Overwhelming debate victory for the 'pirates' in Swedish TV

[TankGirl]

Swedish TV organized 15th March a well-advertised and anticipated debate with representatives from both sides of the piracy fence. There was Henrik Pontén, lawyer from the Swedish anti-piracy bureau, movie director Anders Nilsson, artist + small music label executive (in same person) Ayesha Quraishi, Julien Nebbout from the 'Pirate Bureau' (Piratbyrån, the organization that runs the big torrent site Pirate Bay) plus a couple of other keen pirates with some sort of national fame.

The debate

Here is a brief summary of the debate:

The host of the show was in no way a specialist on the field but he remained reasonably neutral and kept the discussion going quite well.

The anti-piracy lawyer was much what you would expect from a hired corporate gun: he tried to put weight into legality issues, hide his position as a corporate puppet and create an image that they are not after ‘common Swedes’ but hardcore pirates. He was somewhat on the defense due to the dubious methods used by his organization (using paid infiltrators, filming police raids for propaganda purposes etc.), and when asked had he personally ever made any illegal copies he swallowed a couple of times before claiming full innocence… which didn’t really sound too convincing at all...

Movie director Nilsson wasn’t the best representative for the movie industry: his emotions ran high most of the time, and the only serious item in his agenda seemed to be to force the Swedes to see all new movies in theatres with current ticket prices into indefinite future. Anything else would effectively destroy the Swedish movie industry if we are to believe him. He didn’t put any weight into the money coming from DVD sales – an obvious misrepresentation of facts, which was quickly pointed out in the various online discussions following the debate.

Ayesha Quraishi, the artist and label boss, showed open mind regarding different business and distribution models. She wanted to see new possibilities in the evolving technology and overall made a sensible and positive impression. She admitted that as an artist she likes her works to spread to the largest possible audiences - even if she also needs to figure out ways to make money to her label.

Piratbyrån’s Julien Nebbout was clearly the most intelligent and sympathetic person in the table. Unfortunately he didn’t get too much time to speak, but he used the available time to make some good points like asking what sense is there to criminalize something that hundreds of thousands of citizens are already doing and that they don't perceive as being criminal.

One of the pirates appeared to be somewhat spaced out but the other one (having a reputation under the nickname Jens of Sweden) did a good job at challenging relentlessly the anti-piracy lawyer and his views. After the recent police raids Henrik Pontén has become a well-known and widely hated character in Sweden, and many viewers were probably pleased to see him having to sweat under the perky verbal fire of Jens of Sweden.

Besides the usual pro-p2p points the pirate side emphasized the sense of freedom that the younger generation has associated with Internet communications. When young people learn to use Internet as their primary source of music and movies, it becomes a way of life for them, and criminalization can do little to change any of that. They will simply never be similar consumers as what the content industries had before Internet.

Poll results and press reactions

The viewers had a chance to cast their votes to the following question: "Do you think that downloading films and music from Internet should be legal?" After 66338 given votes the poll result was overwhelming: 98 % of viewers thought that downloading should be legal, and only 2 % had the opposite view. The viewers were also offered a possibility to send SMS message comments to the program but the flow of messages was so intense that the computer handling the messages crashed and no messages got through to the show. Obviously a hot topic enjoying wide public interest in Sweden.

The debate was hot enough to cause further waves in the news media. Interestingly the newspapers took if not a clear pro-p2p stance at least a rather critical attitude towards the methods and motives of the anti-piracy organization and the new stricter legislation under works in Sweden. Here’s a freely translated quote from Svenska Dagbladet, one of Sweden’s main newspapers:

Those who benefit from the criminalization of downloading from Internet are mostly the entertainment industry - its movie, music, TV and computer game branches. They have powerful lobby organizations to fight for their interests. Those who suffer from the new laws are obviously not the ones who make dubious money by selling pirated and copied material but those that the laws actually criminalize – that is mostly young people who download music to listen to it at their homes. This group, as far as I know, has no lobbying organizations to fight for their interests. That's weak, Bodström [referring to Swedish justice minister Thomas Bodström].

- tg

[Nicobie]

Is our govm'nt really a Democratic institution or is it just out to fuc over the consumer in favor of the loser gov. workers?