Swedish Pirate Party: A Critical Examination

(This is a translation of a blog entry in Swedish from June 14th, which was the hitherto most read article since the blog started in 2003.)

Now that the Swedish Pirate Party has got their 7 percent of the voters in the Swedish election for the European Parliament, I suppose it is time to write something about their goal, as it is presented in the party program.

Apparently, the party toned down its agitation in the file sharing issue before the election, and focused on the topic of personal integrity and privacy. This was probably, from their point of view, a good strategy. Otherwise, the party would probably to a much larger extent than now have been associated with selfish people who just want to safeguard their free-of-charge access to entertainment. What they say in privacy issues is much easier to agree with, even if not everything on this point is opposition-free either.

Annons

What has copyright to do with democracy?

In view of recent debates, not the least those in Sweden, I wrote this article about the democratic aspects of copyright legislation:

Abstract: The debates on whether or not copyright and democracy are compatible concepts are not new. It has been discussed since the 1700s and concerns a form of separation of powers. Copyright is a monopoly, but at the same time, when copyright came, it was a strike at another form of monopoly, the printers’ rights, with their roots in the guild system. Copyright could not occur until censorship was abolished, and it can actually be seen as a complement to the freedom of expression. Copyright was early associated with privacy issues. However, if proportionality is not followed in the maintenance of law, both integrity and freedom of expression could be threatened.

This text is part of the annual book ”For or Against the Citizenry: Power sharing”, which is published for the third time by the democracy study group D2D. The book is in Swedish, with short summaries in English. It is available free of charge on the web.

Read the whole article at:
http://www.nisus.se/archive/090525e.html

Pingad på Intressant.