20.6.2006
Swedish economist: "Time to get rid of copyright law"
"It is time to get rid of copyright law", writes Karl-Henrik Pettersson, an economist and author, in Swedish newspaper
Expressen. "The thought of not having a copyright law may sound unrealistic. But it is not. A copyright law that is already ignored by millions of young people is in practice already half-gone. And it may very well be in society's best interest to get rid of the law also formally."
He goes on to clarify the difference between stealing and copyright infringement, demanding that the right to make copies is legally clearly separated from the ownership of the artists to their works. "Making this distinction between ownership right and copyright leads to an important insight - that the ownership can remain even if the copyright is taken away. For example, as a creator of music I would always have ownership to my works so I could keep on selling them to companies just like today, and they could keep selling them to the market just like today. There would only be this one important difference: copyrights being removed, the company could not set limits to how many copies of the work are being made, how it is further distributed etc."
He emphasizes common good as the correct basis for legislation. "Naturally we cannot let only media industry and their economical interests to determine whether we should have copyrights or not. An increased benefit for the society must be the basis for a copyright law, just like it is the basis for other laws. Why should we maintain laws that do not give citizens back real value for what they are paying for. I have serious doubts whether today's copyright laws bring any increased benefits for the society at all."
The public debate on filesharing is active in Sweden - and it will probably just heat up as the September election gets closer - with many authors, artists and culture workers coming out with their opinions. The overall response of the Swedish culture community to the filesharing issue favors legalization as proposed by the Pirate Party in its election agenda. There are naturally opposing voices as well but they seem to be in clear minority among artists and culture workers. Many artists express their economical worries about the changes ahead but at the same they time give their support to the legalization as the sensible thing to do.
On the political front only Christian Democrats have taken a definite anti-p2p position while all other parties have either bent to support legal filesharing or at least keep a door open for negotiations.
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