Norwegian Lawyers Must Stop Chasing File Sharers

Skapare sends word from TorrentFreak that Norway's Simonsen law firm has lost their license to pursue file sharers. "Just days after Norway's data protection department told ISPs they must delete all personal IP address-related data three weeks after collection, it's now become safer than ever to be a file-sharer in Norway. The only law firm with a license to track pirates has just seen it expire and it won't be renewed." Skapare adds, "Sounds like Norway's government treats privacy seriously. Maybe they've been watching the abuses in the USA. More info on the Norwegian perspective in this Google translation from Dagbladet.no."

Comments

Half-right...

[Chabo]

Sounds like Norway's government treats privacy seriously. Maybe they've been watching the abuses in the USA.

A bigger part of it is just that European governments take the privacy of their citizens very seriously.

Except Britain, of course.

Re:Half-right...

[T Murphy]

A bigger part of it is just that European governments take the privacy of their citizens very seriously.

Except Britain, of course.

I was under the impression the British government took privacy very - almost too - seriously. They even have those cameras set up to monitor private lives - ensuring no one's right to privacy goes overlooked or unwatched. How can the government know their citizens have privacy if the government can't watch?

This is not over yet...

[Sholmas]

The Minister of Culture has said he supports the outing of "pirates", and will support the so-called "pirate-hunters" in their application for a new lisence. Google Translate link: http://translate.google.com/translate?prev=hp&hl=en&js=n&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dagbladet.no%2F2009%2F06%2F23%2Fkultur%2Ffildeling%2Fteknio%2Ftrond_giske%2F6860130%2F&sl=no&tl=en&history_state0=

Re:This is not over yet...

[verbalcontract]

"Pirate-hunters" -- you are speaking of course about their age-old enemies, the ninjas?

Re:This is not over yet...

[bertoelcon]

"Pirate-hunters" -- you are speaking of course about their age-old enemies, the ninjas?

Is this why we never hear of piracy reports from Japan. I just put two and two together and it now makes perfect sense.

Or maybe they don't care...

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Maybe its not that they care so much about privacy that they don't care so much about piracy.

The reason the US gets so butt-hurt about piracy is because hollywood dominates the entertainment business worldwide - there are only a handful of countries were domestic movies regularly outsell hollywood productions at the box office (mostly S Korea, France, India and mainland China and some of that is helped by quota restrictions on foreign productions), and my guess is that the number is even smaller when it comes to DVDs.

Now I'm going to make a wild-ass guess that a lot of the locally produced works in Norway receive significant public funding. If true, that's also an incentive to ignore piracy because if tax dollars are paying for the creation then it isn't a big leap of logic to expect that the results are "owned" by the public too.

So, from that perspective, it seems reasonable that anti-piracy would be near the bottom of the list of government priorities in Norway (and many other countries for that matter).

Re:Or maybe they don't care...

[causality]

Maybe its not that they care so much about privacy that they don't care so much about piracy.

The reason the US gets so butt-hurt about piracy is because hollywood dominates the entertainment business worldwide - there are only a handful of countries were domestic movies regularly outsell hollywood productions at the box office (mostly S Korea, France, India and mainland China and some of that is helped by quota restrictions on foreign productions), and my guess is that the number is even smaller when it comes to DVDs.

Now I'm going to make a wild-ass guess that a lot of the locally produced works in Norway receive significant public funding. If true, that's also an incentive to ignore piracy because if tax dollars are paying for the creation then it isn't a big leap of logic to expect that the results are "owned" by the public too.

So, from that perspective, it seems reasonable that anti-piracy would be near the bottom of the list of government priorities in Norway (and many other countries for that matter).

I've always felt that when govenrments worry about things like piracy and drug usage, what they're really doing is sending the message "we have an overabundance of resources and personnel which is why we can afford to worry about these things -- please reduce our size and power immediately." The message is quite clear but there are a lot of people who have difficulty interpreting it.

Election year

[Ost99]

Don't expect this to be the last word on the matter, the politicians just don't want to rock the boat right now.

The Minister of culture has openly supported the vigilante tactics of the "pirate-hunters", but this is probably not the right time of the 4-year election cycle to do anything drastic.
During the last election the same man promised to re-legalese file sharing. The statement was retracted only days after a surprising high turnout of young voters won him and his party the election...

Re:So, for the Norwegian Slashdotters:

[Dionysus]

1. What's the tech economy like over there?
2. How long does it take to learn your language OR how English friendly is it?
3. What's the average cost of living in your cities?

1. It's OK. Mostly in finance and oil industry. Java (SOA) is heavily used.
2. Business is basically English (even for Norwegian companies). My company has Swedes (lots), Sri Lankan, Englishmen, couple of Indians/Pakistani, French. Coding/documentation is in English.
3. About like Bay Area.

All that, and we get standard 5 weeks of paid vacation, paternity/maternity leave (husband/wife get to share how much they spend at home the first year), strong currency (relatively cheap to buy stuff when you travel), beautiful Swedish women.
Minuses: a socialist government and Jante Law ingrained in the Norwegian psyche.

Re:How do I Immigrate?

[Anonymous Coward]

Instructions

Re:So, for the Norwegian Slashdotters:

[orzetto]

Not Norwegian myself, though lived there 7 years. Possibly moving back in the near future.

1. 1. Pretty good I would say. The country has had budget surplus for years and is not feeling the effects of the crisis as bad as e.g. Iceland. Estate prices actually went up 4% first quarter (most Norwegians do own their home, so it's a good indicator).
2. 2. Norwegian is not as difficult as German but not as easy as French, many words are not guessable. Main difficulty is that everybody speaks very good English and practising Norwegian is quite difficult if you are not strong-willed. Also, most imported TV shows and movies are in original language (i.e. 90% English). Learning Norwegian also means you can read Danish and read/understand Swedish.
3. 3. Insane, but you pay what you get for. Alcoholic beverages quite expensive because of local edition of prohibition never really being abolished. Foodstuffs are expensive because of protectionism, and quality is lacking (keep in mind I come from a country with high food standard, so I am picky; from the US it's probably still an improvement). Other wares (computer parts, internet connections, whatever could interest a slashdotter) are in line with most of Europe. However, salaries are pretty high for most standards. Note that the Gini index is quite low, i.e. as a sysadmin you will make more than in the US, but not as a CEO.

You forgot to ask for:

• Taxes; it's 25% VAT IIRC, plus about 25-30% on your income (that's for a typical engineering job, after all detractions are taken care of). In 2007 I made 458 kNOK (about $100k) gross as a C++ programmer and paid 29.5% in direct taxes.
• Healthcare: Grand Old Socialist system. You pay 7.8% of gross income (that's already included in the figure at the previous point), when you go to the hospital you could have to pay a fee; anything beyond a certain amount (it used to be 1600 NOK / $250) is shouldered by the state, though. Dentists are for reasons unknown to me only private (and guess what, that's the part of the Norwegian health care that it expensive and broken).
• Bureaucracy: pretty efficient. I live in Germany now and I think the Norwegians did a better job. Not boneheaded at following rules, result-oriented but not scruffy.

So yes, it's a pretty nice place to be, unless you can't stand snow, rain, and socialists in power.

Re:So, for the Norwegian Slashdotters:

[The Wannabe King]

That depends on how you calculate it. The income tax is usually about 30 % - 35 % for an ordinary income ($60k). The marginal tax rate is 47.8 % for income over $110k. In addition the employer has to pay a tax of 14.1 % of the employee's income that the employee never sees. It should probably be included. The VAT is a whopping 25 % (14 % on food).

If you make a lot of money, and spend most of it on non-food, it is probably possible to pass 60 %, but that is rare.

I would also say the numbers are misleading without some information on what you get. Norway, like the rest of Europe, has universal heath care so there is no health insurance to pay, no matter what preconditions you may have. The taxes also include unemployment benefits, a pension plan and 100 % pay for a year if you can't work due to illness. Comparing tax rates without accounting for insurances you absolutely need to have is not fair.

Re:How do I Immigrate?

[Kjella]

Before we scare away all the nice people, it's a traditional christmas dinner but not the most typical. Top three are pork ribs, Pinnekjøtt and Lutefisk. A minority has also adopted the english christmas turkey, smalahove is probably around 5th place. P.S. If you read anywhere that Pizza Grandiosa is popular for christmas, it's for the kids that don't want the wierd stuff :D