You can also follow the trial through a number of different TPB channels, all being aggregated on the site (Spectacle + Trial = ) SPECTRIAL. If you want to chat to Anakata, Brokep or anyone else they also seem to be online in #spectrial on EFNet (IRC). Twitter feeds can also be found on SPECTRIAL, or by clicking here.

Anyways… Yesterday and today has been used by the prosecutor, Håkan Roswall, to present his evidence. He’s so mindblowingly boring to listen to so both the defendants, the judge and the lay judges have problems staying awake. The judge actually asked him not to be so slow in order to keeo everyone awake

The real problems started for him this morning after presenting most of the torrents that he wanted to use as evidence to “that they had helped with copyright infringement”. Unfortunately for him, no documentation on which tracker that had really been in use had been recorded (as pointed out by the defendants).

This rendered most of his “Aiding copyright-infringement”-evidence useless. As brokep (one of the TPB guys) summarized on twitter a couple of hours ago:

- reference.

So now the trial has been reduced to a trial on “Enabling the distribution of torrentfiles ‘containing’ copyrighted materials”.

In other words, the prosecutor is actually trying to convict the TPB guys of distributing .torrent files linking to copyrighted information on www.thepiratbay.com. But… since when is linking illegal?

The guys defense lawyer, Per E Samuelson, summarizes:
“This development is amazing – and that this means that the defence has already achieved half their aims”

As brokep says, EPIC WINNING LOL.

More in English from swedish blogger Scaber Nestor here, here and here.

Attention to the EFF & ORG Sound Copyright petition!

This is an effort to petition against the extension of copyright in the European Union. Extending copyright from 50 to 95 years will not lead to anything positive and will only harm artists and culture. Sign the petition here.

More info:

EFF – EU Copyright Extension: Help MEPs Hear the Other Side
ORG – Consumers, citizens and information professionals around the world unite to condemn copyright extension
Ars Technica – EU pays for, then ignores study on copyright extension
TheRegister – EU commissioner backs record biz on copyright extensions
The Guardian (Cory Doctorow) – Love music? Hate exploitation? Now’s the time to make your voice heard

How copyright extension in sound recordings actually works:

Want more? Do a search on Google. They link to stuff

Well, just don’t add them.

A-R-G-H-H-H.

Swartz used this as an illustration. It’s right on.

The situation is now like this;

The parliament has voted on the Telecoms package. As familiar, amendment 166 was voted into the package and thus providing european citizens with protection against arbitrary disconnection from the internet and privacy.

So far all good and here’s the voting results from EU-parliament so you can read for yourselves.

Now the matter moved on to the “WORKING PARTY ON TELECOMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION SOCIETY” whose job is to prepare the package for either a second hearing, or if everyone are still agreeing, for the ministers for OK’ing.

HOWEVER (always seem to be a however in my posts), what they are now doing is more or less editing away the amendments that were added and making it as they (the french, primarily) want it. Yep, that’s right, they are actually editing the democratic decision by the parliament to fit the lobbying organizations needs. A leaked document shows us this progress and the evidently left out “Article 32a” which would be the one containing amendment 166′s content.

We now need to make some noise! But not just the (crazy?) swedes, everyone! If you are from another European country please send e-mails to your MEP’s and/or call them and ask them to follow-up on and verify that their democratically voted decisions stands firm! Remind them that if this can be changed, so can their own main issues and that this should not go unnoticed through a democratic system!

I’m getting seriously tired of writing about politicians and others tricking and removing citizens rights.

Can’t any of them please break the trend so I can write something nice?

Others writing (mostly in Swedish, use the translator): Oscar Swartz, Opassande, Josef, scaber_nestor, farmorgun, Frihet-Fildelning&Feminism, satmaran, Jens. O, HAX.

Got an invite to the free beta program of Spotify from my co-worker Sebastian (last one ) and I must agree with him when he says this is a great application.

For those of you that have not heard of Spotify, read up on it here. In short, it’s an application that let’s you stream any amount of music for a monthly fee (about 8€). Later on you will also have the option of not paying, but having the app show banners etc. That option is only available right now if you have an invite.

Not only is the application extremely slim graphically, but the performance looks very good as of yet (approx 12MB of ram consumed).

This is the kind of thing that could solve the piracy problem for a lot of companies. This is adapting your distribution methods to a new generation (instead of suing it).

I’m not really surprised that it’s a new entrepreneur that developed this, but it’s kind of sad. If this will be the future and replace many other methods of distribution, what the f*ck was all the legal litigation good for? Why did they not spend the money developing new technology minimizing their “time to market” and other factors instead of ruining ordinary peoples lives. Makes you wonder…

Well well. Spotify is great though Try a “day pass” (about 1€) and see if you like it!

UPDATE: Article at TheLocal.se about Spotify here!

“To be able to live of your creations – an informational folder on copyright” – to be distributed in Sweden’s schools.

Feels strange that my tax money is going to sommy lobbying organizations project, but it’s not all bad. It actually contains correct facts, and correctly identifies some laws that you break every day without trying.

However, some of the usual lies and misconceptions about filesharing and it’s effect on the artists are still there. Swedish politicians and government employees should once again do their homework.

Oh, did I mention the folder is now available on The Pirate Bay ?

PS. For those concerned, I’m not against copyright. I’m just against the current form of it (which just doesn’t provide anything positive at all). .DS

UPDATE: Information of this kind (lobbying/propaganda) is actually illegal to distribute in Swedish schools. All information delivered by the schools themselves need to be balanced, informational and unbiased. So once again the Government breaks the laws it has created. Apparently a member of parliament has asked, in writing, our “Minister of Education” Jan Björklund to explain why they’re doing this and how they will make it right. In other words, they might have to finance a pro-piracy folder in the coming months… Cheerios!