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Swedish Pirate Demo
Arioch of Chaos writes "In Sweden, May 1 is still a day when many people get out on the streets to take part in the traditional demonstrations. Today, the Swedish site Piratbyrån organised demonstrations in several Swedish towns, demanding more bandwith and the abolition of intellectual property laws. This picture is just great. More pictures here." Congratulations to whoever made the AYBABTU sign.
It's unfortunate that piratbyrån get's this kind of publicity, but I'll try to fill you in.
Piratbyrån (roughly translated to "The bureau of piracy") was formed as a childish response to the lawyerfilled "Antipiratbyrån" (I think you can take a guess at the translation).
The "members" are mostly 14 year old kids, who just discovered that "heeey! i can use kazaa to download pr0n! wow!", and shortly after discovered "what do you mean it's illegal? I'll pirate anyway, motherbitches!" and is as of thus filled with these crying fools. Noone with half a brain takes them seriously, and I hope none of you do either.
I'm not, repeat not, som kind of guardian of antipiratbyrån, but piratbyrån uses just the kind of methods that makes antipiratbyrån look like the good guys. Unfortunate indeed.
In Estonia internet (knowledge) access is by law a human right.
... because in 1889, The Second International organized in Paris and set May 1 as a day of international labor solidarity, to support US trade unionists. European socialists like Engels decided it was important to publicise the plight of poor working conditions in the USA.
Whilst they are not as comprehensive as physical property laws and they have more limitations, without them it would just be anarchy under administrative law and breach the international community's understanding of natural justice.
Yes the letter Å is in general pronounced like a in all, but since it was introduced by some stupid king or whatever from the southern half of Sweden to the end of names like Ume, Skellefte, Pite and Lule, nobody actually living in those cities pronounces the final addendum. This is offtopic, hooray! But on the other hand - Ume (with that silly, non-needed and by natives non-pronounced letter) is mentioned in the article, and umu.se is the University of Umeå :-)
Geek rants since like... 2000 or something.
That would mean the daughter of Slash.
- "Every demand is a prison, and wisdom is only free when it asks nothing." Sir Betrand Russell
To answer your question, the head of the state is "Göran Persson", a fool when it comes to foreign politics.
Well I'm a Dane (and therefore I'm obligated to hate the Swedes :)) and I'd say that in Sweeden the are much better off than us Danes. Bandwidth in Denmark costs about 400DKK ~ $60 a month for a 2048/256 ADSL line, where in Sweden the get 10/10 Mbit line capacity for 1/4 of the Danish 2 Mbit ADSL. 100 Mbit bandwidth is also quite common over there for end-users
BTW, if anybody has tried Direct Connect P2P program they'll quickly find out that the 7151.97 TB online are almost hosted alone by Swedes...
http://tinyurl.com/2sqaj
:>
fetched, (yaaa)rarred, served. enjoy
jackal
Hi their, just in case things go sidewise as it were I have put up a mirror.. org/ 0 .jpg is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www.piratbyran. org/1majbilder/umea/DSCF0020.jpg . org/1majbilder/ 2 3.JPG is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www.piratbyran. org/1majbilder/sthlm/DSCF0023.JPG x .html is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www4.tomshardwa re.com/column/20040430/index.html s &file=article&sid=239 is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www.dailywirele ss.com/modules.php%3fname=News&%3bfile=article& amp%3bsid=239 l ess.net/ e t/ s /warfly.avi is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www.tomshardwar e.com/column/20040430/images/warfly.avi
The mirror of http://www.piratbyran.org/ is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www.piratbyran
The mirror of http://www.piratbyran.org/1majbilder/umea/DSCF002
The mirror of http://www.piratbyran.org/1majbilder/ is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www.piratbyran
The mirror of http://www.piratbyran.org/1majbilder/sthlm/DSCF00
The mirror of http://www4.tomshardware.com/column/20040430/inde
The mirror of http://www.dailywireless.com/modules.php?name=New
The mirror of http://www.kismetwireless.net/ is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www.kismetwire
The mirror of http://www.stumbler.net/ is at http://mirrorit.demonmoo.com/r_154/www.stumbler.n
The mirror of http://www.tomshardware.com/column/20040430/image
Hmm, "Å" is equivalent to "aa", and in the place name Faarbog at least (where I have visited several times) the pronounciation is an 'o' sound, like in "ogg".
Well if you want to impress a Swede, pronounce it as Ångstöm. Here is a link with some info on the Ångstöms.
John Carmack fan, browsing at +5 since 1999.
Dagens Nyheter, morning paper
Svenska Dagbladet, morning paper
Aftonbladet, tabloid
Computter Sweden (paying subscribers only)
Yelah
Gnuheter, /. clone
Actually, everyone that doesn't speak Swedish should know that "Piratbyrån" is a phun of "Antipiratbyrån" and I guess everyone knows the word anti.
(piratbyrån = piracy agency)
I agree that with higher tax pressure you expect more service from the government (and that 65% figure, while true, is a bit extreme and only applies to the very highest income brackets.. most people pay 30-35% income tax in sweden).
BUT.
We do not have a specific "broadband tax" in sweden, which means that the first things you should make sure is properly funded by the government should be important things like schools and healthcare (which arent properly funded). Not silly things like fiberlinks to every house. And thankyou for clearing up who the hell these people where when I saw them yesterday. I couldnt hear what the hell the nerd was mumbling into his microphone (I live in the town on the picture that is "just great"... yay Umeå!).
If anyone would like to debate with piratbyrån on abolishment of IP-laws, they can be found at #piratbyran.org @ efnet.
It depends if it is a long or a short "Å" sound. In Swedish the letter "Å" itself is actually pronounced with a long vowel sound in American English, like the "aw" in awesome (or "ou"ght in British English). The short sound (when used in words is pronounced like 'o' in "ogg").
Anyway, as a Brit living in Sweden I think Swedes demonstrating over a lack of bandwidth is a bit like Saudis protesting over a lack of sand. Get outta it! Most people in the cities have access to 10/100Mbit connections and DSL out of the cities. Note they are after 600Mbit!. No sympathy at all. Spoilt kiddies who don't know they are born syndrome.
Ho hum.
"Piratbyrån (the pirate bureau) demonstrated on three locations
Submitted: 2004, May the 2nd, 00:49
In three cities supporters of the Pirate Bureau demonstrated under slogans like "The welfare society starts at 100 Mbit" and "abolish copyright". In Stockholm almost 200 persons demonstrated, in Umeå about a hundred and in Malmö a bold handful. The participants chanted newmade slogans like "Use the force - Open Source" and "We want six, we want six, we want 600 Mbit" (pun lost in translation), and carried homemade banners with piracy and file sharing themes. In Stockholm the first Copyswap ever was pulled off, where people exchanged their privately burned discs with film or music with their new friends. In Umeå a price was awarded to the best dressed pirate; a real harddrive.
Both in Stockholm and Umeå there was particular focus on the newly finished campaign "Stoppa Fluktarna" (stop what? Will some Swedes help me out?), aiming to put pressure on the ISPs, so that they will not accept the media industry's mafia methods; spying on Internet users and subsequently reporting them to their ISPs.
In Umeå the demonstration marched by three large ISPs having offices in Umeå, and in Stockholm the final destination was Datainspektionen where 23000 signatures was passed over - burned on CDROM. Datainspektionen couldn't be bothered, so the list was put in their mailbox.
The Pirate Bureau wishes to thank everybody that participated in the demonstrations today. We showed that we exist for real, and that we have a force to be reckoned with. Until the next happening - keep on pirating!
Actually, sex is six in swedish, so it's more of a play on words than a geek call to mate :P
"Stoppa fluktarna" means "stop the peekers", it is a slang word generally reffering to peeking at wonem. It is a silly word, but the pirate bureau uses it to reffer to ISPs tracking your activities on the internet.
Cig? No, thank you.
Anyone else notice that in every picture the streets are empty? Not a single person outside other than the protestors. Nobody even knew they were protesting...
No, they were hungover. Walpurgis Night (April 30) is an age old drinking fest in Sweden.
Well, one difference is that when the clitoris is excised it eliminates that problematic issue of 'female orgasm' for the most part. It steals a woman's entire possibility of sexual pleasure. Plus there is a top-down theological system of coercion in place forcing the 'procedure' on young Islamic women.
Female breast enlargement isn't forced on women from a theological point of view, it's simply cosmetic surgery gone out of control. Social pressures related to appearance are shallow compared to the full-force cultural hammering that Islamic women fact.
Your trying to equate the issues is offense. It's similar to High School 'human rights' students who might try to equate their not being able to publish a newspaper to horrendous rights abuses from the past like the Holocaust or the Soviet Gulag system.
resigned