Where is your hammer, pirates?
The Pirate Bay political party and the dawn of Internet based politics came to existence on the crest of the BitTorrent TPB site activity wave. The party had given rise to similar political parties in Europe and all over the world. The party suggested reducing the copyright to 5 years, after which all works will transfer into public domain. The party focused on the right to free information and legal security issues. The party was anxious over the Anglo-Saxon and corporate influence over Swedish domestic politics.
In summer 2006 the party organized “pirate demonstrations” in Stockholm and Gothenburg. The leader of the Party said that he was satisfied by 2006 police raids, because they brought party’s political issues in the center of national political discourse. And what about Swedish citizens? Although the party claimed that there are about 1 million of active file-shares in Sweden, it received less than 1% of voters in general 2006 elections and was not presented in parliament.
The Pirate Party declared that it has more members than Green party. Actually it is logical to suppose that recent TPB trial had to increase the popularity of the Party. Nevertheless, recent demonstration on the May Day in Linkoping showed that the TPB party is far from being popular. Only few young people and five policemen actively participated in meeting. Others were sipping their coffee, having fun or taking part in left demonstrations. Actually, jugglery with Swedish flags under International, showed by local social democrats, impressed me much more.
