Miljöpartiet selling out

I guess anyone who believed in Miljöpartiet's election promises on surveillance is feeling pretty ashamed today. Only 3 days after the elections a representative of the party, Isabelle Lövin manage to vote - brace yourself - in favor of the positively insane Gallo report, a report named after its equally insane (or completely corrupt) creator, Marielle Gallo. Read Isabelle Lövins pathetic excuse here. Notice how she uses a clearly fake petition signed among others by deceased filmmakers, to justify her vote for increased surveillance and oppression.

The report, for those of you unfamiliar with it, states on one hand that we don't know enough about the effects of file sharing (clearly all the independent research done over the last couple of years is irrelevant, as it doesn't support the view of the entertainment business), and on the other hand that this doesn't matter at all and that ISP's should be forced to monitor the users for illegal file sharing activities, and also risk liability should they not take action in a manner acceptable to the entertainment industry. In other words, legislation first, facts second. My oh my, if every industry could order oppressive legislation just like that...

Oh yeah, and the report also states that file sharing may lead to health risks. Really. That's just  how insane it is, and how dumb Isabelle Lövin and the other pathetic bastards voting in favor of this report are.

So, by voting in favor of this report, let's have a look at how this is honoring  Miljöpartiet's election promises, made only 3 days ago:

Att staten inte ska ha möjlighet att registrera och övervaka all internettrafik i Sverige. Right, we'll let the ISP's do the surveillance instead, and threaten them with liability if they don't cooperate.

Skapa en balanserad upphovsrätt och avkriminalisera fildelning för privat bruk.
Umm, yeah, a balanced copyright legislation is exactly what the Gallo report is all about...

Of course, traditional media refuse to pick up on this. Instead they're publishing a story on how 70% of Swedish voters have confidence in the politicians. Yeah, I wonder why.

The single most important question that hasn't been answered

Sweden's first Ipred lawsuit ends up in the European Court of Justice. That's hardly a surprise. What is a surprise to me though is that what I consider to be one of the most important questions in this case hasn't even been touched by the courts:

How did the anti-piracy agency, Antipiratbyrån, manage to legally break into a secure server in order to gather evidence? And furthermore, do the courts find illegal activities to be perfectly ok when performed by representatives of the entertainment lobby?

We can't prosecute an entire generation (although we'd love to)

We'll let the entertainment industry do the dirty job instead.

Man, those word will come back and haunt that vicious bastard for a long, long time.

A lot to look forward to on TV this fall...

My God, this fall is bound to go down in history as the most pathetic one so far when it somes to TV entertainment. At least here in Sweden. As if seeing Anna Anka make an ass of herself on a regular basis last year wasn't enough, TV3 are not only continuing with a new season of their shockingly bad show Svenska Hollywoodfruar, they're actually adding another show, Svenska New York-fruar! Yes, it's exactly what it sounds like: Same crap, new city. I think I just threw up a bit in my mouth.

And as if that wasn't enough, other TV channels are pouring out similar crap at a stunning pace: Kanal 5 has a show called "Skånefruar" lined up for us, which I assume is about a pitiful collection of housewives who live in Skåne. Does anyone even care? And TV4 Plus plan to torture the viewers with an equally pointless show, "Ladies på Östermalm". Yes, it's just as boring as it sounds.

And if you haven't completely overdosed on this freak fest of botox-injected, brain-dead women with no ambitions in life apart from marrying rich, there's always Kanal 5's main feature, the brilliantly clever reality show "Kungarna av Tylösand", where the viewers can watch a bunch of retards getting drunk and acting like animals. Now that's good entertainment, Kanal 5.

I guess most sane people will have to rely on DVD's, The Pirate Bay or perhaps even books to get through this fall without permanent brain damage.

The Americans are officially crazy

It's pathetic enough that the American movie industry feels the need to make Hollywood versions of the Millenium trilogy (because clearly they believe the Americans are unable to watch a European movie w/subtitles...). But this really blew me away:

Dessutom skriver tidningen nu att det finns planer på att alla skådespelare i filmen ska bryta på svenska.

Apparently the director wants the actors to talk with a Swedish accent througout the movie? I guess the American version of the movie will be set in Sweden as well, just to make it completely and utterly corny. Well, if they're looking to make a comedy out of it, they seem to be on the right track.

Yoko Ono on the future of the Beatles

This is rich. According to Yoko Ono there will be no digital sales of Beatles songs. Apparently she's got a better idea for distributing music in the 21st century: Selling CD's! Clearly the 60's and 70's brought too much pot-smoking. If nothing else this shows why the existing copyright legislation needs to be changed. Had Yoko not owned the commercial rights to the Beatles' music, everyone would be able to make legal digital copies of their music and spread them throughout the world.

Well, Yoko, don't hold your breath, I won't be buying any of those "best of" or "remastered edition" CD's any time soon.

Photo: Caio do Valle/Public domain

Blizzard ripping off Starcraft 2-buyers?

The computer game Starcraft 2 was released today, and color me surprised when I noticed Blizzard is actually selling the downloadable version of the game for 59.99 Euros (mind you there are virtually no costs involved with this kind of distribution!) on their website, whereas you can get pick up the dvd's from any number of game stores considerably cheaper than that:

Play.com sells it for 48.00 Euros.
Amazon.com sells it for 59.99 Dollars, also around 48.00 Euros.
Most computer stores in Sweden sell it for around 42.00 Euros.

Please tell me that the 59.99 Euro pricetag for downloading this game from battle.net was a mistake that has been corrected by Blizzard now. If anything it should be a way below 40 Euros.

Photo: Screenshot from game.

The dual-watch man

Speaking of celebrities, or rather semi-celebrities, the former boyfriend of Heidi Montag, Spencer Pratt showed up smiling to the paparazzi wearing no less than two watches. What's up with that? Is it some strange way to keep track of two different timezones? Perhaps the watch on his left wrist shows Pacific Standard Time and the one on his right wrist shows Eastern Standard Time?

If so, here's a newsflash for you, Spencer, there are watches out there that will show two timezones. That way you can keep track of your time without looking absolutely clueless:

Breitling Aerospace
Tag Heuer Chronotimer
Victorinox Chrono Classic XLS MT

to mention a few.

Photo: Alloverpress

This site is "optimized" for users within the USA

That's what they call it these days...

Because clearly no European user would be interested in any American music. And obviously we wouldn't want to promote that music to fans around the world anyway. They could end up buying a CD or some merchandise, or even - God forbid - go see an artist in concert.

The entertainment mafia just never ceases to amaze me.

May 4: The day against DRM

So, apparently today is the day against DRM. Every day is a day against DRM in my world, and I'm proud to say I haven't bought a DRM-infested product in years.

Nevertheless I wholeheartedly support any kind of awareness campaign against this evil. So, in addition to a total boycott of the media industry, I signed the iPad DRM petition. How about you?

Hitler orders a DMCA takedown

The entertainment mafia Hitler orders a DMCA takedown.

Hitler, as "Downfall producer" orders a DMCA takedown from Brad Templeton on Vimeo.

Cleanternet

Offering some "support" to EU commissioner Cecilia Malmström, a firm believer in censorship and the useful idiot of the entertainment mafia:


Found on idg.se

UN abandons human rights - embraces copyrights

There's really no other way to interpret this statement. The United Nations has sold out to the entertainment mafia, abandoning ideals of human rights enforcement and instead embracing the tyrannic fight for stronger copyright enforcement. I'm using the word instead because these two rights don't go very well together. A tighter enforcement of copyright does mean sacrificing human rights.

Way to go ruining your credibility, UN.

Found the link through futuriteter.

What's worse - ignorance or incompetence?

I don't know what to say. Apparently Sweden is represented by a deaf, dumb and blind guy in the much criticized Acta talks. According to this moron, Stefan Johansson from the Department of Justice (!!!), there's nothing peculiar about the Acta agreement. They're not out to fight non-commercial file-sharing or any other small scale copyright infringements. We can all rest peacefully knowing that our personal integrity and civil liberties will be well taken care of.

– Ja, så är det, dokumentet tar sikte på mer omfattande intrång. Acta tar inte specifikt sikte på fildelning utan på fysiska produkter.

Yeah, right. Either Mr. Johansson has been spending most of his time sleeping during these talks, or he's just hopelessly incompetent. I don't know what is worse. Actabloggen has made a preliminary summary of the recently released documents, and they're not exactly painting a nice picture:

• 
  
  Customs officials will have the right to search through your luggage for any kind of pirated goods, including searching through your electronic devices looking for pirated content.
• 
  
  The "mere conduit" principle will cease to exist, and the ISP's will be held liable for what their users do on the web. In order to avoid liability they will be forced to filter web-pages pointed out by the entertainment mafia to contain infringing material, and they will be forced to terminate user accounts based on allegations from the very same mafia, effectively introducing not only a 3 strikes, but a 1 strike regime!
• 
  
  The most grotesque part is that all these measures are effectively bypassing the code of law. There's no right to have one's case tried by the court of law, there's no presumption of being innocent until proven guilty, it's basically the entertainment mafia playing judge and jury.

I'm guessing we'll see a lot more evil appearing as the Acta agreement is dissected by the community.

Links:
- ArsTechnica has a comprehensive analysis of the entire process behind Acta.
- IDG.se has a few words (in Swedish), although not very comprehensive at all.
- Europaportalen.se (also in Swedish) lets a couple of critical voices be heard.
- Christian Engström, Pirate Party politician and member of the EU parliament, gives his view on the 3 strikes threat.

Photo: chaouki

Still wonder why?

If you're still wondering why you should boycott the entertainment mafia, this is it (article in English here). Considering how this industry has influenced politicians throughout the world to adopt the most bizarre laws, and how some of this ridiculous suggestions are actually being seriously discussed in the Acta talks you can be damn sure that they will show up in one form or another pretty soon.

Every penny you spend on a CD or DVD, or going to the movies, is one penny that this destructive industry will spend on deteriorating the freedom and personal integrity of people all around the world. Stop feeding the monster.

The Swedish police: A complete embarassment

Well, it's official, not only are single policemen bought by the entertainment mafia, the entire Swedish police system seems to become a division of EMI/Universal/Sony/Warner, doing their dirty work extorting and bullying simple file-sharers in an organized way instead of prioritizing crimes that actually involve victims. Crimes that actually matter.

As a first step, nine police officers will be taken out of meaningful duty (and by meaningful I certainly don't mean the kind of appalling abuse of power displayed by these two pitiful clowns) and enrolled in the entertainment mafia division of the police, where they will knock down doors, seize computer equipment and threaten youngsters who are simply sharing their music or movies with friends or others.

In other words, it's some sort of reverse Ipred. In addition to outsourcing police work to private companies with financial interest in the work, the private companies are now also getting police staff working for them. And the police's excuse for this is probably the most pathetic thing I've heard:

Brott mot immaterialrätten är enligt Polismyndigheten ofta gränsöverskridande och beräknas omsätta stora belopp. Det nationella samarbetet är ett sätt att komma åt problemet.

Right. Non-commercial file-sharing generates a lot of profit.

This is a complete and utter disgrace for the Swedish police.

Original photo: Kike@

Guilty until proven innocent

The mafiosos over at the record companies (yes, the usual "axis of evil", Universal Music, EMI Music, Sony Music and Warner Music) continue their crusade to make the world an insecure place to live. According to Dagens Nyheter, Dagens Industri and Svenska Dagbladet they insist that two of the Pirate Bay founders are still involved in the management of the site, and should be fined accordingly. Not only that, but they seriously expect that mere allegations should be enough, and that the accusers should have to prove their innocence! The witchburners of the 18th century would be proud.

Enligt skivbolagen har de två har brutit mot vitesförbudet "genom att delta i driften av fildelningstjänsten", och skivbolagen anser att bara det faktum att Pirate Bay fortfarande fungerar är tillräckligt för att de två ska anses ha överträtt förbudet - såvida de inte kan visa att de inte längre är delaktiga.

"So, you're not a witch, huh? Prove it, or you're obviously guilty and will be burned at the stake."

I actually had to read that last sentence a couple of times before I realized it was serious. The good old "guilty until proven innocent" tactics that most developed countries abandoned decades ago. You're kidding me. However I'm quite sure the court will continue to obey the entertainment industry no matter how seriously it violates basic human rights.

Bono says: Look to China!

U2 front man and tax refugee Bono comes out of the closet as a firm believer in China style censorship (more comments on this article are here, here, here and here). Who would have thought a guy who's based his image over the last decade on being some kind of human rights activist, would do a U-turn like this and embrace oppression:

We’re the post office, they tell us; who knows what’s in the brown-paper packages? But we know from America’s noble effort to stop child pornography, not to mention China’s ignoble effort to suppress online dissent, that it’s perfectly possible to track content.

Sure, why not. Let's make a "noble effort" to monitor all user's Internet traffic (and just forget about details like multiple computers sharing the same ip address and other minor details...) in order to protect an outdated industry refusing to renew itself and instead demanding special legislation in order to keep the profit growing. Yeah, that's the noble thing to do. You complete moron.

I also love the part about the rich, evil Internet service providers and the poor songwriters:

A decade’s worth of music file-sharing and swiping has made clear that the people it hurts are the creators — in this case, the young, fledgling songwriters who can’t live off ticket and T-shirt sales like the least sympathetic among us — and the people this reverse Robin Hooding benefits are rich service providers, whose swollen profits perfectly mirror the lost receipts of the music business.

Swollen profits? Lost receipts? You might wonder what was in that pipe Bono just smoked. If anyone's making profit ripping off the "poor songwriters" it's the rotten to the core record labels. So please, Bono, stop embarrassing yourself by writing absolute bullshit about stuff you know nothing about, and stop promoting oppression and abolishing human rights in order to boost the profit of a vicious industry. It's really bad for your image.

If you want to read an intelligent piece of text on the subject, go read David Byrne's Survival Strateglies for Emerging Artists here. You don't have to be a slave to the CD manufacturing industry just because you want to write and/or perform music.

Or, if you're a friend of oppression, like Bono himself, read about how the Belarus are about to handle the "problem" of free speech and sharing of information. There are some good ideas to be found there.

Evidence in the way of "justice"

According to lawyer (yes, this buffoon is actually a lawyer, believe it or not!) Peter Danowsky, you can't expect the entertainment mafia industry to protect their new business models if they actually need any kind of evidence to obtain info on the person(s) behind an IP-address. Obviously, a mere allegation based on insufficient information gathered using plain criminal methods should be more than enough to get this information from the court, and proceed to ruining a persons life, innocent or not:

Bokförlagens juridiska ombud Peter Danowsky bedömer i överklagandet att syftet med lagen riskerar att undermineras om beviskraven ställs för högt.

What's that? Rule of law? Naw...we don't believe in that.

– Hovrättens beslut är inte acceptabelt för rättighetshavare, säger Danowsky.

Well, Mr. Danowsky, I can assure you it's perfectly acceptable for all those people who would be hunted down and had their life destroyed just because they might or might not have shared the latest Shakira album with others. I think most people, with the exception of politicians, entertainment industry lobbyists and Peter Danowsky agree that no one should be convicted without a shred of credible evidence. That is what has made us a civilized society, you don't burn a person on the stake just because someone accused this person of being a witch. Unfortunately it's the first thing to go now that an increasing number of previously civilized countries have decided that democracy, freedom and human rights are deeply overrated, and are moving back into the dark ages at a frightful speed.

A secure FTP server is...well, secure

Svea hovrätt just announced that having a secure FTP server that requires a username and password to access, means it's files are not publicly available. No shit, Sherlock. Although, I have to say I'm a bit surprised that this incompetent institution actually managed to find a judge that had no affiliation with the entertainment industry, and that actually made some sense. This means the ISP Ephone does not have to give up its customer's integrity.

Now what I want to know is when Antipiratbyrån will be prosecuted for breaking into this server in the first place, to gather the pathetic piece of "evidence" that was presented to the court (and found to be more than enough by the retards at Solna tingsrätt)? Last time I checked hacking into secure servers was still a crime. A much more serious one than copyright infringement, I might add.