Re: [fc-uk-discuss] Re: [Libre-Discuss] Steal This Film!

[David Berry]

On 29 Aug 2006, at 11:50, Tom Chance wrote: With a nod to Crosbie's email as well, I didn't say "I'm an RIAA/MPAA fanboy",  No-one said you were. Although there was an implicit assumption that copying copyright work is somehow morally wrong, rather than whilst acknowledging the legality, the morality of the situation is very much more ambiguous.  I said I thought that film (or at least part1) put the case pretty poorly.  I wonder what 'case' you are referring to? Their case, well made, is that Pirate Bay is a legal site in Sweden, that they have wide-spread support across the country and it is only by strong-arm tactics by Washington's State Department threatening the Swedish state (i.e. through bare coercion). The Swedish government then acted ILLEGALLY (i.e. against Swedish law) and also anti-democratically (i.e. without any popular mandate to do so) in forcing the police  to act (even though the police warned the government that they had no right to seize the equipment) and even more, that it is actually illegal for the government minister to order the police to act in this way in the first place.  Now remember, we are talking about copying films etc here. Suddenly, just because the US government says so, the government of Sweden ignores the law and starts arresting people and seizing their property. That to my mind is very very strange activity. The US Government is, in effect, intervening into the national sovereignty of the Swedish state which it has absolutely no right to do so - and more the Swedish government is too scared to stand up to them. It is less worried about breaking its own laws, and offending and notion of democratic legitimacy than it is in upsetting the US government.  That is frightening.  Aside from the annoying style (MUST... FLASH... SILLY... SLOGANS) it just  came across to me as a bunch of geeks making flimsy justifications for  controversial activities. Someone has to start speaking. And if it is geeks, so what? They are surely entitled to put their side of the story out there. And hey, maybe we can give them the benefit of the doubt and acknowledge that seeing as though it is LEGAL in sweden, and the fact that the US Government pressured the Swedish Government to act illegally in shutting them down, that they might have something interesting and important for us to listen to.  In any case, I don't see how the aesthetics of the film need undermine the message.  Why is it controversial to you? Can I just repeat - IT IS LEGAL IN SWEDEN. Therefore it is NOT controversial in Sweden. Just because we are being brainwashed by MPAA and the other multinationals to accept some weird form of natural law in regard to cultural production in the UK doesn't mean it is true for all nations everywhere that copying culture is wrong or illegal.  It's about as interesting and convincing as  Revolution OS, which boils down to: we're all very boring on camera, VA Linux  floated on the stock market, yay! Well that is very cynical and shallow.  So you would prefer media trained model-bots who speak confidently and look easy on the eye? I actually think that Revolution OS is a great film because these are the people actually involved in the making of free software (i.e. a semi-ethnography). And additionally, it doesn't hide the divisions and fractures between different parts of the movement that make the whole subject so compelling. And strangely enough, the VA Linux shows that the whole thing is potentially being captured by business and that money plays a big part in free culture as any other part of capitalism.  I also think 'Steal this film' is an interesting film because it really is catching a zeitgeist in Sweden in particular (and perhaps more widely). The drop-in cuts of Swedish young people's opinion on sharing music and culture is really fascinating... and the declaration of war on youth copying by the chairman of Universal Music, which even he admits is not a great business proposition, is eye-opening. This is critical cultural production that is both trying to say something important and using the proprietary culture to help in telling that story.  Are the subsequent parts any better? If you mean parts of the first part (i.e. the divisions on Youtube) then I personally think it is extremely interesting and worth watching. Particularly the section in part 3 (I think) on the US pressuring Sweden.  Best David

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