Ask the UK Pirate Party's Andrew Robinson About the Issues 391
VJ42 writes "With the 2010 UK general election fast approaching, the Pirate Party of the United Kingdom will be fielding elections for the first time. The Digital Economy bill and ACTA are hot topics for UK geeks, and the Pirate Party is looking to pick up some votes. Their leader, Andrew Robinson, has agreed to answer your questions. Normal Slashdot interview rules apply."
Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:3, Interesting)
It seems Pirate Party UK's one of the core policies is reformin copyright and patent law so that non-commercial file sharing would be legalized. While certainly a noble goal, shouldn't content producers, artists, programmers, and basically anyone producing something have a right to their work?
This is not only limited to music, movies or other kind of entertainment - among other things, it also affects open source coders who release their code under GPL. If there weren't copyrights, there couldn't be GPL either, nor Creative Commons Attribution, No Derivative Works and Share Alike licenses. In this exact case copyright is used to allow the author to make sure he is attributed and his work isn't misused.
Wouldn't the world be less controlling if the authors actually had some saying over their works instead of being forced to lose control over their work?
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I agree - politics basically works by middle ground. In many cases, it's an argument to moderation fallacy, and it's poor for many reasons (including the fact that it rewards people for taking extreme positions), but despite being a fallacy, it's how politics works.
If some people say "Copyright should be life plus 70 years, be extended whenever Mickey Mouse might become public domain, we should have laws criminalising telling people how to circumvent protections even if you legally bought the material, and
Re:Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:5, Insightful)
I bet you would find a rather large number of people who think that, for example, making a mix tape is entirely ethical and should be legal. Lots of people don't agree that artists should have ultimate control over their work. Also, who is being *forced*? not giving artists the privilege of ultimate control over the use of their published creations is not *forcing* them to do anything.
I hate that GPL argument. Sure it's technically correct, but the GPL was written with the intent of subverting copyright using it's own rules. The GPL would be unnecessary, and would most definitely not be common had the copyright system been much more lax during the last few decades.
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The GPL would be unnecessary, and would most definitely not be common had the copyright system been much more lax during the last few decades.
With weaker copyright the GPL would certainly be less beneficial because the GPL relies on strong copyright. Without that we might not have the benefit of good GPL licensed projects like the linux kernel and the GNU userland.
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Unless every piece of software is open source, which is the goal of the Gnu project. Then copyright would be meaningless.
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The GPL is an anomaly caused by strong copyright. If it was easier to merely contribute to the public domain and copyright had realistic fair use then the GPL would be unnecessary.
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How do "realistic fair use" provisions in copyright law and practice help you gain access to the (trade secret, unpublished) source code for a proprietary application so you can fix a bug or enhance it?
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With weaker copyright the GPL would certainly be less beneficial because the GPL relies on strong copyright.
Why? I cannot see why the GPL would benefit more from the excessively strong copyright law of today compared to a sane copyright law with a term length of maybe 20 years, and no DMCA-style rules such as the notice and takedown system, anti-circumvention provisions, statutory damages of 150,000 USD per infringement, etc. Name one case where any open source developer has sent a DMCA takedown request to an infringer, or an open source developer suing a grandma for 150,000 USD because of license infringement.
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I think BSD license would be a lot closer in subverting copyrights using it's own rules. GPL clearly states that if you GPL'd code, along with the binaries you need to make your own source code available too. Having the source code available is something the author wanted and is using his right over his work. Without copyrights anyone could take anyones code and never release the modifications or even relicense it under non-compliant license like BSD license.
Re:Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:4, Interesting)
"Subverting" in this context meaning more of "back to basics". Considering that it originated from the US and the US Constitution is quite specific on what "copyright type" things are ment to do.
Re:Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:5, Informative)
making a mix tape is entirely ethical and should be legal
Indeed, take for example UK artist Lily Allen - she believes that people who download are thieves, and was a vocal support of UK plans to disconnect people suspected of downloading. But even she seems to think it's fine to distribute mix tapes, on her record company's website, using other artists' material, in order to promote her own commercial material...
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The GPL would be unnecessary, and would most definitely not be common had the copyright system been much more lax during the last few decades.
Completely disagree with that. The purpose of the GPL is to allow me to release my project out to the world for people to play with/change/learn from however they see fit while preventing people from changing it then releasing an improved version without the same freedoms I originally gave.
It was originally created by RMS after he released a version of emacs to a company who modified it, then released their own version but refused to give out the source code, and absolutely requires copyright laws in place
Re:Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:5, Insightful)
Basically, I disagree with everything you said. No, you shouldn't be able to retain permanent control over an idea. No, saving the GPL is not worth perpetuating our current broken copyright. And no, a world with drastically reduced creator control over their "intellectual property" would be on the whole far less controlling, instead of more.
Besides, how often does the GPL come up in non-commercial cases?
Re:Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:5, Informative)
Here's how it (roughly) works over here (Spain):
- Audiovisual works can be shared noncommercially, but we pay levies on all kinds of media and copying devices (CD/DVD-Rs, hard drives, media players, cellphones)
- Software is protected and P2P sharing of software is not legal
Now, there's a huge SNAFU going on here with our RIAA-equivalent (the SGAE), who are lying bastards and cheaters, the levy system isn't ideal (many people get charged who don't use P2P, and the devices/consumables that get levies are just stupid - I think it'd be better to charge levies on internet connections instead of consumables and devices), and the way the levies are distributed is completely backwards (SGAE execs have been known to use some privately, transparency is nil, and small artists get squat). Nonetheless, the basic premise isnt all that bad: legalize audio/video/book file sharing, but impose some reasonable sort of cash stream from the people very likely to use P2P to the people who very likely have their works shared.
You also need to realize that legalizing file sharing does not imply removing all copyright. All it says is that sharing copyrighted files is fine (authors have less control over how their work is distributed noncommercially), but it doesn't imply licenses are invalid: You still can't produce a GPL'd derivative work and not provide source, you still can't violate the attribution/share-alike/non-commercial provisions of Creative Commons, etc. I don't think anyone is seriously arguing that copyright should be abolished - there's a huge difference between that and just making the usual P2P scenarios legal.
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All it says is that sharing copyrighted files is fine (authors have less control over how their work is distributed noncommercially), but it doesn't imply licenses are invalid: You still can't produce a GPL'd derivative work and not provide source, you still can't violate the attribution/share-alike/non-commercial provisions of Creative Commons, etc.
If it wouldn't affect licenses at all, wouldn't EULA's then just state that to legally run the program or game you need to have a license which is only obtainable via proper channels (ie. buy the product)?
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No, because audiovisual works don't have EULAs, and even if they forced them upon buyers, a clause preventing you from legally sharing it noncommercially would probably not be enforceable.
As a copyrighted work, software is considerably different from just media.
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I buy Cd's, i have over 600 at last count, and none of those are from 'mainstream' artists (whom tend to suck badly anyway), if they insist on those levies, i want to be able to bring in my legal purchases as a reduction against those levies (hell, they'd owe *me* money that way) when
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Isn't that a required "qualification" for such positions?
the levy system isn't ideal (many people get charged who don't use P2P, and the devices/consumables that get levies are just stupid - I think it'd be better to charge levies on internet connections instead of consumables and devices),
Which is still going to be just as unfair the only change is that it might be different people who are
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I submit that making ISPs pay the levy is fairer, as 1) they are the ones who profit directly from downloads, 2) people connecting to the Internet are more likely to correlate to people who download (especially with higher-speed connections, which are marketed quite blatantly as being for faster downloads), at least more so than levies on blank media. Blank media isn't a good match becau
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The levy system is not ideal, but it's the best thing we have. As far as I hear, Canada likes it.
Frankly, if I had to pay an extra $1 on a spindle of CDs or an extra $10 on an iPod and in exchange get the right to download whatever the hell media I want, I (as an American) would gladly take that option.
Re:Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:4, Informative)
Frankly, if I had to pay an extra $1 on a spindle of CDs or an extra $10 on an iPod and in exchange get the right to download whatever the hell media I want, I (as an American) would gladly take that option.
In Sweden, we have a levy system, but non-commercial sharing is still illegal, except in a very narrow set of your closest friends and family, where enforcement would be very hard. So you cannot download from people you don't know, but you still pay a levy on blank CDs, DVDs, portable audio players, etc. In addition, you cannot legally get a copy from someone who doesn't have the original.
When this point is brought up, it is excused with the levy being compensation for the copying between family members and very close friends. If the levy meant that you could download all you wanted, I think far fewer people would have any problem with it (given that it isn't also raised significantly.
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Couldn't you write a Facebook-like P2P program that just copied files from people you knew personally, or if they didn't have it, sort of copied from someone they knew to them, then to you?
Like, I don't know Dorothy, but I know Alex. And Alex knows Bill who knows Carrie who knows Dorothy. Alex and Bill and Carrie don't have Timberlake's "Motherlover [hulu.com]" (Low quality, non-hulu link [youtube.com]) song, but Dorothy does. She sends it to her friend, Carrie, who sends it to her friend, Bill, who sends it to my friend, Alex. Now
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She sends it to her friend, Carrie, who sends it to her friend, Bill, who sends it to my friend, Alex. Now I can get it, and all the sharing has been perfectly legal.
No, that wouldn't be legal in Sweden, since each recipient must get their copy directly from someone who owns an original (i.e. one they bought in a store).
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Libraries, recording radio music etc aren't illegal and neither do they ruin the industry.
If there is an "anti-piracy tax", let that tax cover the perceived losses and let it go at this. I pay tax for purchasing a blank CD, to cover damages to the music industry for pirated songs I'm going to put on that CD. So why I still can't legally put the songs on the CD, if I paid that tax? The music industry is getting paid twice, once in my tax and once as damages from lawsuit against me...
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Re:Forcing authors to lose rights over work (Score:5, Insightful)
Should creators have rights over their work? Yes. For a limited time. The problem is that the time is no longer limited and it is not the creators who are asserting rights, but huge third parties who are small in number. Small numbers of players in a marketplace means the consumer is screwed.
Mickey Mouse should have been free LONG LONG ago but is not. Much very old music such as "happy birthday" is still being used as a weapon against people everywhere instead of being released to the public as it should have been long ago.
The problem isn't that authors are being forced to lose control of their work -- it's that they are not. Worse, the authors ARE being forced into losing control of their work in favor of large copyright publishers.
Your idealism in in some of the right places, but to see the problems, you have to first see reality as it is practiced.
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Creators currently mostly do not have any rights over their work ....
If I create software, my company owns the copyright not me ..., If I publish a song, then the record company will have control of the copyright even if it is nominally in my name..., If I have any creative ideas it is likely that someone else will have more control than I as the author have .... this is the reality
Even if I have control over my work, (software I wrote at home, self published books, son
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shouldn't content producers, artists, programmers, and basically anyone producing something have a right to their work?
It is important to separate copyright into commercial and moral rights. It is very possible to want to give copyright holders less commercial rights, while keeping or even strengthening the moral rights such as the right to be recognized as the creator of a work. In my opinion, moral rights should also not be for sale. (from my understanding, they aren't here in Sweden)
If there weren't copyrights, there couldn't be GPL either, nor Creative Commons Attribution, No Derivative Works and Share Alike licenses.
This falls under the discussion of what kind of moral rights a creator should have to restrict a work from being used for specific purposes.
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it also affects open source coders who release their code under GPL. If there weren't copyrights, there couldn't be GPL either, nor Creative Commons Attribution, No Derivative Works and Share Alike licenses.
Yes, that is technically correct, but the non-confrontational attitude* of open source people hints that the increasingly aggressive copyright laws of today are not what they are asking for. I think that few open source developers/artists/etc would have any problems with reasonable term lengths (e.g. 10-20 years after creating a work) and lax enforcement w.r.t. non-commercial private use.
* = i.e. try to work out a solution first, only go to court if an offender fails to rectify problems after several attemp
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Killing copyright is not enough, because companies would just release binaries which would effectively be useless to the community. You need to enforce the release of the source code when binaries are released, which is the whole point of the GPL.
Just a metter of time (Score:2)
until the car makers say
- What make of tyres
- What brand of oil
- what brand of fuel
- what type of windscreen cleaner to use
Otherwise you will void any warranty whatsoever (akin to the Microsoft EULA where they disclaim any liability whatsoever)
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which the buyer then can copy and sell as many times as he wants
No, that wouldn't come under non-commercial.
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In addition, they still have other terms we have to agree to like EULAs and terms of use.
The only plausible argument for EULs being a valid contract is based on copyright: namely, you need permission to even copy it from disk to memory, so you'll be committing copyright infringement if you don't accept the licence.
So if it was no longer copyrighted, you could simply use it without accepting the licence.
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"Forcing authors to lose rights" - NO! A common misconception. *Some* rights maybe, but only to guarantee the rights of the public!
What these "artists" (and I use the term loosely, as this mainly seems to be driven by the labels and many artists actually oppose the labels' standpoint) always seem to gloss over when they talk about "losing rights" is that these aren't some kind of natural, inalienable rights, they're rights specifically granted to them by the public. If the public feel that they are abusing those rights or taking them to the extreme then it's perfectly justifiable to reign them in or remove them completely. What the gov
The only question... (Score:4, Interesting)
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The only thing I want to know is whether or not there are going to be some candidates standing for the pirate party in the general election, and if so in what seats? It'd be interesting to see how well they do.
yes, Andy is standing himself (I believe it's Worcester, but don't quote me); IIRC there's also another candidate confirmed to be standing, but I can't remember where apart from "up North" ;p
We're also hoping to field candidates in the local elections on May 6th
In Principle vs. Practical (Score:5, Interesting)
In Principle I really support what the Pirate party works. But in practical sense, there is a left-of-center ground for compromise. Copyright probably needs to go back to what it was around 130 years ago when it was a sane compromise. Now that ever happening in the western world is next to impossible unless there are large scale changes in governments. I'm sorta in favor of the idea that Copyright be fair, not non-existent. And not perpetual, and not in favor of massive IP holder trusts.
Re:In Principle vs. Practical (Score:4, Funny)
I'm sorta in favor of the idea that Copyright be fair, not non-existent.
Interesting, I didn't realize there was a middleground - I thought one had to be either one extreme or the other.
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Which is one of the problems of a representative democracy, especially those with only two or three parties. If you agree with one party in some major issues, and with another in other issues, who do you vote for?
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The one who promises the biggest tax cut for your income bracket of course !
Money (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Money (Score:5, Insightful)
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Of course there is no a priori right to make money from an activity but what's the a priori right behind property laws (one man's property is another indigenous people's theft) or earning a wage for any job? Copyright has allowed us to move beyond the creative tyranny of patronage to an explosion of independent creation and allowing the investment of ridiculous sums of money into creative works.
Sure the setup we've g
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How would you suggest copyright be reformed?
This is the UK pirate party's stance on copyrights, as from their front page [pirateparty.org.uk]:
Do you have another suggestion as for how the copyright system should be reformed that would be more moderate and still effective? Or are you j
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Is this same as burning it to the ground. Legalised non-commercial file sharing is so close to not having copyright you may as well come out and say it in an honest manner.
This is a free cake policy.
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Copyright is more than just some corporate entity making money for 30+ years based on the work of someone else. Copyright is there so that those who make popular works can thrive, and so, make more popular books/programs. So, without copyright, authors, movie studios, and recording artists would not bring in enough money doing what they do to afford to live a comfortable lifestyle.
When it comes to movies, how many people does it take to make a movie, and how much money does it cost just to pay the act
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While I don't take a hardline stance that all copyright should be eradicated, playing devil's advocate for a moment, you can't say that artists wouldn't produce worthwhile work in the absence of copyright, because we already know that for hundreds of years they did just that. Some of them did very well for themselves, too.
Charging for performances (for music artists, gigs, for movies, make the cinema experience actually something worthwhile to compete with the home cinema experience, for painters, exhibitio
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Easy to answer. Content creators will be paid for the work they are actually doing at the time of content creation, not for the work they have done 20 years ago. The people that need the content---be it music, software, news or books---will pay the content creators. How this works in the detail depends on the domain. Most musicians, for example, already today live off teaching and giving concerts, so for them the changes will not be very huge. Journals and news items will probably become subscription-based
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A Booker prize winning book requires one guy to spend his evenings for a year writing. A AAA computer game involves a hunderd people working full time for 3 years costing millions upon millions of dollars.
They are pretty much not comparable as a creative endeavor.
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A computer game these days seems to consist of some newly colored uniforms, some new league fixtures, and another 80 dollars for Madden 2011.
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A computer game these days seems to consist of some newly colored uniforms, some new league fixtures, and another 80 dollars for Madden 2011.
So it's turtles all the way down? There was no 'original' game?
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And how much will they be paid? The Standard Rate as defined by government? So, you're basically advocating communism.
Imagine I'm a talented writer or painter. If you want a picture or literary work, pay me and I'll make you one. No government involvement needed.
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In a world with no copyright for "non commercial" distribution of work how is anyone who creates a non subscription fee based computer game or e-book supposed to make money given that the work will be freely available on file sharing sites?
Ask for donations? It seemed to go OK for Radiohead, provided you don't use RIAA fantasy accounting to count every non-payer as a $20 loss. (I also know of one independent band who successfully financed their last several albums by getting fans to pay over the odds, in advance for "limited edition" CDs. It worked, because fans wanted to support the band).
Get a day job and treat writing/making music as an enjoyable hobby? Accept that the technology that enables you to produce and distribute studio quality m
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Even with copyright there is no guarentee that you will make money. At least in a "capitalist" economy. The other thing is that plenty of people "give away" plenty of stuff right now. Sometimes without expecting any financial reward, sometimes asking for donations, some
PPAU apathy (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm wondering if you had any trouble getting members for the party as opposed to what is happening in Australia. The pirate party here is suffering from member apathy, no one is going as far to fill out the paper work in order to help the party get the numbers needed to register as a political party. Has the UK pirate party had any similar issues?
Bring in a 3 strikes law (Score:5, Insightful)
Can we have a 3 strikes for politicians so that when they've been caught with red handed with their hand in the checkout 3 times they're jailed and banned from ever entering politics again so that the likes of Mandelson would never have got to a position where he could single-handedly manipulate the Digital Economy Bill in the first place?
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3 strikes? What about zero tolerance?
Politicians are placed in an elevated position of trust, and need to be bludgeoned by the ban hammer for the slightest indiscretion.
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Everyone makes mistakes, even the most pure and honest people and the rules for MPs are mind bogglingly complex. Do we really want a situation where someone has been in politics for 30 years, has helped move the country into a new age of prosperity, suddenly gets sacked and loses his pension because he ate a cookie a little girl baked for him as thanks for keeping their school open (accepting a bribe/not declaring a gift)?
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Can we have a 3 strikes for politicians so that when they've been caught with red handed with their hand in the checkout 3 times they're jailed and banned from ever entering politics again so that the likes of Mandelson would never have got to a position where he could single-handedly manipulate the Digital Economy Bill in the first place?
You joke, but our draft manifesto addresses transparency in government: http://www.pirateparty.org.uk/wiki/Drafts:Manifesto_Proposal#We_want_increased_government_transparency_and_accountability [pirateparty.org.uk] it's being voted on as I speak.
Priorities for spending of funds (Score:5, Insightful)
Why does your treasurer and campaigns officer, apparently under heavy pressure from the likes of Eric Priezkalns, feel that spending almost all of the party funds on the upcoming general election is the right way to go, given that, realistically, the PPUK will not make much of an impact in these elections? Don't you think that the better approach is a long-term one, and blowing all the money available to the party right now on the upcoming elections would be resources badly spent, when they could be better used to garner long-term widespread support/publicity, and apply long-term pressure?
Diluting possible change (Score:4, Interesting)
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Labour : Want copyright strictly enforced
Conservative : Want copyright strictly enforced
LibDems : Want copyright strictly enforced
Labour : Caught fiddling expenses
Conservative : Caught fiddling expenses
LibDems : Caught fiddling expenses
Which of the above do I vote for to inspire faith in parliament, and not vote in people who want strong copyright laws for their friends in the media industry?
Since when is autorship transferrable? (Score:4, Insightful)
Why do people believe that I can give the fact that I wrote a story or a song away? Shouldn't the first issue in any copyright negotiations be that the author's right is non-transferable?
If author's rights are transferable, the "new author" (a publisher, for example) will not write the sequel to the original book, nor write the next song of the original author. In fact, the author is only discouraged to write anything if somebody else can steal his rights.
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It is quite common in the financial world to sell an asset early for a smaller sum rather than wait for its full value to appreciate. There are several benefits to this. The first is that you get the money now. You may need the money to pay for things like rent and food. A million dollars ten years from now does me no good if I starve to death today. The second (and more important) is that you can offload risk to another person. Your song/book/software *might* be worth millions or it might be worth no
What is your stance on erosion of privacy in UK? (Score:4, Interesting)
What is your stance on erosion of privacy in UK? Will your party only follow the path of Intellectual Property rights, or do you plan to fight for freedom of speech, against invasion of privacy online and in daily life, censorship and other vital freedom-related problems.
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What is your stance on erosion of privacy in UK? Will your party only follow the path of Intellectual Property rights, or do you plan to fight for freedom of speech, against invasion of privacy online and in daily life, censorship and other vital freedom-related problems.
We campaign on all three issues: http://www.pirateparty.org.uk/ [pirateparty.org.uk]
Naming Rights (Score:5, Interesting)
Us nerds and geeks get it, but how does The Pirate Party aim to convince normal people that this political party is more than a modern Monster Raving Looney Party?
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Second this
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explain that the name tory comes from the irish for outlaw?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tory#History_of_the_term [wikipedia.org]
she can vote for pirates or outlaws. :-) isn't history fun!
Help for British copyright holders (Score:2)
I work hard to produce quality photographs for British newspapers and British news web sites. A major American company recently published several of my photos on their web site without permission. The company acknowledges that the photos are mine but refuses to pay, and says that I must file a complaint under the US's Digital Millennium Copyright Act if I want them to stop using the photographs. What could the Pirate Party do to help British copyright holders in situations such as this?
Swedish Pirate Party equivalent (Score:2)
What steps/actions are you going to take, to ensure the UK Pirate Party can emulate the success of the swedish Pirate Party? Have you been in touch with them to discuss their approach, how they gained exposure, and how they managed to rally so many voters to their cause?
Good luck!
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1) The Pirate Party got the votes in the EU elections, not the national one. The Swedish national elections are coming up too and they don't even show up in the polls yet (meaning they have less than one percent). Basically, it seems like people in Sweden do not care about the EU elections that much, or alternatively they believe copyright is a European issue and not a national one.
2)There is a history of personal freedom where pe
The Pirate Party (Score:2)
While there's nothing wrong with standing on a single issue 'point of principle', and it's admirable that you've been able to raise money enough to stump up the deposit(s) required and you're willing to give up your own time and energy to further the cause, isn't it moronically stupid to then torpedo* your chances running under a banner that will conjure such negative associations for most of the electorate?
In my opinion "Fair Use" copyright infringement should not be a crime, and those who do it should not
Britis helection system is the biggest barrier (Score:2)
Is reform from the present first-past-the-post system to for example the more democratic representative system maybe part of the Pirate party's program?
Monster Raving Loony Party (Score:5, Interesting)
(for the yanks, it was and is a genuine political party)
Knew all the old crew (Sutch, Hope, et al) well, great social events and parties, no hope of ever actually winning, just thumbing your nose at the system.
Why is the UK Pirate party any different, apart from the lack of great social events and satirical candidate names? Oh, and the lack of any other decent policies to counter the insanity worked by the likes of Harman etc.
Whereas a vote for the BNP (British National Party, often called British Nazi Party) really would be a protest vote, as more than a handful of seats might actually go to them, and NOTHING would shock british politics more than a notable proportion of the population electing wannabe Hitlers to the House of Commons.
This is not a troll, this is a serious question.
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Seconded, wish I had mod points. The Pirate Party UK comes across as earnest and angry [pirateparty.org.uk]. Since it's a tiny insignificant protest party, that's a rather risible position to take. If you don't develop some levity, shouldn't you expect to be mocked?
Why not (and this is also a serious question) lighten up and try and project a fun, positive message, rather than just impotently bitching and moaning?
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Why is the UK Pirate party any different, apart from the lack of great social events and satirical candidate names?
Because we have some actual principles? If you believe in IP reform, greater individual privacy & more freedom of speech, we're the only party to vote for.
Voting for the BNP is an extremist vote (Score:5, Interesting)
Voting for the BNP is not a "protest vote" - this is not a warm and cuddly hippy protest option like voting for the Monster Raving Loony Party.
Voting for the BNP is voting for an extremist party, a party that grew out of the National Front (look all these up on wikipedia) and until they were forced to change by European law this year had as part of their constitution a ban on people that weren't "white" from joining the party membership.
To my mind that's quite an extreme position for a party to take if it declares its goal to be getting political power, ruling over people of a variety of different ethnic groups. I think voting for the BNP is a dangerous way of expressing your protest at the current political system. The BNP is serious about some of its extreme politics, and is likely to get some seats and have real influence in UK politics if people start voting for them in the misguided belief that they are just offering up a protest to the system.
Typo (Score:2)
"Fielding candidates" not "Fielding elections".
The Rest of Your Views & Stances (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:The Rest of Your Views & Stances (Score:5, Insightful)
Your question appears to be based on a flawed premise.
Do not vote on who you want to be the Prime Minister. Vote on who you want to represent your interests in parliament.
Yes, it's useful if that representative doesn't present views with which you agree on broader issues (foreign policy, education, healthcare, taxation being the usual suspects) but in reality a PPUK vote isn't even voting in a candidate; it's voting for a given issue ahead of the others.
If you really care strongly about foreign policy then vote for a candidate that will represent your views. If you care about a range of issues, find a candidate that represents you the best across the range.
If you find that the three main parties are all corrupt and pushing broadly the same policies, the Greens have no sense of reality, the BNP are a bunch of racist fuckwits and none of the independent candidates have knocked on your door to tell you what they're standing for, then why not vote for a single issue party. If you hate Europe vote UKIP, if you want greater transparency and online rights then vote PPUK.
Re:The Rest of Your Views & Stances (Score:4, Insightful)
Voting (to me) shows more than support. It shows I am confident in that person or group as leader of my country.
And this is why we're in the mess we're in. Our politicians are meant to be our servants, not our masters; I don't vote for a leader, I vote for a representative that I can hold to account.
Questions (Score:2, Interesting)
(In order of importance)
1. How are you going to improve our Schools and Hospitals?
2. What is your stance on the "War on Terror"?
3. The economy is facing another nosedive before the end of the year, how are you preparing for it?
4. How are you going to tackle the uncontrolled immigration problem?
5. Do you have any plans to control anti social behaviour?
(loads of other more important questions later)
4432. What will you change in copyright law, whilst still making sure that the 2 years+ unemployed bloke next do
Re: (Score:2)
More importantly, how good of a job have the "other" parties done to address your areas of concern? Obviously not so well, since they are STILL problems that you see as needing a fix.
Your kind of thinking is what keeps democracy enslaved in a useless two-party system where both parties do an absolutely terrible job at everything. Why don't you take a chance for once and assume that a new guy might do no worse than predecessors on all the "other" issues but at least do a damned good job within one special ar
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I see the point you're making - but most of those questions are only relevant for a party forming a Government.
There's no chance of that happening here - I don't mean that in a "they won't get that many votes" sense, but I mean in the sense that they don't have enough people even standing for election. So such a thing is impossible.
It's still important I think to have policies on a wide range of issues, because if you had one as your MP, you'd still want to write to him, and hope he has an opinion on more t
Economy (Score:2)
What the UK population is most concerned about is a sustained, healthy economy (with continued free quality healthcare, education and welfare at the point of delivery).
How will the Pirate Party's policies demonstrate that a sustainable healthy economy is a necessary outcome of degrading the copyright and patent laws?
Let's ask the important stuff! (Score:4, Funny)
Pirates versus Ninjas...who'll win??
Artifical Digital Scarcity Vs Digital "Pirate" (Score:3, Interesting)
The "Pirate" in The Pirate Party's name implies the duplication of digital information. One side of the "Pirate" argument, mostly being represented by large digital distributors such as the Music Industry [wikipedia.org] and Motion Picture Associations [wikipedia.org], believe that our society needs strong legislation enforcing Artificial Scarcity [wikipedia.org] into the digital medium via treaties such as ACTA [michaelgeist.ca]. In other words, they appear to hold the view that only certain rights holders should have exclusive legal right to make and sell unlimited digital copies for fixed cost [wikipedia.org], just like any physical good for sale. On the other side of the debate we have the "Pirates" who appear to hold the view that digital information should not be treated as a scarce good [wikipedia.org], that digital distribution [wikipedia.org] is just a natural property of any digital medium and should be available to everyone.
How does the Pirate Party intend to allow those wishing to distribute original creative digital works to make a profit without legislating artificial scarcity into the digital medium?
Re: (Score:2)
The single issue your party is based upon is extremely "fluffy" in your parties manifesto. While I have read your forum and appreciate this is being worked on it seems to still lack any significant content in terms of planned measures and rather focuses on statements to the effect of "We will make IP more fair". Based on this fact how could people justify voting for your party when all we basically have is a statement of intent rather than implementable policy?
The final draft manifesto: http://www.pirateparty.org.uk/wiki/Drafts:Manifesto_Proposal [pirateparty.org.uk] is far more concrete; it's being put to a party vote right now.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
That pressure group already exists, has done for a couple of years now, and does some excellent work.
http://openrightsgroup.org/ [openrightsgroup.org]
Why repeat that organisation's activities instead of doing something else, such as giving the disenfranchised population the chance to vote against the mainstream parties?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Is fielding candidates the best course, for a single issue group like yours?
As well as the PPUK there is a lobby group: Open rights group [openrightsgroup.org] & a business coalition: Coadec [coadec.com]. To change policy we need to work through all these channels.