

We will host The Pirate Bay inside the Swedish parliament - bigstorm
http://www.piratpartiet.se/nyheter/we_will_host_the_pirate_bay_inside_the_swedish_parliament

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acon
This really makes me question my vote for the pirate party. I really like
them, as a voice for freedom on the internet and beyond, and would really like
them to lay of the pirate propaganda and start preaching the gospel of freedom
instead. Perhaps I bet on the wrong horse all along. Unfortunately I don't
know what the right horse is.

~~~
rick888
"This really makes me question my vote for the pirate party. I really like
them, as a voice for freedom on the internet and beyond, and would really like
them to lay of the pirate propaganda and start preaching the gospel of freedom
instead. Perhaps I bet on the wrong horse all along. Unfortunately I don't
know what the right horse is."

I would vote for them as long as "freedom" doesn't mean the ability of anyone
to download/share commercial software, music, and movies with no legal
consequences.

~~~
zyb09
I don't think piracy is such a bad thing. Imaging there's a gigantic library
that has every music title, movie, TV show, book and software made by man in
their shelfs and everybody has free access. Sounds like a desirable thing.

Now the problem of course arises when content creators don't get paid anymore
and therefore content creation becomes unprofitable or the quality of the
products diminishes. But neither of these things seem to be happening. Not
even in the slightest. Entertainment is booming, movies and games reach new
heights of invest and profit each year and despite having now a generation of
children that probably never bought a music album in there life, Apple will
tell you the music industry is far from dead.

So it actually seems you can have both - a highly profitable digital content
industry, while having said content available for free to everybody.

~~~
pyre
That's kind of missing the point. The content isn't 'free to everybody'
because there is always the spectre of getting caught and sued hanging over
people's heads.

If the authors/content owners themselves said, "Here's this place where you
can get all my content for free, legally, but still buy my albums from the
store if you want to support me," then we could have a debate about the
results of that.

------
madmaze
I wish the US would have a Pirate Party! I would be a supporter of freedom of
speech and internet neutrality!

~~~
Cayenne
Aren't you a citizen of the US? If you are, then why not just start it
yourself, instead of wishing?

Also, there IS a Pirate Party for the US: <http://www.pirate-
party.us/news.php>

~~~
hugh3
If those are the issues you're concerned about then I don't think a Pirate
Party is actually helpful.

But it's an interesting question: if you want a certain type of political
change are you better off forming a crazy extremist group or a modest
mainstream one?

~~~
CapitalistCartr
I think the extremists are more effective. While people don't take them as
seriously, they do move the balance of the discussion. It's like a see-saw
{balance}. Where do you put a limited weight to have the maximum effect.
Groups like The Sierra Club were ignored or seen as pretty fringe, until
groups like Earth First came onto the scene.

------
henning
That talk about freedom of speech is a nice way of defending large-scale
copyright infringement.

~~~
tsally
Good thing you can't find copyright files to download via Google search.
Otherwise it would be as bad as The Pirate Bay!

Enabling someone to break the law doesn't make the enabler culpable. We apply
this standard to manufacturers of lock picks, crowbars, physical key-loggers,
books detailing the security of computers, etc. I'm curious why you feel a
different standard should apply to someone who provides hosting for torrent
files. The onus is on the criminal, not those who provide tools which may or
may not be used in a crime.

~~~
rick888
"We apply this standard to manufacturers of lock picks, crowbars, physical
key-loggers, books detailing the security of computers, etc. I'm curious why
you feel a different standard should apply to someone who provides hosting for
torrent files. The onus is on the criminal, not those who provide tools which
may or may not be used in a crime."

If I had a website setup exclusively for sharing valid credit card numbers
(and yours was on my site), would you want my site taken down?

After all, the credit card number itself is just data (nothing is actually
taken from the original owner when it is shared) and my site isn't actually
doing charging anything to the cards.

~~~
tsally
Stealing a credit card is stealing in itself, you don't actually have to
charge anything. The analogy isn't valid. The correct analogy is the fact that
you can use Google to find numbers that look like credit card numbers.
Similarly, hosting a copyrighted file is illegal. But providing the means in
which to find said file is not.

There's a reason why the world should work this way. I can use a wide array of
objects as a lock pick (i.e. a banana). To prosecute me for walking down the
street with any of these objects (including actual lock picks) is just
ludicrous. Hence why the law says that I actually have to demonstrate the
intention to use a tool to steal something in order for it to be a crime. And
in any case, the took maker is usually never liable.

It's a very simple idea. Prosecute the criminals, not the people who provide
tools which might be used in a crime. Obviously there's an upper limit. For
example, a grenade is a pretty unambiguous, single-use tool. That's why
selling one is illegal. But most tools have many uses, some illegal and some
not. It's an impossible task to go after the tool makers, so just go after the
criminals.

~~~
rick888
"There's a reason why the world should work this way. I can use a wide array
of objects as a lock pick (i.e. a banana). To prosecute me for walking down
the street with any of these objects (including actual lock picks) is just
ludicrous. Hence why the law says that I actually have to demonstrate the
intention to use a tool to steal something in order for it to be a crime. And
in any case, the took maker is usually never liable."

Your examples are ridiculous.

Here is an example from TPB:

[http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5666626/Adobe_Photoshop_CS5_...](http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5666626/Adobe_Photoshop_CS5_Extended___incl_Serial)

it's for photoshop CS5. The readme, which is on the website, clearly states
what it is. There is no confusion. You aren't getting a demo or a trial.

TPB is also not like google because they also run many of the trackers used to
download these files.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitTorrent_tracker>

"Hence why the law says that I actually have to demonstrate the intention to
use a tool to steal something in order for it to be a crime. And in any case,
the took maker is usually never liable."

If you sell knives, you won't be prosecuted for murder. However, if you have a
website detailing exactly how to kill someone, their schedule, and sell knives
along with this guide, you probably will be held liable.

"It's an impossible task to go after the tool makers, so just go after the
criminals."

It's not impossible to go after the tool makers. By going after TPB, they can
potentially stop millions of downloads per day in one shot.

