"Rule Brittannia, Britannia rules the waves, Britons never, never shall be made to slaves"
"It is inconceivable to me that a waking nation in the full consciousness of its freedom would have allowed its government to pass such laws as
the Protection from Harassment Act (1997),
the Crime and Disorder Act (1998),
the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (2000),
the Terrorism Act (2000),
the Criminal Justice and Police Act (2001),
the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act (2001),
the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Extension Act (2002),
the Criminal Justice Act (2003),
the Extradition Act (2003),
the Anti-Social Behaviour Act (2003),
the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act (2004),
the Civil Contingencies Act (2004),
the Prevention of Terrorism Act (2005),
the Inquiries Act (2005),
the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act (2005),
not to mention a host of pending legislation such as the Identity Cards Bill, the Coroners and Justice Bill, and the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill. " after Philip Pullman
Just a reminder...
Not mentioning it doesn't make it go away
We do not want to hear you talking about truth Truth is a friend of yours, not a friend of ours "
The quote above, and below, are from "Malevolent voices that despise our freedoms" by Philip Pullman, on Times Online. Written for last years Convention on Modern Liberty, it is the best thing I've read all year... This is just a snippet ... I encourage you. Go read it all... (My friend in serendipity was Charles Pooter, at Little Man, What Now?...)
"It is inconceivable to me that a waking nation in the full consciousness of its freedom would have allowed its government to pass such laws as the Protection from Harassment Act (1997), the Crime and Disorder Act (1998), the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (2000), the Terrorism Act (2000), the Criminal Justice and Police Act (2001), the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act (2001), the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Extension Act (2002), the Criminal Justice Act (2003), the Extradition Act (2003), the Anti-Social Behaviour Act (2003), the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act (2004), the Civil Contingencies Act (2004), the Prevention of Terrorism Act (2005), the Inquiries Act (2005), the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act (2005), not to mention a host of pending legislation such as the Identity Cards Bill, the Coroners and Justice Bill, and the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill.
Inconceivable. And those laws say: Sleep, you stinking cowards Sweating as you dream of rights and freedoms Freedom is too hard for you We shall decide what freedom is Sleep, you vermin
Sleep, you scum. "
But let's say you are not asleep? What are you going to do about it???
Cabalamat blogs on The Pirate Party blog about the case of Edwyn Collins - who was barred by MySpace from uploading his own music because he didn't own the copyright - but he does. The story was also covered in the Guardian but origininates from Edwin's wife and manager Grace on the blog on Edwyn's MySpace page..
According to the Guardian the villians of the piece are Warner Music group - who have been contacted by Grace but months later failed to resolve things.. (It's nowhere explained if Edwyn also owns the copyright on his recordings..) The savvy Grace also comments "Warner's were one of the lead petitioners in the attempt to put those three stoner lads in Sweden in prison recently, remember."
What the Guardian doesn't mention (nor Cabalamat for that matter) is that Grace's original blog post is a response to the Featured Artist Coalition's "Air statement". This statement of support for Lily Allen also includes this curious statement:
"Our meeting also voted overwhelmingly to support a three-strike sanction on those who persistently download illegal files, sanctions to consist of a warning letter, a stronger warning letter and a final sanction of the restriction of the infringer’s bandwidth to a level which would render file-sharing of media files impractical while leaving basic email and web access functional."
They are trying to play the nice guy by stopping short of an outright ban - but it misses the point.... Leaving aside whether file-sharing for non commercial use should in fact be an offence -
If you commit a crime in the street you are not banned from the street, if you rob a bank you are not banned from banks, and if you commit a crime on the internet you should not be banned from the internet. Moreover, a group punishment - affecting anyone in a household - is inherently unjust.
Besides which.... What level of bandwidth stops you downloading a 3Mbyte .mp3 but let's you happily surf around bandwidth hungry websites?
So basically FAC. Your position sucks.
Grace hits the point... "The gig's up. You might as well take a position about when you want the sun to come up in the morning. It's over. Now let's get on with working out a wonderful new way for music lovers to enjoy music for free or for a small subscription that makes it legal and easy to hear ANYTHING and allows the artist to reap the rewards of such freedom of access. Viva la revolucion! "
Posts
