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The Circus Widens In Aftermath of Pirate Bay Verdict
MaulerOfEmotards sends along an in-depth followup, from the Swedish press, of our discussion the other day about the biased trial judge in the Pirate Bay case. "The turmoil concerns Tomas Norström, the presiding judge of The Pirate Bay trial, who is suspected of bias after reports surfaced of affiliation with copyright protection organizations. For this he has been reported to the appeals court (in Swedish; translation here). The circus around the judge is currently focused on three points. First, his personal affiliation with at least four copyright protection organizations, a state the potential bias of which he himself fails to see and refuses to admit. Secondly, Swedish trials use a system of several lay assessors to supervise the presiding judge. One of these, a member of an artists' interest organization, was forced by Mr. Norström to resign from the trial for potential bias. The judge's failure to see the obvious contradiction in this (translation) casts doubts on his suitability and competence. Thirdly, according to professor of judicial sociology Håkan Hydén (translation), the judge has inappropriately 'duped and influenced the lay assessors' during the trial: 'a judge that has decided that "this is something we can't allow" has little problem
finding legal arguments that are difficult for assisting lay assessors to counter.'" Click the link below to read further on Professor Hydén's enumeration of "at least three strange things in a strange trial." On a related note, reader Siker adds the factoid that membership in the Pirate Party exploded 150% in the week following the verdict. The Pirate Party now surpasses in size four smaller parties in Sweden, and is closing in on a fifth. Political fallout could ensue as soon as June, when an election for EU parliament will be held.
Professor Hydén continues with enumerating "at least three strange things in a strange trial" (translation): First, that someone can be sentenced for being accessory to a crime for which there is no main culprit: "This assumes someone else having committed the crime, and no such individual exists here... the system cannot charge the real culprits or it would collapse in its entirety." It is unprecedented in Swedish judicial history to sentence only an accessory. Second, that the accessories should pay the fine for a crime committed by the main culprits, "which causes the law to contradict itself." And third, that accessories cannot be sentenced to harsher than the main culprit, which means that every downloader must be sentenced to a year's confinement. Prof. Hydén sums up by saying that to allow this kind of judgement the Swedish Parliament must first pass a bill making this kind of services illegal, which it has not done.
Professor Hydén continues with enumerating "at least three strange things in a strange trial" (translation): First, that someone can be sentenced for being accessory to a crime for which there is no main culprit: "This assumes someone else having committed the crime, and no such individual exists here... the system cannot charge the real culprits or it would collapse in its entirety." It is unprecedented in Swedish judicial history to sentence only an accessory. Second, that the accessories should pay the fine for a crime committed by the main culprits, "which causes the law to contradict itself." And third, that accessories cannot be sentenced to harsher than the main culprit, which means that every downloader must be sentenced to a year's confinement. Prof. Hydén sums up by saying that to allow this kind of judgement the Swedish Parliament must first pass a bill making this kind of services illegal, which it has not done.
The one party pretending to be two have the people sufficiently duped. I think that wrestler turned politician, Jesse Ventura, said it exactly right when he said politics is a tremendous show and it's all fake. In so called "professional wrestling" people do actually get hurt and do actually die, but when they aren't in front of a camera, they are all going out to dinners with one another, playing golf, visiting each other's homes, having parties and the like. They are NOT bitter enemies. Republicrats are the same way. They may actually get indicted and prosecuted and even convicted of various things in and around party politics, but at the end of the day, they're all good ole boys and socialize and play together in their elite circles.
Had the judge been an active member of the Swedish Pirate Party, worked closely with the defendants in the past, not disclosed it and handed a not guilty verdict, you can be sure the *AAs would of been all over it like flies on a pile. Mistrial, end of story.
Their political system is fundamentally different from the one in the US, because it allows smaller parties to flourish. Fringe parties with say less than 10% of the vote actually get some representation, unlike in the US where the best they can do is screw one of the two parties.
Why is that more probable than the proposition? What are you basing your claim on?
The one party pretending to be two have the people sufficiently duped. I think that wrestler turned politician, Jesse Ventura, said it exactly right when he said politics is a tremendous show and it's all fake.
Piet Hein said it poetically:
Relativity: A grook with no reference whatever to the two-party system
To wear a shirt that's relatively clean,
You needn't ever launder off the dirt
If you possess two shirts to choose between
and always change into the cleaner shirt.
-- Piet Hein
We need a "+1 -- nice sig" moderation.
I'm not 'pro-piracy', although to say I'm 'anti-big media' would probably be fair. That said, copyright is not a single ideal and there are plenty of opinions on it's implementation. The groups that the judge is a member of take a view that the law should be changed to make copyright stricter - surely that presents a conflict of interests when dealing with a case that tests the limits of copyright law in the opposite direction?
It is an obvious conflict of interest when you are presiding over a case and are a member of an organization that sides strongly with one of the parties in the case.
It is generally okay to be biased toward one side due to internal beliefs. Most people do tend toward one side in contentious issues, but to openly run around and say it or promote one side (via membership in pro- organizations) is inappropriate.
Keeping works from the public domain by means of effectively infinite copyright terms is more disgusting. It's also "stealing" in the literal sense of the word, without having to twist its meaning to jive with a political agenda like the pro-copyright lobby likes to do, and is a violation of the social contract that is the sole reason copyright exists in the first place.
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
The name Pirate Party especially intrigues me. The reason is this: movements in history often end up very far from where they start. Imagine in 100 years, when history has stripped the original reason for the naming of the 'Pirate Party' from social memory, as a father explains to his son why the majority party of their country is named after ancient sea-robbers. Already the term pirate has been shifted and reassigned once. What if some day the just majority of a society is known as pirates? Shifts in ideology produce interesting etymological histories.
They are NOT bitter enemies. Republicrats are the same way.
An irony is that while the politicians get along pretty well, the rank-and-file citizenry of the Democrat and Republican parties in the US are practically at each others' throats, in no small part because they've been goaded there by fringe groups and media personalities.
Apart from the outrageous examples you mention, it's really because you don't have proportional representation but a "first past the post" electoral system. When only one candidate from a constituency gets elected smaller parties have no real chance.
I'm sorry if I haven't offended anyone
Exactly. This judge is essentially speeding in order to change the speed limit. Instead of judging by the current laws and waiting for the legislature to change the laws which he can enforce, he is taking matters into his own hands and changing the law himself by stretching the law to cover the situation in the way he feels it should.
The question is: is this or isn't this simply what judges do they administer verdicts? Isn't just always inherently interpretive? Is judgment a referential or creative act?
Cause political chaos by throwing sudden, and massive support behind a new political party. Wish Americans were capable of picking some other party aside from Republicans or Democrats.
Both the Republican and the Democrat parties are Pirates. They both want all my money, and go to extreme measures to get it.
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
Libertarians have a hard time bowing to authority and being labeled.
So a lot of them feel it necessary to rebel against the Libertarian Party, only dooming every libertarian to even further political insignificance.
Hence, every libertarian (one who subscribes to libertarian ideals) is not a Libertarian (one who subscribes to libertarian ideals and belongs to the Libertarian Party). Yawn.
Buckle your ROFL belt, we're in for some LOLs.
I honestly believe that the Internet is one of, if not the, greatest inventions ever. That's why I think defending it is more important than if the tax goes up or down 2%
On the one side: Copyright infringers.
On the other side: Those who want to lock down personal computers and the internet, spy on same, lock down anything else which can reproduce sound or video, implement a pay-per-use system for everything, shut down DVD rental services, eliminate fair use, use lawyers to bully people (whether culpable or not), increase copyright terms to infinity less one day, etc.
Which side would you expect slashdotters to be on? You can argue there's a middle ground, but for various reasons I think there really isn't, and in any case is it really surprising getting binary thinking from a computer geek site?
Nobody cares about the "Pirate Party." It's just a bunch of morons who signed up online out of spite and probably will never be heard from again.
Uh, considering your whole post was as bad as this, I'm just surprised it didn't stay modded down.
Perhaps if you at least left out all the name-calling?
Most European countries are ruled by coalitions. Apart of Italy, they tend to be pretty stable and last at least the four years till the next election.
The party that wins the election tries to find a party that makes it the majority in the parliament. To find such a partner, it has to make concessions and to promise not to go on ideological overdrive. The pressure to rule wisely doesn't come only from outside from the public and the lobbying interest groups, but also from inside the government itself.
I tend to think this is fairly wise way to rule a country. Sure, you can't make fast moves like you can in America, but on the other hand, the changes that happen are well thought out and not apt to be reversed after the next election. The instability of the cabinet brings, maybe contradictionary, stability to the country as a whole.
Chronologically late.
FPTP tends to produce a two-party system, but these parties have a strong incentive to cluster around where the true compromise position is likely to be
You mean a strong incentive to cluster around where the money is likely to be.
The really outstanding part of FPTP is it's really cheap to buy the appropriate representation; it's not like a purchased candidate is going to be replaced with an unpurchased one. You can afford them all.
Political compromise positions in two party systems do not have to fall anywhere near the voters actual compromise positions; fptp politics, even beside the ease of exerting pressure, simply cannot accurately represent a multidimensional political landscape.
The system can sometimes be unfair, especially to people with more unusual views
Oh, please. With the high level of disenfranchisement, the majority position of the US congress is achieved at vote representing somewhere between 20-25 percent of eligible voters. That itself is equivalent with the level of support some far left socialist or libertarians get in some countries with proportional representation.
However it is because their views are unlikely to form part of the consensus position
Their views on what? There are certainly many issues where libertarians would join some republicans in forming a consensus on economics. And they'd form a consensus with some democrats on other issues. Adding more dimensions does not mean you get a consensus further from the voters, it means it gets harder for politicians to ignore their voters and quid-pro-quo bargain away issues as they like, as there are other options to vote for.
You never think about the people you're ripping off--the musicians, software developers, screenwriters, and so on.
Horse-carriages and automobiles my friend.
Musicians: If I can't copy their music, then neither can they. Do gigs and performances like real musicians do. There's no law that says you, as a musician, are entitled to income. It's an art, if your art sucks, if people don't like you enough to buy your cd's, you don't get paid, and you don't get to whine about it.
Software-developers: You produce tools that people use to create value. Tools that can be magically copied with no effort. If you want to make money on it, do it by implementing the tools you have created (being the creator gives you a fair head-start in this). Would you have a problem giving away hammers to people for free if you could replicate an original (which you made yourself) ad infinitum?
Screenwriters: Adjust your expectations. Just because your output-volume has risened does not mean the individuals demand will too. In every other field people know what they're buying before they buy it. Don't jump at people for wanting to know whether your work is quality or insipid trash before they decide to buy (or not buy) your product. A recent survey has shown that people who pirate movies are ten times more likely to buy movies than people who don't pirate. Don't whine if you fail.
If you quote this signature there'll be 72 copies of Windows ME waiting for you in Heaven.