[pp.int.general] Attaching a file to releases in filesharing networks

[Valentin Villenave]

2007/10/22, Helmut Pozimski <helmutpozimski at web.de>:

Hi Helmut, nice to hear from you.

(my alias is pers, so you know who's speaking here ;)

http://wiki.piratenpartei.de/index.php?title=AG_Filesharing/Infotext-Datei_NG/Franz%C3%B6sisch
> (French)

On our forum, I posted a slightly modified version of the French
translation. I'll talk about it below.

> I already posted the drafts in the national forums (except of Sweden)
> and in the international one. The answers were really different. This
> (and the wish of pers from France) is the reason why I start this
> discussion on the mailing list. I will first try to summarize the
> arguments already named in the discussions and then state my point of
> view.

Yes indeed, I think we really should have this discussion here. It is
IMO a major choice to make, which has to involve every PP.

> The first argument which I heard several times was that this project
> was about promoting illegal downloading and violating copyright and
> therefore shouldn't be done.
>
> The second one was that we would get even more in the fame of a file
> sharing party.
>
> Some people wanted to attach the file only to legal downloads but
> other people argued that this would be useless. I there were more
> arguments I forgot, just add it!

Yes, maybe there will be. Just to explain the discussion with the
French PP: in France we have many, many Free-Software-related
organizations, and a (relatively) large audience for "free" licensed
software, music, paintings etc.

This has led to a situation where the Parti Pirate, maybe more than
other PPs, has to cope with two different orientations: one is to
promote the "free" licenses, spirit, etc., the second is to defend our
civil rights, privacy, and freedom to share even copyrighted material.
In the first one, which is kind of my speciality as an author myself,
we're regarded as "FSF-ayatollahs", in the second one, we're treated
as terrorists.

Moreover, the French parliament itself has become quite schizophrenic
about it: in the same time, they've adopted an awful law which takes
away almost every freedom for users (making such softwares as VLC
illegal, by the way; I can even go in jail just for having mentioned
its name!), and... they've adopted another agreement which makes
deputies use Ubuntu as their only OS!

So the Parti Pirate is in a difficult situation. Both of the
orientations I just defined are legitimate, and we do endorse both of
them. But we also want to act as thoughtful citizens, and not ignore
the laws and the institutions, no matter how strongly we can disagree
with them.

> At least, the Austrian party (ppoe) decided not to take part in the
> project because they feeled the risks were too high and I think the
> French pirates haven't decided yet.

The last version of the text file I sent has not raised any objections.

Basically, I added the following sentence (here translated into English):

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
To achieve this goal we want to redefine copyright laws:  to decriminalise
the private use of filesharing networks to download copyrighted material to
attain a great cultural variety.

There are already creation or distribution models which give citizens
such a freedom, and to support these, we will only attach this text
file to contents whose license allows us to do so. If you happen to
have found this file alongside with copyrighted material, abusively or
illegaly downloaded, we can not be held responsible – though we are
glad that existing technologies have given you full access to
Knowledge, Culture or Art.

How a free handling of culture without dramatic restrictions already works
today can be seen on jamendo.com, a great music portal where more than 5000
albums available can be downloaded, redistributed and enjoyed for free.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


> My opinion about this is the following:
>
> There is no legal danger in projects like that since we are not going
> to spread copyrighted material ourselves. Instead we'll ask file
> sharers to do it for us.

Yes. Hence the sentence I added, to emphasize that point.

> At least I want to invite every single pirate party to join the
> project. If there's no translation in your language yet, just ask
> someone to translate it or write a text yourself.

Once again, I think this is worth a discussion on this list.

I find that the idea is great, but we have to be extremely careful.

What I told the Parti Pirate guys (and gals ;) is: "as free
individuals, you can do whatever you want, download or upload whatever
you want and attach whatever text you want, we just don't want to know
about it, neither do we want to know about your private life. if you
ever encounter any legal issue, just face the consequences by
yourselves. BUT then, don't come to us and pretend you acted in the
name of the Parti Pirate – we will deny any knowledge of your
actions..." ;)

This had to be said.

Cheers,
Valentin aka pers