Pirates join the European Parliament

It's just a shame that the Pirate Party wasn't fully established in the UK otherwise they would have got my vote. I like their stance on no-software patients mongst other things including support of Free Software. Unless the Free Software Foundation start a political party the Pirate Party UK may well get my vote next time.

Rob

I hope this victory will be the first step in the direction of a world without MAFIAA. Now people know that there is hope against "big brother" police on the internet.
You can expect growth in pirate parties around the world...
Sweden led the way!

I would also have voted for the UK PP, all is not lost: considering how well PP has done in other countries should be an impetus for UK people to get their act together.

Thank heavens the citizenry is fighting back over the copyright debacle.

I'm not against copyright law, people are owed dues for effort but what's happened in recent times is simply outrageous--copyright has become absurdly tight.

The Berne Convention [1886] snuck in at a time when the citizenry could barely communicate across borders, so those with power and influence, Victor Hugo and cronies, had the means to get this international agreement put in place essentially without opposition.

Since then, it's been downhill all the way for consumers of copyrighted materials. 'Fair use' is a joke, orphaned works--who nobody really owns--are copyrighted almost indefinitely, copyright duration is outrageous--70 years after the death of the author, and on it goes.

For example, say a World War l soldier took photos of the War in 1916 and he eventually died in 1990, this means the photo wouldn't enter the public domain until 2060! That's 144 years after the event. Don't think this is an odd scenario, it isn't; the Australian War Memorial in a recent submission to the Australian Government over copyright raised similar issues regarding the publication of WW-l soldier's wartime correspondence. Unlike the soldier, this copyright problem is alive and well.

Clearly, this level of copyright is absurd.

There are many other issues too, for starters, copyright holders get the knowledge for their craft from the society that they come from, they're educated, often at state expense, they absorb the culture, they use the country's resources etc. etc.--in short, they are a product of that society and culture, and that society has some call on the output of that investment but NOT ALL of it.
(Essentially, copyright holders, by virtue of their position, morally have some due to payback to that society.)

However, existing copyright laws worldwide, give TOTAL exclusive rights to the copyright holder to with what he wants. Berne was responsible for this stuff-up, Berne has given him/her a far too bigger slice of the cake. Yes, he/she's owed some of it but not all.

The real debate in the 21st Century will be to see how much can be lopped of the 19th Century's decision yet still be fair to both sides.

I hope Pirate Bay help rather than hinder this process. They're in a marvellous position to do so.

Four of the companies that started all this in Sweden are Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Bros, EMI and Columbia Pictures. Maybe people start voting with their feet now. Are we still going to buy their stuff? Go to their movies? There are perfectly legal ways to cut their revenue stream. If we just ignore them.

And remember: Sony is the one spreading malware on DVDs. No one went to jail for that. Yet.

Meanwhile, if we buy anything, the new slogan is

"It's NOT a Sony!"

Do they have staying power? Once the trial is over, will people STAY interested enough to vote for them again and again? The only way to achieve long term change in government is to stick around for a while.

So we now have one Pirate amongst 10,000 robbing corrupt bastards.

Whats the big deal?!

Look, unrestrained piracy is the worst possible solution - it just means nobody who is creative will be able to fund their work anymore, and all that will remain is super-cheap-and-trashy reality TV.

Sometimes it feels like most of the younger generation seems to have lost track of this, and think everything should be free... but really it's themselves they're shooting in the foot there, by closing off potential future jobs for themselves and their children.

Bah, if the alternative to unrestrained piracy is that "big brother" monitors and controls every part of our lives, then I'll take unrestrained piracy every time.

Btw, people that are truly talented will still make plenty of money, because people will still come to see their performance and buy their original creations. However, it will definitely cut out most of the middlemen parasites that exist right now, the ones that are also trying to curtail the general publics freedom.

And your threat that "nothing creative" will be made anymore, just shows you have no understanding of what truly creative is. Real artists are driven to create whether they have an audience or get paid. Only the sham artists will be driven from the business, you know the ones that create those 200 million dollar piles of stinking crap they call movies these days.

That is all.

Honestly I would say this is the ultimate proof of just how broken copywrite law is these days. Would you believe that copywrite was originally designed to protect peoples rights to copy things, not to sue them for over 1000x times the value lost due to piracy?

Anyway the piracy problem is no where near the finacial drain the industries have always claimed it to be. I don't say this blindly either, there have been many, many major studies over the years that support this statement. Hell if I remember correctly there was a study published by one of the University of North Carolina business schools in conjunction with the Harvard business school during the glory days of Napster which stated that in order to effect the sales of a cd by one copy it would have to be downloaded in it's entirety over 10,000 times. In otherwords even if a cd was downloaded 10 million times it would still only have effected that CD's sales by 1,000 copies which is nothing for a major band release. Even if I'm remembering drastically wrong and it was only 100 to 1 ratio that's still barely anything. Proof of point Green Day's last album sold over 7.7 million worldwide so in order to effect it's sales by even 10% assuming the lessor 100 to 1 ratio of illegal downloads to CD's sold means it would have to be downloaded close to 800 million times. To put that into perspective that means in order to effect the sales of that album by 10% pretty much every man, woman and child in all of europe, 11% of the worlds population, would have had to have downloaded a copy. Kinda frightening numbers when you think about it cause that means that in order to wipe out that album's sales completely 100% of the worlds population would have had to download it and 10% would have had to have downloaded it twice.

Also if you're an avid reader of the inquirer you probably would have read the recent story about a poll conducted by the makers of one of the more popular torrent programs which indicated that filesharers actually buy more then non-filesharers because they get a chance to find out if they like something before shelling out the money for it, a very popular idea given the economy these days.

Registure Yourselves in Whos,Who,,,,North America. Be Big & BOLD. UnderLine Bunch of Stuff,Too.

its Here:

http://www.montclairwhoswho.com/nomination/executives.html?sc=ELBGED

The populace wants to be numbed by the imperialist capitalist media illusions.
And; They want it for FREE !

What freedoom is it in that, the purple color of the pirates is red on the outside but blue within.

I find it funny how people rationalize stealing.

If people were stealing each other's cars I have a feeling the general consensus on this would be a bit different.

Yes the RIAA is being overzealous but copyright laws are in the public's interest.

"Btw, people that are truly talented will still make plenty of money, because people will still come to see their performance and buy their original creations. However, it will definitely cut out most of the middlemen parasites that exist right now, the ones that are also trying to curtail the general publics freedom."

Maybe in Bizaro-world this would work out. Concerts aren't the huge money makers for the artists you'd think they might be, with some exceptions. I went to college with the daughter of a concert promoter and a close friend of mine works in the stage lighting and sound industry. Don't think the artists themselves will put it together themselves. Putting on a couple major concerts per year is a full time job. The logistics are ridiculous. Concerts are generally in support of Albums for a reason.

A big act like U2 or The Rolling Stones may pull in several hundred thousand fans per tour. Smaller acts may sell that many CDs if they're lucky. After the expense of a tour, the logistics, etc, the real money comes from increased CD sales and the sales of a live album if applicable. It's basically word of mouth advertising and a lot of radio/advertising hype, and a good chance to introduce new talent to the industry (the opening acts), wrapped up into a somewhat profitable venture.

The idea that their "original works" will make them money is funny considering they'll just get tormented to death.

If copyright laws are torn down, the only music you'll see will be one off albums done as labors of love, media sponsored acts like Hannah Montana (with the only money coming from TV shows and Movies), and musicians with paypal donation links on their website.

I live in Hollywood, I see these guys struggling to get anywhere, not knowing where their next paycheck comes from. Even the ones with record deals may make 10% royalty. Its NOT easy for me to pirate music because I get to look at these guys in the face on a weekly basis. I've seen guys sell 1000 copies of a CD only to see their sales die because it ended up on a file sharing site. Everyone has this idea that you're taking a couple bucks away from Michael Jackson. If that was only the case, it probably wouldn't be an issue.

If you guys hate the RIAA so much, support Indie labels or ask your legislatures to probe into the low royalties these guys are being paid. But most of all, if you guys really care about anything besides a free lunch, STOP PIRATING MUSIC.