It's pretty plain to see that the Swedish legal system has been hijacked by the media industry.
Typical fines dished out recently by the courts in Sweden...
Murder: 75000kr (£6825)
Rape of a 14 year old girl: 50000kr (£4550)
Pirate Bay fine for aiding Copyright infringment: 46000000kr (£4.1 million)
I'm not saying that they haven't done anything wrong (although if they have done something wrong then it's hard to understand why Google haven't been indicted as their index contains many, many more links to torrent files than the Pirate Bay's does), but lets get this in perspective. The fine is outrageous and has absolutely no basis in reality.
Another thing to mention is that this is not the end of the road. The Pirate Bays guys have already said they will appeal this ruling. There is one higher court in Sweden to appeal to and they have already said they will appeal to the European Court in Brussels if necessary.
I've never understood why it is allowed to publish the names of the accused in the first place, until it is established if they are guilty or innocent.
In the U.K. (my homeland) as in many countries in the world the press are allowed to report the names of those accused but not charged with a crime. In Sweden (the country where am I living right now) this is not allowed, which means that when the press report on high profile cases going through the courts they generally make up their own "nicknames" for the accused. Right now they are reporting on the "Arboga Murderer" and a couple of years ago in a famous case here in Sweden involving a murder by members of a religious sect there was a female accused that the press called "The Bride of Christ". The press are only allowed to publish the names if the accused are found guilty, otherwise they slip back into the anonimity they had before the whole court case started.
I think this is a better system but obviously there are differing views.
I'm interested to know, why do you think it's important for the press to be allowed to publish the names of people accused of crimes before they have been found innocent or guilty?
The reason that, although it's illegal, the police don't go after individual downloaders is that in Sweden this is only a civil offence which even if prosecuted only incurs a fine with no possibility of jail. There are rules in Sweden which prevent the police from searching premises or property or obtaining information from third parties like ISPs when only pursuing a civil case which has no possibility of a jail sentence. That's the reason why the whole country was up in arms about the original raid and the seizure of the servers. Everyone thought this was a complete waste of police time and tax payers money pursuing a civil and not criminal offence.
There's a company in Sweden called UpZide Labs (http://www.upzide.com/) that's been working on a technology called VDSL (Vectored DSL) for a few years. This also promises speeds of 100Mb/s using normal copper connections in use right now with normal ADSL.
The figure you give is for the Olympics as a whole over the whole period that the Olympics are broadcast. The last World Cup final in France in 2002 attracted a TV audience of 1.3 billion viewers which is the largest TV audience for a single event.
In Europe many of the games will be played during working hours and since most office workers don't have a TV at their desk they will probably be watching via the internet. The big worry is whether corporate networks can cope, not the internet in general which I'm sure will be just fine.
The article was mainly referring to the BBCs decision to stream all the matches live on the internet for viewers in the UK. Many of the matches are during working hours and there is a big worry that many corporate networks won't be able to take the strain of hundreds of people watching at their desks. I don't think there is any great danger of the internet as a whole having any problem whatsoever.
I know you're only a troll. But anyway the the World Cup Final is the single biggest sporting event in the World period. It dwarfs the so called World Series in baseball and the Super Bowl and any of the individual Olympic events. It also happens to be a sporting event that actually deserves the word "World" in it's title unlike the World Series in baseball which as far as I can tell is contested between teams from USA and Canada exclusively and the Super Bowl where the winners are crowned as World champions (what a joke!)
(From a Brit. currently living in Sweden)
The biggest complaint from most of the Swedish public seems not to be with the morality or legality of what Pirate Bay is doing, but is with the gross waste of public funds being used to pursue a largely unimportant civil crime for which the maximum penalty is only a fine with no possibility of prison. The police in Sweden do not normally get involved in pursuing this type of case leaving it up to the aggrieved party (in this case the Record and Film companies) to bring this up before a civil court themselves. People in Sweden are mighty pissed off that their taxes are being used in this way.
Aftonbladet (one of Sweden's biggest newspapers) has an interesting survey on their website asking "Is it right that the police should crack down on file sharers?"...
I live and work in Sweden (although I'm from UK) and the standard benefit is 25 days vacation plus around 13 days of public holidays. This is pretty similar to UK which also generally has 25 days vacation plus around 11 days of public holidays.
In both Sweden and UK some companies also operate flex time so it's possible to build up more free time (the company I work for also allows you to choose between cash or free time when you have worked paid overtime).
However, the biggest difference in Sweden is that it is a workers right to be allowed to take 4 weeks vacation in a row in the summer (assuming of course they have enough holiday entitlement left), and it's not that uncommon for people to take 6 weeks in the summer if they have built up enough free days. A lot of Swedes work like mad in the winter when it's dark so they can enjoy the nice weather in the summer.
In UK, it is uncommon to take any more than 2 weeks vacation at one time. The last company I worked for in UK allowed you to take 3 weeks but you had to ask permission and your manager had to agree.
The BBC receives no 'hefty' governmental contributions whatsoever and is funded entirely by the license fee and any other commercial activities they are allowed to engage in accoring to their Royal Charter.
It was a huge GM plant until they closed it down about 6 months ago. Now its empty and a lot of poor people in Luton are without jobs. -- Steve Brammer (From U.K. but currently residing in Västerås, Sweden)
There is an update to the earlier article that kicked of this discussion at The Register which I think shows just how confused, and confusing, British law is at the moment regarding the use of mobile phones while driving. If the article is correct it doesn't look like its going to get any better either.
--
Steve Brammer
(From U.K. but currently residing in Västerås, Sweden)
Then the question must be... Why doesn't some entrepreneur in UK start a company and connect people woth 10MBits/s broadband? What is the reason that this is possible in Sweden and seems to be impossible in UK?? -- Steve Brammer (From UK but currently residing in Västerås, Sweden)
You are correct when you say that there is a huge demand for broadband in the UK, but the really sad thing is that what is being offered to fill the demand is already out of date. In this day and age ADSL can hardly be described as 'broadband' as it is in most cases only 512Kb/sec. The UK government is dreaming if they really believe that everyone having an ADSL connection will make the UK the most competative place in Europe for e-business. By the time they have managed to roll out ADSL to the majority of the population, most of the rest of Europe will already have installed fiber networks and consumers will have 10Mb/sec connections. Sadly, at the moment, the UK governement either doesn't have a clue or doesn't have the inclination to even start talking about fiber networks.
I am from UK, but I live in Sweden in a town of approximately 120,000 people (small by UK standards) and I have a 10Mb/sec ethernet connection in my appartment for which I pay 300kr per month (about £25 or $30). ADSL costs the same as this in UK and in most cases is 20 times slower. Why can't UK get its act together? And before people start talking about BTs monoply causing problems please considered that Telia in Sweden also have about the same kind of monopoly position as BT in UK but this does not seem to have hindered the roll out of high speed consumer broadband in Sweden!
-- Steve Brammer (From UK but currently living in Västerås, Sweden)
The PP part has changed in recent years and no longer represents Place of birth. I know as I have a Swedish personnummer and was born abroad (England). When you apply for a personummer the current form explains that the PP part of the number just cycles around a series these days and does not indicate place of birth or if you where born abroad.
I guess because of the number of immigrants these days (myself included by the way) they are afraid of unfair treatment based on the knowledge that someone was born abroad or were born in a certain area in the case of second genration immigrants (if ghettos start to appear).
Also, in reply to an earlier post the YY part is more commonly YYYY these days. This is how it is on new ID cards and increasingly offical forms that require you to enter your personummer ask for 4 digits for the date.
Slashdot Mirror
It's pretty plain to see that the Swedish legal system has been hijacked by the media industry.
Typical fines dished out recently by the courts in Sweden...
Murder: 75000kr (£6825)
Rape of a 14 year old girl: 50000kr (£4550)
Pirate Bay fine for aiding Copyright infringment: 46000000kr (£4.1 million)
I'm not saying that they haven't done anything wrong (although if they have done something wrong then it's hard to understand why Google haven't been indicted as their index contains many, many more links to torrent files than the Pirate Bay's does), but lets get this in perspective. The fine is outrageous and has absolutely no basis in reality. Another thing to mention is that this is not the end of the road. The Pirate Bays guys have already said they will appeal this ruling. There is one higher court in Sweden to appeal to and they have already said they will appeal to the European Court in Brussels if necessary.
I've never understood why it is allowed to publish the names of the accused in the first place, until it is established if they are guilty or innocent.
In the U.K. (my homeland) as in many countries in the world the press are allowed to report the names of those accused but not charged with a crime. In Sweden (the country where am I living right now) this is not allowed, which means that when the press report on high profile cases going through the courts they generally make up their own "nicknames" for the accused. Right now they are reporting on the "Arboga Murderer" and a couple of years ago in a famous case here in Sweden involving a murder by members of a religious sect there was a female accused that the press called "The Bride of Christ". The press are only allowed to publish the names if the accused are found guilty, otherwise they slip back into the anonimity they had before the whole court case started.
I think this is a better system but obviously there are differing views.
I'm interested to know, why do you think it's important for the press to be allowed to publish the names of people accused of crimes before they have been found innocent or guilty?
It's Denmark not Holland.
The reason that, although it's illegal, the police don't go after individual downloaders is that in Sweden this is only a civil offence which even if prosecuted only incurs a fine with no possibility of jail. There are rules in Sweden which prevent the police from searching premises or property or obtaining information from third parties like ISPs when only pursuing a civil case which has no possibility of a jail sentence. That's the reason why the whole country was up in arms about the original raid and the seizure of the servers. Everyone thought this was a complete waste of police time and tax payers money pursuing a civil and not criminal offence.
There's a company in Sweden called UpZide Labs (http://www.upzide.com/) that's been working on a technology called VDSL (Vectored DSL) for a few years. This also promises speeds of 100Mb/s using normal copper connections in use right now with normal ADSL.
Population density in Sweden is in fact much lower than in USA. 20 people per sq. km in Sweden and 31 people per sq. km in USA.
_ population_density
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by
That still doesn't explain the difference in broadband quality between Sweden (20 people per sq. km) and USA (31 people per sq. km).
Sorry, my bad, of course the last World Cup was in Japan & South Korea. The viewing figure still stands.
The figure you give is for the Olympics as a whole over the whole period that the Olympics are broadcast. The last World Cup final in France in 2002 attracted a TV audience of 1.3 billion viewers which is the largest TV audience for a single event.
In Europe many of the games will be played during working hours and since most office workers don't have a TV at their desk they will probably be watching via the internet. The big worry is whether corporate networks can cope, not the internet in general which I'm sure will be just fine.
Oh great, Japan as well, like that makes it the "World" Series.
The article was mainly referring to the BBCs decision to stream all the matches live on the internet for viewers in the UK. Many of the matches are during working hours and there is a big worry that many corporate networks won't be able to take the strain of hundreds of people watching at their desks. I don't think there is any great danger of the internet as a whole having any problem whatsoever.
I know you're only a troll. But anyway the the World Cup Final is the single biggest sporting event in the World period. It dwarfs the so called World Series in baseball and the Super Bowl and any of the individual Olympic events. It also happens to be a sporting event that actually deserves the word "World" in it's title unlike the World Series in baseball which as far as I can tell is contested between teams from USA and Canada exclusively and the Super Bowl where the winners are crowned as World champions (what a joke!)
(From a Brit. currently living in Sweden) The biggest complaint from most of the Swedish public seems not to be with the morality or legality of what Pirate Bay is doing, but is with the gross waste of public funds being used to pursue a largely unimportant civil crime for which the maximum penalty is only a fine with no possibility of prison. The police in Sweden do not normally get involved in pursuing this type of case leaving it up to the aggrieved party (in this case the Record and Film companies) to bring this up before a civil court themselves. People in Sweden are mighty pissed off that their taxes are being used in this way.
v isa/0,1937,20844,00.html
Aftonbladet (one of Sweden's biggest newspapers) has an interesting survey on their website asking "Is it right that the police should crack down on file sharers?"...
http://www.aftonbladet.se/vss/special/storfragan/
Currently over 50,000 votes have been cast and it's roughly 16%-yes and 84%-no.
Scotch is an alcoholic liquor distilled from grain.
People who come from Scotland are called Scots.
I live and work in Sweden (although I'm from UK) and the standard benefit is 25 days vacation plus around 13 days of public holidays. This is pretty similar to UK which also generally has 25 days vacation plus around 11 days of public holidays.
In both Sweden and UK some companies also operate flex time so it's possible to build up more free time (the company I work for also allows you to choose between cash or free time when you have worked paid overtime).
However, the biggest difference in Sweden is that it is a workers right to be allowed to take 4 weeks vacation in a row in the summer (assuming of course they have enough holiday entitlement left), and it's not that uncommon for people to take 6 weeks in the summer if they have built up enough free days. A lot of Swedes work like mad in the winter when it's dark so they can enjoy the nice weather in the summer.
In UK, it is uncommon to take any more than 2 weeks vacation at one time. The last company I worked for in UK allowed you to take 3 weeks but you had to ask permission and your manager had to agree.
Särskilt till amerikanare vem kanske inte förstår sakasm i all fall ;-)
--- Brit. living in Sweden
The BBC receives no 'hefty' governmental contributions whatsoever and is funded entirely by the license fee and any other commercial activities they are allowed to engage in accoring to their Royal Charter.
It was a huge GM plant until they closed it down about 6 months ago. Now its empty and a lot of poor people in Luton are without jobs.
--
Steve Brammer
(From U.K. but currently residing in Västerås, Sweden)
There is an update to the earlier article that kicked of this discussion at The Register which I think shows just how confused, and confusing, British law is at the moment regarding the use of mobile phones while driving. If the article is correct it doesn't look like its going to get any better either.
--
Steve Brammer
(From U.K. but currently residing in Västerås, Sweden)
Then the question must be...
Why doesn't some entrepreneur in UK start a company and connect people woth 10MBits/s broadband? What is the reason that this is possible in Sweden and seems to be impossible in UK??
--
Steve Brammer
(From UK but currently residing in Västerås, Sweden)
You are correct when you say that there is a huge demand for broadband in the UK, but the really sad thing is that what is being offered to fill the demand is already out of date. In this day and age ADSL can hardly be described as 'broadband' as it is in most cases only 512Kb/sec. The UK government is dreaming if they really believe that everyone having an ADSL connection will make the UK the most competative place in Europe for e-business. By the time they have managed to roll out ADSL to the majority of the population, most of the rest of Europe will already have installed fiber networks and consumers will have 10Mb/sec connections. Sadly, at the moment, the UK governement either doesn't have a clue or doesn't have the inclination to even start talking about fiber networks.
I am from UK, but I live in Sweden in a town of approximately 120,000 people (small by UK standards) and I have a 10Mb/sec ethernet connection in my appartment for which I pay 300kr per month (about £25 or $30). ADSL costs the same as this in UK and in most cases is 20 times slower. Why can't UK get its act together? And before people start talking about BTs monoply causing problems please considered that Telia in Sweden also have about the same kind of monopoly position as BT in UK but this does not seem to have hindered the roll out of high speed consumer broadband in Sweden!
--
Steve Brammer
(From UK but currently living in Västerås, Sweden)
The PP part has changed in recent years and no longer represents Place of birth. I know as I have a Swedish personnummer and was born abroad (England). When you apply for a personummer the current form explains that the PP part of the number just cycles around a series these days and does not indicate place of birth or if you where born abroad.
I guess because of the number of immigrants these days (myself included by the way) they are afraid of unfair treatment based on the knowledge that someone was born abroad or were born in a certain area in the case of second genration immigrants (if ghettos start to appear).
Also, in reply to an earlier post the YY part is more commonly YYYY these days. This is how it is on new ID cards and increasingly offical forms that require you to enter your personummer ask for 4 digits for the date.