[pp.int.general] where is the manifesto?

Mon Dec 29 09:13:08 CET 2008

i think it is not very useful to continue this debate. you consistently try NOT to understand me.
i suspect you are a fifth colone employed by a record company. or you are simply a pathetic troublemaker. of course there is room for disagreement and debate, but then it should be conducted in a constructive manner. you look for differences where they do not exist. you are not prepared to accept basics in law that are familiar to all lawyers. and you have the bad habit of making a factual debate personal, blaming me to offend you. if you can't control  your emotions, we do not get anywhere. you even occasionally blame me to offend others, like the UN.

Yes indeed, this mail IS offensive. And I am also about to get offended by your unwillingness to conduct a constructive debate.

If ever there will be a Dutch PP, it will use its own "manifesto" - and it will probably use a different name.    

Groeten, Grüße, Regards, Cordialement, Hälsningar, Ciao, Saygilar, Üdvözlettel, Pozdrowienia, Kumusta, Adios, Oan't sjen, Ave, Doei, Yassou, Yoroshiku, Slán, Vinarliga, Kær Kvedja
>>> REINIER B. BAKELS PhD LL.M. MSc
private: Johan Willem Frisostraat 149, 2713 CC Zoetermeer, The Netherlands telephone: +31 79 316 3126, GSM ("Handy") +31 6 4988 6490,  fax +31 79 316 7221
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Carlos Ayala Vargas 
  To: Pirate Parties International -- General Talk 
  Sent: Monday, December 29, 2008 3:40 AM
  Subject: Re: [pp.int.general] where is the manifesto?

  Reinier Bakels wrote: 
    My experience is that it is not very helpful at all to refer to human rights considerations in a political context. Political arguments are different from legal arguments anyway, and if you still want to address specific legal issues or proposals, it is helpful to be careful not to give your opponents (IFPI etc.) the arguments for saying: these people are irresponsible. That risk is particularly high with human rights. 

  If the opponents are going to say that, I'm going to laugh at them -people who knows about RMOs in Spain vary from laughing to blaming RMOs when they publicly dismiss human rights like privacy -violated by SGAE-, right to associate -violated by SGAE-, obligation to have inner democracy within an association -violated by SGAE-, etc.

  The thing is, Reinier: do you find irresponsible that we, in PPI, refer to human rights? Truly, as long as PIRATA refer, in its very Statute, to human rights and UDHR, it doesn't matter to me; human rights are so important for us that what seems irresponsible for me is to dismiss them.

    And for copyright, there are the collective rights organisations. This is a complete Sodom & Gomorra.
  Gomorra, yes.

    Incidentally, authors who use the services of such organisations loose the right to prohibit publications - which is a central (also moral) aspect of the copyright as it was designed. And the levies.

  There is a proverb, "you are preaching a converse" -about the harm made by levies and RMOs; about other issues we are actual and obviously antagonists-; I think that the PPI answers to the levies consultation already show how we reject levies and how we reject the current role of RMOs -the problem is not in RMOs existing, but in RMOs hijacking some author's rights (RMOs must serve authors, not the opposite)-.

    And isn't - in practice - the prime task of the PP to counter the dominance of the distributors, who are no longer needed in the Internet era - and try to prolong their life by ugly legal methods? This calls for better copyright contract law, among other things.

  This call, first of all, to forget the c word and the intellectual pro...whatever concept; and talk about author's rights. If you are so worried about RMOs, first of all I think you should avoid to use they language.

    But stay away from human rights.
  I have to wholeheartedly say that I totally dismiss advices like "stay away from human rights" -whatever the context in which such words may be said-.

    As you all know, I have extensively cooperated in the campaign against software patents. But I always advised my fellow activists not to use amateur human rights arguments.
  Bad for them if they paid attention to such advices. In EU, biopatents are allowed; in EU, monopolies from patents can arise; while the EU patent system may not present as much problems as US system, it indeed has problems.

  And strictly about software patents, why is it so bothering to you to hear your fellow activists to talk about, e.g., the Blackberry (RIM vs NTP) scandal and other real dangers of the US patent system? It's a great idea to show how things are in other countries, to convince people to not follow bad examples, and it of course can be done within the software patents concept.

    If only because - at best - their efforts will duplicate the work of real lawyers, while no one cares for the social substance of the problem, e.g. the (alleged) stiffling effects of software patents.
  There is a misconception about the importance of real lawyers: being a real lawyer doesn't imply that such lawyer is going to give you good advices, or that is going to make good usage of laws; simply, it implies that such lawyer knows about laws. However, that knowledge can be used for evilish purposes -I see it in Spain, where Law scholars, even constitutional experts, while I don't doubt that they perfectly know about Spanish Constitution and constitutionalism, I neither doubt about the reasons for their lies about those issues-.

  If a trustable lawyer tells me "you cannot inmediately adapt all the system; you can change the framework for new items, and manage a transitional period for old items to harmonize", I'll make usage of the lawyer's wisdom, as long as that lawyer shows how to make changes without violating rule of law. However, if that lawyer states "you cannot adapt the system" ... I search for other lawyer.

    Then you get the kind of conversation:  "This is a disaster all over Europe". Answer: "Give me one example" - and then there no example, but just hearsay from the US (where the patent system is definitely different). 

    To some extent it is a blessing in disguise, that the disasters in the field of copyright are more obvious. On the other hand, the PP arguments are slightly counter intuitive vs. the "poor" artists.

  Again, I disagree with your unjustified viewpoints. How do you say that PPI (not PP, we are not PP) arguments are slightly counter intuitive?

  - having less than 1.000 poor artists controlling a 85.000-member RMO like SGAE is pretty intuitive and people who knows about it understands it very quickly
  - collecting a fee for media and devices, no matter whether you are going to use them for copyrighted works or not, is pretty intuitive
  - dangers of initiatives like US Choruss and France's Olivennes Agreement -their threats against privacy and other fundamental rights (those rights you advice to stay away from ... no thanks)- are pretty intuitive.

  And I don't talk about PPI supporters; I talk about people who have never heard about us, hairdressers, bartenders, etc, who after hearing the wonders made by RMOs inmediately understand the threat that it implies. So please don't be so disrespectful with our arguments.

                                                                                                 Carlos Ayala
                                                                                                 ( Aiarakoa )

                                                                       Partido Pirata National Board's Chairman

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