Pirate Party Victory in Sweden
“Together, we have today changed the landscape of European politics. No matter how this night ends, we have changed it,” Falkvinge said. “This feels wonderful. The citizens have understood it’s time to make a difference. The older politicians have taken apart young peoples’ lifestyle, bit by bit. We do not accept that the authorities’ mass-surveillance,” he added.
Funny thing about what happens when the majority of the population participates in an illegal activity: eventually it’s not illegal anymore.
So writes John Quarterman in “Pirate Party Legitimized by Winning EU Parliament Seat.”
As an author who’d love to make enough money to live off my writing, I’m somewhat saddened by the idea that people’s creative work is easily copied. I wonder a lot about the business models of the future, and what winner-takes-all and the rise of prosumer enthusiasts means to the middle of the production curve. That is, people who aren’t Steven King or J.K Rowling or ever going to get a book on the Times bestseller list. Will there be thousands of people able to earn a living writing book-length articles without a patron?
But I’m heartened to see the abuse of power result in a backlash. I can’t help looking forward to the first copyright hearings in the new EU parliament.
This reminds me of the quote about how democracies cannot exist as permanent governments because the public eventually figures out that they can transfer money from the treasury to their own pockets by means of a vote.
Well, I would recommend reading up on what they actually want to do. It’s far more interesting than “lets make downloading free for everyone”.
As an author you probably shouldn’t worry too much. It’s very rare for authors to be able to live on what they write. The pirate party is not likely to change that (other than perhaps making more people read your books).
Oh, you forgot to link to them 😉
http://www.piratpartiet.se/international/
Hmm. It seems like Student’s post above could be summarized as, “it’s OK if it becomes harder to make money off writing, because it was already pretty hard.” I don’t think that’s really a justification for anything.