarily on the Internet and through telephones. He points to an evident double-dealing of the minister, where the minister is one of those that are the most aggressive on making the European Union when it comes to carrying through a more far-reaching monitoring legislation, while domestically, said changes is made out to be implemented because Sweden has accepted European legislation, not because he wants it to be that way. The report goes so far as to accuse Bodström of outright lying to parliamentary committees on how he is working in the European council of ministers. At the same time, more subtle changes is made in Swedish law: the European legislation makes it possible to monitor suspects of serious crime, and Swedish legislation is tampered so that more and more people are included in ‘suspects of serious crime’ – and more and more can be done against people ‘related to’ or ‘involved with’ or ‘associated with’ people suspected of these wider and wider definition of serious crime.

In conclusion, Swartz demands that Bodström is brought before the Committee on Constitution, the executive committee of the Swedish parliament that checks to see if decicions and actions of the government are in accordance with the Swedish constitution. When the report was presented, at least one MP was present, who promised to work to this end.

The term Bodström-samhälle was established well before this report was published. The picture below has been seen on more and more Swedish blogs. The text says, ‘Democracy and terrorism is not compatible. Let us therefore abolish democracy.’

But with this report, critics of the current course of Swedish society towards Orwellian heights have now got a black on white arsenal of arguments and facts to use in debates. What will become of the demands to put Bodström before a committee is yet to be seen.

And what of the legislation carried through in Sweden, is it that serious? Well, if all would be carried through, it would be quite possible to install keyboard loggers and bugs on your computer, if a friend of the family was ever suspected of a serious crime – and remember, more and more crimes are being turned into ‘serious’. When the Pirate Bay was raided, their judicial advisor was forced to leave a DNA sample, even if it had no apparent significance to the investigation.

On my personal blog, Piracy Unlimited, I once made a compilation of laws, proposed laws and laws suggested for future installment, that has our Justice Minister as originator or advocate. Unfortunately, since I wrote it on June 19, there have been some additions to it.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

There are rumours that the Swedish government was indirectly acting on behalf of the U.S. MPAA in shutting down the site. Do you feel that your government is beholden to U.S. interests?

Oh, the MPAA said so themselves in a press release, it’s more than a rumor. Check their press release “Swedish authorities sink Pirate Bay”.

And yes, this particular fact has caused something of an uproar in Sweden. It’s widely believed that Swedish authorities were more or less ordered by a foreign power to act forcefully against an entity that was in, at worst, a legal gray area according to Swedish law.

The raid must have boosted your recognition. How many members do you currently have, and how successful has your fundraising effort been so far?

Our member count is at 6540, no, 6541, no wait, 6543… well, you get the picture. Our members register themselves on our website after paying the membership fee electronically, which helps reduce our admin load considerably.

Fundraising brought in 108,000 SEK (approx. 14,700 USD or 11,600 EUR), enough to buy 3 million ballots, which is some kind of at-least-we’re-not-starving minimum. We’re not full, but we’re not starving, either. Following the raid on the Pirate Bay, we have received another 50K in donations. My sincere thanks to everybody who wants to help out; we are now looking into getting more ballots to make sure we don’t run out on election day. (10 million ballots was our initial full-score aim.)

Do you think you will be able to cover future expenses such as radio and television ads?

Following the raid on the Pirate Bay, and our tripling of the member roster, we don’t need advertising. :-) We’ve been mentioned almost every news hour across all channels on national television in the last week.

Also, the established parties have now started to turn, following our success. Parties representing almost half of the elected parliament are now describing today’s copyright situation as not working. They still don’t understand why, though, they are just echoing what we say without understanding what the words mean. We’ll get around to teaching them – them and the voters alike.

This might be hard for people not following the Swedish media to grasp, but we have made a big splash. Today, our Minister of Justice was quoted as saying that he’s open to changes to copyright laws that would make file-sharing legal, with the headline “Bodström (his name) flip-flops about file sharing.” Immediately underneath were the Pirate Party’s comments to his suggestions. Let’s take that again: when a minister makes a statement about file sharing, media calls us for comments, and publishes them next to that statement. That’s how big we have become since the raid on the Pirate Bay.

The Minister of Justice later denied having made that statement to the press that reported it.

We will never be able to pay for television ads, the way I see it. Unless a very wealthy donor comes on stage. (If any such person is reading this, we have planned how to spend up to $375,000 in a cost-efficient way up until the elections, on the chance that donations appear. That spending does still not include any TV ads.)

Are you aware of similar initiatives in other countries?

Some are trying, but none have achieved the necessary momentum and critical mass that we have. We expect that momentum to happen once we get into Swedish Parliament and show that it can be done.

(The US Pirate Party lauched two weeks ago)

The name “Pirate Party” seems to identify the party with what is currently defined as a crime: piracy of software, movies, music, and so on. Will a name like “Pirate Party” not antagonize voters, given that the label is so negatively used? How about potential allies abroad who argue for a more balanced copyright regime, such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation or Creative Commons?

Oh, it is a crime. That’s the heart of the problem! The very problem is that something that 20% of the voters are doing is illegal by punishment of jail time. That’s what we want to change. Where the established parties are saying that the voters are broken, we are saying it’s the law that is broken.

Besides, it’s a way of reclaiming a word. The media conglomerates have been pointing at us and calling us pirates, trying to make us somehow feel shame. It doesn’t work. We wear clothes saying “PIRATE” in bright colors out on the streets. Yes, we are pirates, and we’re proud of it, too.

Also, the term is not that negative at all in Sweden, much thanks to the awesome footwork of the Pirate Bureau (Piratbyrån), who have been working since 2003 to educate the public.

If you are elected, and have the opportunity to become part of the next government of Sweden, do you intend to focus only on the issues in your platform (IP law and privacy)?

Our current plan is to support the government from the parliament, but not be part of it. If we’re part of it, that means we get a vested interest to not overthrow it, which puts us in a weaker position if they start going against our interests.

Overall, our strategy is to achieve the balance of power, where both the left and right blocks need our votes to achieve a majority, and then support the issues of whichever government that agrees to drive our issues the strongest. Basically, we sell our votes on other issues to the highest bidder in exchange for them driving ours.

Have you already made any contacts in Swedish politics?

Contacts… I’m not sure what you mean. Several of us have been shaking hands with some of the established politicians, particularly in the youth leagues, if that’s what you mean.

I was thinking along the lines of exploring possible modes of cooperation with established political parties , are you already taken seriously?

We are taken seriously by most of the youth leagues and by at least one of the represented parties. In particular, which is what counts, we are now taken seriously by national media. However, we can’t tie contacts that explore modes of cooperation quite yet , since our strategy depends on holding the balance of power, we need to not express a preference for whom we’d like to cooperate with, or we’d put ourselves in a weaker bargaining position.

What is your position on moral rights, as recognized by European Union copyright laws: the right of attribution, the right to have a work published anonymously or pseudonymously, and the right to the integrity of the work. Do you think these rights should be preserved?

We safeguard the right to attribution very strongly. After all, what we are fighting for is the intent of copyright as it is described in the US constitution: the promotion of culture. Many artists are using recognition as their primary driving force to create culture.

Publishing anonymously or pseudonymously happens every day on the Internet, so no big deal there either.

The right to integrity, however, is an interesting issue. We state that we are for free sampling, meaning you can take a sound that I made for my tune and use it in your own tunes, or for that matter, a whole phrase. That’s partially in line with today’s copyright law on derivative works; as long as you add your own creative touch to a work, you get your own protection for the derivation. We want to strengthen that right.

You might want to consider the alternative. In the 50s and 60s, a lot of rock and roll bands started doing covers of old classical music. This would almost certainly have been considered to violate the integrity of the original artist – and was considered to do so by many – but in the eyes of many others, it was instead great new culture of a previously unseen form and shape.

So I don’t have a definite answer on the integrity issue. While I am leaning towards the promotion of new culture taking precedence over a limitation right, there may be unconsidered cases.

Do you feel that trademark law is adequate as it is?

Yes. We have not seen any hidden costs to trademarks that outweigh the benefits of reducing transaction costs on a market where seller and buyer are not personally acquainted.

How do you intend to deal with EU treaties which define certain legal frameworks for the protection of intellectual works?

What can they do? Fine us? Send us an angry letter?

Come on, countries need to think more like corporations. If the fine is less than the cost to society, which it is in this case, then the right thing to do is to accept the fine with a polite “thank you”.

Actually, national media just called me about this very question; the Department of Justice has stated that we can’t allow file sharing, as it would break international treaties. My response was that it is more important to not have 1.2 million Swedes criminalized, than it is to avoid paying a penalty fee.

Do you think that weaker intellectual property laws would lessen the amount of products released in Sweden by foreign companies, such as Hollywood studios?

As long as they believe that they will have a revenue here that exceeds the cost of operations, they will keep coming here. Anything else would be wrong from a corporate standpoint.

Besides, you need to remember what we are doing is to change the map according to what reality looks like. We do not want to change people’s behavior. We want to change the law so it reflects what the world actually looks like.

So, as they apparently make a profit today, I expect that to continue.

Do you feel that the music industry in its current form will still be needed in a world where non-commercial copying is permitted?

It’s not so much if they are needed where non-commercial copying is permitted, rather if they are needed when they’re not necessary any more to be the middle man between consumer and artist.

The music industry will lose its current chokepoint, because they don’t add any value to the end product any longer. They will probably survive as a service bureau for artists, but they will not be able to control distribution.

It’s actually quite simple: if they get their act together and provide a service that people want to buy, they will remain. If not, they will vanish. Today, they have legislated that people must buy their service regardless of whether it adds value or not, and that’s not gonna hold in the long term.

Why fight against intellectual property laws, instead of focusing your energy on creating freely licensed content, such as Creative Commons films or open source software?

I want to raise the issue a level, to show that it’s not about payment models or what level of control the copyright holder chooses to exert over his or her work.

Let me put it this way: we have achieved the techical possibility of sending copyrighted works in digital, private communications. I can send a piece of music in e-mail to you, I can drop a video clip in a chat room. That technology is not going away, leaving us with two choices.

So , if copyright is to be enforced , if you are to tax, prohibit, fee, fine, or otherwise hinder the transmission of copyrighted works in private communications, the only way to achieve that is to have all private communications constantly monitored. It’s really that large.

Also, this is partly nothing new. We’ve been able to do this since the advent of the Xerox copier – you could photocopy a poem or a painting and put it in a letter in the mail. Again, the only way to discover or stop that would have been for the authorities to open all letters and check their content.

So we’re at a crossroads here. Either we, as a society, decide that copyright is the greater value to society, and take active steps to give up private communications as a concept. Either that, or we decide that the ability to communicate in private, without constant monitoring by authorities, has the greater value – in which case copyright will have to give way.

My choice is clear.

The Pirate Bay was shut down and re-opened days later on a Dutch server. According to a Swedish newspaper report, traffic has doubled since then. How long do you think the cat and mouse game will continue?

Until one of two things happen: The authorities realize they can’t enforce laws that require monitoring all private communications, especially given the large international level of grassroots support, or [they] actually start monitoring all private communications.

Original article can be found at Wikinews

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Lars Ilshammar, an information-technology historian who recently suggested Sweden to impose a fee similar to the one proposed in France said to the IHT:

“The process for change has now begun in Sweden, but it’s clear that this problem cannot be solved by one country alone,” said “More countries have to come out of the closet.”

One thing is for sure. Things will, and must change. Don’t expect that the copyright restrictions will disappear, but we will definitely need more “rights” to copy. It almost seems like the easier it gets to share things, the harder the restrictions get. I mean, come on, how insane are those people if they request to take down clips of children dancing on their favorite song on youtube or google video? Uma Suthersanen, a professor of international copyright law at Queen Mary, a college at the University of London sums it up quite nice:

“The way it works now, it is a little as if you give the consumer a lollipop, and then smack them over their heads, saying that they can’t use what they’ve bought,”

Go Pirates.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Over 75 percent of those asked said it was OK to download illegally from the Internet, said the survey.

These figures indicate that the Swedish Pirate Party (piratpartiet), may collect a significant number of votes.

The survey was conducted a week before the Piratebay raid and the pro-piracy demonstration, and it’s likely that filesharing got even more popular after that.

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Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

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Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.