

US government dictates Swedish copyright laws - moeffju
http://falkvinge.net/2011/09/05/cable-reveals-extent-of-lapdoggery-from-swedish-govt-on-copyright-monopoly

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morganpyne
Unfortunately, this scenario is being played out all over the world. We had
similar revelations in New Zealand a while ago.
<http://www.nzcs.org.nz/newsletter/article/119>

It's disgusting, but not surprising. US has been desperately attempting to
export it's draconian grip on copyright to the rest of the world at all costs
for quite a while now.

~~~
kragen
A lot of these changes actually go beyond what the copyright industry has been
able to do in the US. There's no data retention provision in the US, for
example.

~~~
pasbesoin
I think some of this is a two part play against domestic policies. Bully
foreign interests to implement, and then push the same policies domestically,
using the foreign implementations as part of the argument. ("Compliance",
"even they're doing it", "parity", "protect domestic interests", etc....)

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duncan_bayne
This is just one of the reasons I got out of politics several years ago.
Simply put, things don't work the way most people think they do.

Policies are decided behind closed doors, by people with vested interests, and
then presented to the public - who are by and large uninterested, uninformed,
insufficiently educated and unwilling to consider anything but their immediate
short-term interests.

As Mark Twain is supposed to have said, "If voting changed anything,they'd
make it illegal."

~~~
gwright
Thus the interest that many of us have in reducing the size of government and
in general the concept of _limited_ government. Unfortunately the general
direction seems to be in increasing the size of government and the rationale
seems to be 'so it can fix everything'.

~~~
winestock
Bless your heart, I truly and sincerely sympathize with the concept of limited
government, no joke. However, limited government is to political science what
perpetual motion machines are to physics.

Whatever body limits the government is itself sovereign. What limits that
body? Are written constitutions supposed to limit the power of government? Who
implements those provisions if not the government?

The concept of limited government, as it is typically expressed today, had its
origins in the Enlightenment. It was all the rage among the cool people in the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. That idea deeply influenced the
constitutions of nearly every nation in the West. Look around. All of those
nations now have large and growing governments. The idea of limiting the scope
and reach of government by popular will or by written charter has had a track
record of perfect failure.

A government of limited and specifically enumerated powers is too weak to
resist pressure to make it larger. The best way to get big government is to
start with a small government.

The way out of this is to think sideways.

~~~
StavrosK
I had an idea yesterday, it was, basically, crowdsourced politicians. You'd
have a number of politicians, as many as you could get elected in parliament,
and you would have a website detailing every law currently under vote. Anyone
could vote on these laws on the website, and the politician(s) would all have
to vote the way the online poll went.

Of course, this is ripe for abuse and corruption (one website controlling an
entire country), but interesting idea nonetheless.

~~~
markokocic
Why do you need politicians then? Why not just let people vote directly?

~~~
buro9
That's the idea I've been having recently.

Would it be possible to build a party with the sole intent on producing
transparent government and the eventual ability to open all debate to the
public via the internet.

In essence, the reason for representatives is that historically people could
not take the time out of work to participate in a debate. Even more so if this
meant travelling to a debate.

You're supposed to debate locally, and have your representative go represent
your area, but what really happens is that your rep is party of a party and
the party agree a line and they vote regardless of local voices.

So... if voting was open on all debates for the people to partake in... what's
the worst that could happen? Where would it fall down?

Initially I think security issues would be interesting, could they be open and
transparent?

And everyone would initially vote for NIMBY policies, so it would grind a lot
of stuff to a halt.

The big question, are people able to think of big things that benefit the
whole of society even at the cost of them as individuals.

But then, that's the crux of a lot of political issues.

~~~
narcissus
I read once that originally, politicians were not paid by the government.
Their only form of income was from the people that that person represented: if
the constituents believed that the politician did a good job representing
them, then it was up to the individual people to pay that politician what they
believed s/he was worth.

I guess the idea was that if you don't do a good job, you don't get paid. On
the other hand, if you don't pay the representative fairly, then they won't
run the following year. "You get what you pay for".

Would this work in the grand scheme of things these days? I always think that
there are too many 'key people' and too many companies with so much financial
clout that the money they give would overshadow what the constituents would
pay privately. The one saving grace there, I guess, is that at the end of the
day, the person still needs to be voted back in...

~~~
tsycho
Government salary is not necessarily their main source of income...

* They often own businesses, which often benefit significantly from government contracts * Direct or indirect kickbacks from other business owners/lobbyists in return for more favorable legislation

~~~
narcissus
That's a good point about them owning their own businesses: I guess it didn't
matter so much back when the majority were farmers and landholders.

Kickbacks etc. are going to be a problem no matter _how_ they are 'officially'
paid. This comes back to voters paying attention and caring, I guess, so...

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CWuestefeld
Leading off with a hyperbolic statement like "every law proposal, every
ordinance, and every governmental report hostile to the net, youth, and civil
liberties here in Sweden in recent years have been commissioned by the US
government and industry interests." -- I can only take the whole thing with a
grain of salt.

I'm quite willing to believe that the US government exerts a large influence.
I'm absolutely unwilling to believe that the Swedes are angels, and never do
anything wrong on their own; that _every_ problem in Sweden is a self-
inflicted wound as directed by America.

~~~
danssig
Why would Sweden be making laws to protect _US_ IP? Why would they care?

~~~
tokenadult
_Why would Sweden be making laws to protect US IP?_

International treaty obligations, negotiated on the basis of some advantage
perceived for Sweden. A lot of what countries do in law enforcement protects
the nationals of other countries or protects the interests of another
sovereign state. The usual reason for that is mutually negotiated agreements.

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dhughes
If any other country even thought of doing such a thing the USA would be
claiming it was an attack on its sovereignty and declare war.

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user9756
I wonder if there is a country on this planet independent from US policy? I
wonder how such a state would be portrayed by the "free" media...

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jtwb
Why? What does the US have to offer to Sweden in return for implementing this
legislation by their design?

~~~
dexy
The US wields all kinds of influence over a nation like Sweden. If the US
raised a few barriers to trade with Sweden, it would have a drastic effect on
Sweden's economy. Many Swedish industries depend on exporting to the US, and
while US citizens could just import similar goods from elsewhere if Swedish
goods became more expensive, Swedish businesses would lose a gigantic and
wealthy market that they depend on selling to.

I'm sure that Sweden depends on the US as a military ally as well, it provides
visas for many Swedish citizens regularly, and much more. At the end of the
day, Sweden just needs the US more than the US needs Sweden, and that's why
the US can argue from a position of power for its own industries.

~~~
burgerbrain
I think Sweden might overestimate their dependence on the US. The military
threat to Sweden is currently rather low, (and there's always the rest of
NATO).

Countries just need to all agree to start ignoring the US. I bet doing so
would be a positive gain for economies in the long run.

~~~
chc
Ignoring the US effectively means shutting yourself off from the global
culture, because like it or not, America's entertainment industries are the
biggest in the world. American movies play everywhere. American music is heard
everywhere. Last I heard, America is about half of the video and computer
games industry. And even the Internet is dominated by America unless you're
Chinese or somewhere similarly insular (this site you're on right now?
American).

Some examples of things you'll have to boycott to truly ignore America:

• Google

• Bing

• Blekko

• DuckDuckGo

• Facebook

• Macs

• Windows

• iPhone

• iPad

• Android

• MS Office

• Photoshop

• MySQL

• Java

• C#

• Red Hat

• Firefox

• Chrome

• IE

• Safari

• iTunes

• Final Cut

• Premiere

• Avid

• ProTools

• Logic

~~~
Too
> MySQL

Actually, Mysql is Swedish :P

~~~
chc
No, Oracle is definitely American.

~~~
forza
...and MySQL is definitely open source.

