Despite claims by the ignorant that it’s just a ‘one trick pony’, the political movement based on transparency & accountability of government officials; increased personal privacy; and reform of copyright, trademark and patent laws can chalk up yet another country – Norway.

The Norwegian Pirate Party announced its new status in a low-key manner, with a tweet. Now Norwegians nationwide can vote Pirate.

It’s a fast turnaround for a party that only started a serious quest for recognition in July. To do so, they had to collect 5000 signatures by January 1, 2013.

The recognition from the Register in Brønnøysund indicates they made that goal. However, it’s just the first step. In an email to TorrentFreak, the party warned that they still have to organize chapters in all 19 counties, and they hope to do so by the next election on September 9 this year.

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

When it comes to surprises, even among pirate observers, this was certainly one.

The title for the first Pirate in a national parliament was expected to go to the Dutch last month, but didn’t happen. Now, in a two-stage runoff election, the Czech party’s Libor Michálek  has become the first Pirate to be elected to a national government seat.

Michálek is a noted whistle-blower in the Czech Republic, who first came to prominence 16 years ago after criticizing the slow privatization of banks. In 2010 he hit the headlines again after exposing irregularities with the State Environmental Fund, which led to a number of government resignations.

The 44 year-old ran in the Senate elections as a Pirate, with the support of the Green and Christian Democrat parties. In the first round of voting, last week, he managed 24.3%, giving him a spot in this weekend’s run-off election.  Here he dominated getting 74.4% of the votes, and is now Senator for District 26, one of 81 members of that country’s upper house.

While some may decry him as not a ‘proper pirate’ but as a whistle-blower on an anti-government platform, Michálek’s primary affiliation was the Pirate Party, because of their transparency and accountability platforms.

Meanwhile, Rick Falkvinge, Pirate Party founder and TorrentFreak Columnist was also eager to point out another fact which many may overlook – Michálek is the first politician elected under FPTP with credible opponents (while Alex Arnold was also elected Mayor under a FPTP system, he had no serious candidates in opposition) .

Now the only major achievement left for any party to grab, is ‘first to keep their seat at an election’, and you can bet the parties will still compete for that.

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

The membership application, which had the apparent backing of the WIPO Secretary General, was deferred until next year due to concern by some member-countries.

A report from Knowledge Ecology International (KEI) director Jamie Love has stated that the membership application was put off until 2013, apparently at the request of the French, American and Swiss members.

This morning, under agenda item 6, the WIPO General Assemblies decided to defer a decision until 2013 on the application for accreditation by Pirate Parties International. I was told that the US, Switzerland the France raised objections in the informal consultations, and that some other European countries wanted to raise objections, but found it awkward given the recent success of domestic Pirate Parties in national elections. The USA said it asked for a hold on the decision until WIPO could decide if it wanted to accept political parties as WIPO observers. One delegate said European countries were concerned that the Pirate Parties would take “political action” back home when they disagreed with positions taken by the official delegates at the WIPO meetings.

What makes this unusual is the fact that PPI is not itself a political party. It’s an association of parties, but is registered as a Belgian NGO like many other WIPO observer-members.

Thus the American concerns seem to be based on misinformation (but many would say ‘what’s new‘ when it comes to WIPO). Meanwhile the other concerns seem to be equally curious. Many WIPO members have taken political action in response to WIPO proceedings, including leaks of ACTA documents.

The PPI was unaware of the proceedings when TorrentFreak contacted them regarding the KEI notes this morning.

“Unfortunately we didn’t get any notification from WIPO,” Denis Simonet (PPI Board member and the lead on the membership application) told TorrentFreak.

“So we don’t know more than what everyone can read over the Internet. This is surprising because we fulfill all the requirements and the secretary general even recommended acceptance of our application, we’re working on getting more information from WIPO,” he added.

Meanwhile KEI is using the decision for their own political action, highlighting the revolving door between the WIPO and corporate interests, as the US delegate proposed a means to ease access to WIPO delegates and officers for Corporate CEOs; something not planned for public interest or consumer groups.

It is just as well KEI had their membership approved before they too were seen as a significant political threat with their political action really, else we’d never know about things (Like ACTA).

The fear of the pirate movement is clearly growing among entrenched bureaucrats, so while they may not always succeed at the polls, they’ve got some people scared.

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

In a press release today the region’s electoral commission revealed that the pirate group fell short of the 100-member requirement by just 6, after 16 of the 110 names submitted failed checks. As a result the party will not be listed on the ballot for the October 20th election.

The rejection isn’t going to stop the 6-week old state party from running candidates through. Instead of running them as ‘Pirate Party Candidates’, they will be running as unlabeled independents. “The ACT has three electorates,” Glen Takkenberg, the territory’s Registered Officer told TorrentFreak, “and I’d like all Canberrans to have the chance to vote pirate.”

Meanwhile it’s the opposite story in Russia, where attempts to register the Pirate Party were thwarted by the Justice Ministry and backed by a judge who objected to the name. As a result of changes in the law following the December 2011 elections, the Russian Pirate Party was finally allowed to register under its proper name, and did so in an event June 30th.

That also means it’s almost possible to circumnavigate the globe entirely (albeit at 60°N) and stay in countries where the Pirate Party is officially recognised.

Finally, another success in for the Pirates in Italy. Back in April we reported on how a group was attempting to use the Pirate Party name, for an un-Pirate Party purpose. The judge saw through that, and ordered the ‘fake’ Pirate Party group (called pirateparty.it and run by Marco Marsili) to stop, and to refrain from using the name or domains that implied that they represented the Pirate Party.

Marsili appealed and last week the courts affirmed (Italian, translation) their earlier judgement. Any further violations of the name will carry a fine of €500 as well as a €200/day fine for any delay in complying. Signor Marsili was also ordered to pay all costs.

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

The obvious intent was clear – to prevent groups which have the promotion of criminal acts at their core, such as the Pedophile Party, the Kill-all-Jews Collective, or Kidnappers Anonymous – but these are unambiguous terms.

When it comes to the term “Pirate” then there are increasingly two meanings. The first is that of the ‘classic buccaneer’ as famously portrayed by Johnny Depp, and often found acting off the east coast of Africa.

The second is a label more often thrown at someone accused (often wrongly) of sharing a data file.

However, the Russian Government clearly hasn’t heard of the second definition, which is odd when you consider that events surrounding sites like Allofmp3.com became an international issue for them a few years back.

As a result of this name misconception, the name Pirate Party was rejected. Furthermore, the party didn’t get all the formal notices from the Justice Ministry which would enable them to deal with the rest of the paperwork. So, in an attempt to move things on, they sued, and earlier this month, according to the Russian Pirate Party, the Judge ruled that the March rejection counts as the missing paperwork, and they should find another name.

The current frontrunner is Bez nazvaniya (“unnamed”) but other options include “Pirrate Party of Russia” and “Pira7e Party of Russia” according to a blog post by chairman Pavel Rassudov, which ends with the following plea:

I would like to conclude with stating that our principles, ideas and our website remain unchanged. I ask the public, journalists and all reasonable people to continue calling us “Pirate Party of Russia”

Fine by us, Pavel….

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

That meant that for several hours The Pirate Bay, for the first time in many months, was taken offline. An insider at the site told TorrentFreak that people shouldn’t worry, and that the site would soon return.

By start of play this morning that promise had been kept. In most corners of the globe, the world’s most resilient BitTorrent tracker was living up to its name by coming back online with a new and as yet unnamed host.

Now the identity of the site’s ISP has been revealed, and it is a somewhat of a surprising revelation.

“Today, on 18 May, the Swedish Pirate Party took over the delivery of bandwidth to The Pirate Bay,” says the Party’s Rick Falkvinge in a statement.

“We got tired of Hollywood’s cat and mouse game with the Pirate Bay so we decided to offer the site bandwidth,” he adds. “It is time to take the bull by the horns and stand up for what we believe is a legitimate activity.”

The Pirate Party say they will provide bandwidth to the site’s homepage and search engine.

“The Pirate Bay is a search engine, and as such it is not responsible for the results,” notes Falkvinge.

The Party adds the attempts at censoring The Pirate Bay “is an attempt to silence one of today’s most important opinion makers in matters of civil liberties and rights on the web,” adding that it is “nothing less than political censorship, and something that any democratic-minded person must reject.”

With a general election coming up in Sweden, the Pirate Party’s move is also an attempt to reiterate what the Pirate Party stands for.

“It feels great to get an opportunity like this to demonstrate that we put our money were our mouth is,” Falkvinge told TorrentFreak. “We’re not your run-of-the-mill politician who commissions reports and spends 8 hours a day avoiding blame. We’re people committing our own resources and time to the values we believe in.”

“The only thing we have in common with today’s politicians is that you can vote for us, and I hope this demonstrates how we are prepared to take responsibility for civil liberties and the future of the net in a very direct way,” he added.

Meanwhile, a Pirate Bay insider remains vague about the exact location(s) of the Pirate Bay servers, and ensured TorrentFreak that nothing is as it seems. The important thing though, is that the site is fully functional again.

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