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?

Lies, lies, nothing but damn lies.

IDG.se, the IT business equivalent to Se & Hör, has an article today on how some of the political parties stand on various IT related issues. The problem is they've just sent out a bunch of questions and asked the parties to answer. Well, you get what you ask for, I guess.

Let's go through some of the Q&A's, ok?

2. IPRED. Vill ni upphäva Ipred-lagen (som gör det lättare att hindra olaglig fildelning)?

JA: Vänsterpartiet, Miljöpartiet, Centerpartiet.
NJA: Socialdemokraterna.
NEJ:Folkpartiet, Kristdemokraterna, Moderaterna.

Centerpartiet voted for the IPRED law only a year and a half ago. Why would anyone believe that they've suddenly changed their mind? And why a "nja" for Socialdemokraterna? They too voted for the IPRED law, even on an EU level. These two political parties have absolutely no integrity in this matter and are obviously just on a desperate hunt for votes.

3. FRA. Vill ni upphäva FRA-lagen (som gör det lättare att övervaka internet och telefon)?

JA: Vänsterpartiet, Socialdemokraterna, Miljöpartiet.
NEJ: Centerpartiet, Folkpartiet, Krisdemokraterna, Moderaterna.

So, Socialdemokraterna who actually came up with the entire FRA-law back in 2005, and handed it over to the subsequent government are suddenly opposing it? Yeah, right. What they fail to mention is that they simply want to create a slightly different FRA law. Same shit, new wrapping. Socialdemokraterna don't have a shred of credibility in this matter.

4. LOGGNINGSLAGEN. Tänker ni rösta ja till att införa datalagringsdirektivet (som tvingar internet- och teleoperatörerna att spara uppgifter om hur deras kunder kommunicerar).


JA: Folkpartiet, Kristdemokraterna, Moderaterna
NJA: Socialdemokraterna, Miljöpartiet.
NEJ: Vänsterpartiet, Centerpartiet.

Wait, what? Centerpartiet have already decided for the data retention directive, back in 2009. Again, why would anyone believe they've suddenly changed their mind? And a "nja" from Socialdemokraterna again? What the hell? They are the only party in the red/green coalition who are still strongly in favor of the data retention directive. Nja my ass.

It would be refreshing if IDG, instead of just printing these answers would follow them up with these parties, asking them why they're answering "yes" when in real life politics they are clearly "no", and vice versa. That would be much more interesting.

You want some plague to go with that cholera?

The upcoming general election in Sweden is already turning into quite a bizarre spectacle, with 5 months left of campaigning.

The socialist coalition are working incredibly hard on ruining people's economy, making what kan only be defined as threats to increase taxed across the board should they be elected:

• Increased income tax (as if 56,7 percent isn't enough...)
• Increase fuel taxes (because clearly, in an effort to make it less profitable to work only raising the income tax isn't enough, the actual travel to work should also be punished!)
• Increase the payroll tax (you didn't think only the employee should be punished for working, did you?)
• Increase alcohol and tobacco taxes (God forbid you should be allowed to enjoy a drink after a hard day's labour)
• Restore the hopelessly outdated wealth tax (making sure companies as well as people move their wealth abroad - we don't want those rich bastards living in socialist Sweden!)
• Restore the arbitary and unfair housing tax (also known as the "Stockholm tax", because obviously it should be considered a crime to live in or near such an expensive city and spend all your money on that several million kronor mortgage)
• Introduce a new "energy" tax on the horribly polluting hydropower (well, actually the reasoning seems to be that the energy companies have a healthy profit, and the socialist coalition feels its only natural to introduce special taxes to get a bigger share of that profit - I guess a phone company tax, a lawyer tax or a property broker tax is next, and we all know who will get the bill in the end - the consumers)

Meanwhile the non-socialist coalition, "Alliansen", are hell-bent on finding new ways to strip the public of the last shreds of personal integrity and freedom:

• Random drug tests in school (clearly giving the police mandate to perform drug tests on kids without parent's permission wasn't enough)
• Publishing pictures of suspected criminals (because apparently the stigmata of sending purple letters to the families of suspected sex buyers wasn't enough...)

Not to mention all the disgusting laws that have been passed already during the last 4 years.

Of course, the socialists aren't friends of freedom and integrity either, supporting the new and oppressive laws that have been passed during the non-socialist government, the FRA-law, the data retention directive and the Ipred-law. They've even suggested every kid in school should get a "personal police officer" watching over them, making sure they don't do any mistakes (you know, being out partying on a Saturday night), and accepting any incriminating information they might have on other kids, in effect creating a society based on fear and squealing.

So the question is really, would you like some plague to go with that cholera, or is cholera enough? I'd like neither, thank you so much.

I noticed blogger Ravenna shares my views on some of this insanity. A post well worth reading.

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@

Rip and replace

Socialdemokraterna, the social democratic party, are experiencing a fight of generations within the organization. The old farts, with Thomas Bodström as prime example of how much damage one person can do, destined to tear down every shred of personal integrity and civil liberties for it's citizens, and the young generation who are at least portraying an image of the opposite.

The problem is, even the young generation of social democrats are not really interested in freedom, integrity and civil rights:

– Partiet är helt fel ute. Ipred borde rivas upp och börjas om från början.

Right, so you don't really want to tear up this revolting new legislation, you just want to pretend to tear it up, to gather votes for the 2010 elections, and then replace it with something similar right after the elections, should you - God forbid - get the people's trust. You've already promised to tear up the FRA law (and replace it with a similar law...). How dumb do you really think your voters are? Presumably they're pretty damn dumb, but still.

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.

Mona Sahlin is not a fan of justice and integrity

Social democratic opposition leader Mona Sahlin wants to tear up the much debated FRA law, apparently out of concern for people's integrity. How convenient. Of course she wants to replace it with another, similar law... Quite frankly I fail to see how Sahlin's option is any more edible.

Also, Sahlin doesn't seem to understand that the legal abomination called the Ipred law is equally damaging (we're already seen the first examples of how the entertainment mafia abuses the law, and this is only the beginning), she simply sees it as a way for the entertainment mafia to protect their rights. You know, the classic "the goal justifies the means" argumentation:

Ipred handlar om hur man garanterar att artister, låtskrivare och författare också får möjligheter till att få inkomster. Det tror jag att alla tycker är självklart.

Oh well, as long as those greedy bastards are able to fill their pockets at an increasing pace, to hell with integrity and justice.

This nonsense leads me to the conclusion that Mona Sahlin is either dumb as a rock, or completely ignorant when it comes to questions of integrity and the Internet.

FRA is illegal

The Stasi FRA law is in conflict with the European Convention on Human Rights, says lawyer Anders Lagerwall in today's DN.

No shit, Sherlock. How can wiretapping the entire Swedish population just in case any of them should ever commit a criminal offence be in conflict with human rights? I just wonder how long it'll take the experts to figure out that the Ipred law is in conflict with the same rights.

ARTICLE 8

1. Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.
2. There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

Voddler - a fiasco in the making

Voddler is supposed to be a kind of Spotify-like service, only for movies and TV-series. This is all good, but according to the article in SvD, Voddler will be burdened by the same antique release window system invented by the movie industry that is killing the DVD market and causing people to illegally download US-released movies and TV-series that won't hit European theaters for months:

Alla filmer kommer alltså inte att finnas i gratisversionen och filmer kommer även att kunna flyttas från gratisvarianten till premiumvarianten och vice versa. Baserat på filmbolagens så kallade releasefönster kommer filmer även att kunna försvinna helt i perioder.

Seriously, who's gonna pay for a premium account?

Unfortunately it seems as long as you want to stay on friendly terms with the entertainment mafia, you're going to have a poor, defective service. If you, on the other hand, decide to give the customers what they want, expect to be persecuted prosecuted by an industry that makes its own laws. It's really a lose-lose situation.

How to keep a steady growth rate

Do you feel your business is a bit slow these days? You don't feel like exploring new business models or giving your customers what they really want? And as a consequence of these old business models, do you see your YTY growth rate go down from 30% to a mere 2%?

No worries, do what the entertainment mafia did: Create laws that give you police authority, spread terror and force the consumers back:

Förra året kom trendbrottet i den till synes ständigt rusande dvd-­försäljningen. Enligt branschen var det fildelningen som slog igenom på allvar – trots detta handlar det, efter 10 års oavbruten ökning, om hela 35,6 miljoner dvd-filmer som trycktes ut på den svenska marknaden. Försäljningen fortsatte att öka, men bara med 2 procent, inte med de omkring 30 procent som ökningen legat på tidigare år.

Men efter Ipredlagens införande i april i år är ordningen återställd. Stora videodistributören Bonver, som har 1.500 videouthyrare och 1.200 dvd-försäljare som kunder, redovisar kraftiga ökningar för månaderna maj–juli.

Uthyrningen ökar med 27–34 procent jämfört med 2008, och dvd-försäljningen i juni och juli låg på 70 procent plus.

Ordningen är återställd. Of course, any business should be able to uphold such an incredible growth rate. Any dip is unnatural and should be remedied not by new and future-oriented business models but by threats and terror. If the consumers don't want to buy your old, outdated products, force them to do it. That's the Hollywood way. That's the ugliest face of capitalism.

– Det här är något fantastiskt som vi ser, man respekterar verkligen Ipredlagen. Det har blivit tydligt för svenska folket att det är olagligt att ladda ner och så har man slutat att göra det, säger Gerard Versteegh, vd på Bonver.

"We're experiencing something truly amazing. People with a loaded gun pointed at their forehead are actually doing what we tell them to do! Faced with massive threats they're being obedient customers!" says Gerard Versteegh, CEO at Bonver. Any dictator will tell you that oppression and threats will make the people do what you want in the short term, you compete ass.

Please stop supporting this insanity. Stop feeding the monster. Stop buying those damn DVD's.

Another contribution to my list of shame

A bunch of movie companies have decided to test drive the infamous Ipred law, and have turned to the court in an attempt to gather info on the owner of an Internet subscription, in order to sue him or her for millions of dollars, obviously.

Much like the first Ipred-case a couple of months ago, where a bunch of publishing houses presumably broke the law in order to gather "evidence", and still had the court ruling in their favor instead of throwing them head first out of the court room (yes, the legal system in Sweden is that corrupted at the moment), these morons from the movie industry are doing the exact same thing: Illegally gaining access to a private torrent tracker, SweTorrents.org, trying to secure some sort of "evidence" that it contains copyrighted material:

- Swetorrents tillhandahåller upphovsrättsskyddade filmer som de inte har rättighet att sprida på internet. I vissa fall gäller det filmer som inte ens har kommit ut på marknaden. Det handlar om relativt omfattande verksamhet. Det blir ett dränage på filmbolagens intäktssida, säger Antipiratbyråns ordförande Björn Gregfelt.

Riiight, so we're still not past the completely misleading "torrent trackers contain actual movies that can be downloaded by anyone" reasoning.

Luckily, and quite surprisingly to be honest, the ISP in question, Telia Sonera, has decided to fight this, and not give out any sensitive information to the movie industry without a proper court ruling. Let's just hope this case doesn't end up in the hands of those baboons over at Solna tingsrätt...

I can hereby add the following movie companies to my list of shame, to mock and to boycott for eternity:

• Svensk filmindustrin
• Pan vision
• Filmlance international
• Yellow bird

I wish you all an ever decreasing profit with a future of really crappy movies that absolutely no one will pay to watch. That would serve you right, you criminal bastards.

Evaluating oppression

Apparently an evaluation of the infamous Ipred law is under way. About bloody time you might say. But hold your horses, it will take an astonishing three (3!!!) years for it to be done. The politicians have bought themselves three years where they will have to do nothing about this judicial abonimation ("we can't do anything until the evaluation report is ready...in 2012"). Three years of repeated miscarriages of justice, of lives ruined, before coming to an obvious conclusion:

Threats and oppression work in the short term. If you put a gun to someone's head and tell them to do something, most likely they will do it. But is it the right thing to do? And shouldn't the government of a so-called democracy be protecting it's citizens rather than protecting the ancient business models of unscrupulous, multinational corporations at the expense of it's citizens?

Ipredator going live

Good news. Swedish newspapers DN and SvD, as well as frontman Peter Sunde himself, report that the anonymity VPN-service Ipredator is in it's final beta stage and could be going live any day now.

Of course, in an ideal world Internet users wouldn't need such a service, but in a world where our civil liberties are constantly under fire by repressive governments and private interest groups, it's a necessity.

Update: According to police lawyer Fredrik Ingblad Ipredator will only make it a bit more difficult, but not at all impossible, to track down users of file sharing services. Of course he refuses to give any examples of how this would be done...

The VPN-solution I use at work, or rather when I'm not at the office but want to access the company network, encrypts the traffic from my client and to the VPN-server, and the only visible IP-adress is the one of the VPN-server. I'm assuming Ipredator is working more or less the same (except, obviously, my company keeps logs of what I'm doing when I'm using their VPN service), so I would like to know which rules Mr. Ingblad and his comrades intend to break in order to get past this. Install spyware on every Swedish citizen's computer (would be all the more reasons to switch to Linux)? Either way I'm sure they could get plenty of good advice from sleazeball extraordinaire Henrik Pontén and Antipiratbyrån on this.

Another miscarriage of justice

The Swedish ISP Ephone has in an utterly bizarre verdict by Solna tingsrätt ("Framgång för bokförlagen i det första Ipred-ärendet", skriver tingsrätten i ett pressmeddelande) been forced to provide personal information about the owner of an internet subscription to five publishing firms. Why? Because someone using this internet subscription had set up an FTP-server, a private server requiring authentication to access its content. Supposedly this FTP-server contained copyrighted material, which Antipiratbyrån gained access to, presumably either through hacking or just by plain and simple threats. Remember that the next time you upload that MP3-file, image or XVID-movie to your personal online storage facility - the mafia entertainment industry might hack into your account and then accuse you of making the material accessible to the public.

Anyway, this personal information will of course help the publishing firms hunt down and take legal action against the owner of the internet subscription (not the actual perpetrator, mind you!), and most likely be responsible for yet another miscarriage of justice. We all know the court will find him or her guilty without a shred of credible evidence, a screen shot and an assumption that the internet subscription owner and the perpetrator are the same, is enough these days. Recent verdicts in the previously civilized part of the world has shown that one is in fact no longer presumed innocent until proven guilty when it comes to acts of copyright infringement. Instead, we've taken a giant leap backwards in time and embraced the principle of "guilty until proven innocent". Makes it all a lot easier for the court, doesn't it? "So, you can't prove that you're innocent? Can't prove that somebody else was using your WLAN that night? Too bad, that'll be 15 millions in fines. Next!"

Also, I can't help but wonder how the judge in Solna tingsrätt is affiliated with the mafia entertainment industry in this particular case. Or perhaps he too was promised a well paid pro forma job in the industry if he helped them along by making a decision that went against all common sense?

If anyone should be on trial here it should be Antipiratbyrån and Henrik "Pirate" Pontén, as they have illegally gained entrance to a private FTP server. Somehow these computer crimes, regularly performed by Antipiratbyrån to secure "evidence", are never an issue.

Clearly, those with enough money and lobbying power own the justice system.

A joke, I presume?

"You've got to be kidding me". That was my first thought when reading Henrik Pontén's letter in today's Svenska Dagbladet. Assuming Mr. Pontén is in fact the athor (which I must admit I'm having problems believing) he seriously wants the public to believe that IPRED, IPRED2, FRA, Hadopi, Acta and Datalagringsdirektivet, to mention a few, are just products of our imagination, they're not real, they're not threatening the freedom of speech or personal integrity. And none of them are the result of lobbying efforts from the entertainment industry. Oh, and the industry paying off judges and policemen to win highly questionable lawsuits, that's just part of the whole conspiracy theory against these peaceful "friends of the Internet" (yes, he actually uses this term!).

What kind of drugs is Henrik Pontén on? Or perhaps he's just trying to be funny, or something?

Pontén ends his ridiculous rant with a call for The Pirate Party to explicitly denounce the threats made to him over the last couple of years. As if this political party has somehow been involved in these threats.

If anything Don Pontén and his little Camorra-army should apologize profoundly to all the people whose lives they have ruined or seriously damaged with outrageous threats, lawsuits and compensation claims. Innocent or not, it doesn't matter, pay up or face the consequences.

Centerpartiet - the new Piratpartiet?

I've written about opportunistic politicians before, who change views and opinions as often as they change their underwear (and that's not to say they are particularly smelly!).

The last in line is Centerpartiet, a political party that has lost all credibility, recently having voted for the FRA surveillance law, and the Ipred "private police law".

With Piratpartiet, the pirate party, flying past them in the latest polls, Centerpartiet appears struck by panic, and has suddenly adopted Piratpartiets views in these questions, more or less to the letter, all in order to win back votes:

I ett yttrande till partistämman i Örebro skriver partistyrelsen att upphovsrätten är i stort behov av en omfattande översyn. I försöken att stävja den illegala fildelningen har "skyddet av upphovsrätten generellt sett värderats för högt i förhållande till skyddet av den personliga integriteten", skriver partistyrelsen.

In other words: "We mean exactly the same as Piratpartiet. Please believe us, and please forget the fact that we've voted for these misanthropic laws, we didn't mean to". Sounds credible.

One streaming book, please.

Five publishing houses were the first to abuse the new Ipred law, attempting to start legal proceedings against the owner of an FTP server, claiming he had made publicly and widely available copyrighted material. Those of you knowing what an FTP server is will know that they usually don't make anything "publicly and widely available".

Anyway, one of the publishers behind this revolting act, Storyside, has come up with a brilliant idea to battle piracy (besides violating human rights and suing their customers): A "Spotify-like" service for sound books. Yes, that's right, folks!

Helena Gustafsson, VD på Storyside, funderar i lite andra banor och vill utveckla nya kanaler för distribution av ljudböcker. Hon tror att människor vill köpa ljudböcker på olika sätt och är övertygad om att det finns flera modeller som ännu inte testats.

– Jag tror till exempel på en sajt som Spotify fast i bokform. Strömmade ljudböcker ska vara billigare än nedladdade, den som vill äga en produkt måste vara beredd att betala, säger hon.

Right. Now, who on earth would be interested in sitting in front of his computer listening to a streaming sound book? Sound books are for long car rides, intercontinental flights or maybe even subway rides, provided they are long and boring enough. And the idea to actually charge money for this? Umm, well, good luck. Especially now that you've alienated your customers by taking legal actions against them.

Another one of these bright minds, Shadi Bitar of Earbooks, is looking for laws and regulations on the Internet:

– Vi hoppas att det ska införas lagar och regler på internet. Det är väldigt svårt att konkurrera med det som är gratis och först om vi får en legal marknad kan våra tjänster utvecklas, säger Shadi Bitar, VD på ljudboksförlaget Earbooks.

Well, Shadi Bitar, here's a newsflash: There are laws and rules on the Internet, just as there are in real life. And the police have traditionally upheld them, cracking down on child pornography, frauds and scams. The problem is that you and your comrades in crime insist on bending these rules and even creating your own rules enabling you to act as both police and judge.

Anyway, for those of you interested, the publishing houses involved in the abovementioned judicial farce are:

• Bonnier Audio
• Earbooks
• Norstedts
• Piratförlaget
• Storyside

They're all on my do not buy-list (or "don't feed the monster" list), and they should be on yours too.

Tricky Dick

Swedish writer Dick Harrison has probably done more to hurt his own career lately than any pirate could. This cartoon character has made a complete ass of himself while debating the Pirate Bay verdict and other piracy questions on national TV, demonstrating both a lack of knowledge and a lack of manners. He has openly applauded the highly questionable and ridiculously harsh Pirate Bay trial verdict, claiming that he would have loved to see an even harsher sentence (...). Not only that, but the Dick is also highly in favor of the Ipred law, a revolting piece of work designed to protect the profit of the entertainment industry at the sacrifice of personal integrity and privacy.

Following all the ill-informed nonsense and ridiculous TV-appearences, Mr. Harrison appears to have become a victim of harassment, brought to our attention in this article by his charming fiancee, Katarina Lindberg. Seeing as Dick Harrison is no stranger to harassing people himself, it's tempting to say that what goes around comes around. Bad karma and all that.

Still, frustrated pirates, or local loonies, whoever it might be, should not stoop to his level like this. There are better ways to fight the insanity of Tricky Dick and others. Informed argumentation worked remarkably well on TV, for instance. Keep going down that path.

I will refrain from commenting on Katarina Lindberghs rant about threats and freedom of speech, as I guess everyone can see the obvious irony in them. However, I found this little piece of text a bit amusing:

Vi skall bemöta våra motståndares åsikter med argument, men inte kränka dem som människor. Om det finns människor som vill argumentera för att det skall vara okej att sno andras grejer, visst sätt igång att slipa argumenten, för ni har ett tufft jobb framför er.

Right. So Lindbergh want's to fight her opposition with good arguments (clearly her fiancee doesn't agree with her on that one), and in the very same sentence she accuses people having different opinions about copyright laws for promoting theft? Very smooth, Lindbergh. Very, smooth.