In the last months, at least in some circles the Pirate Parties caused some commotion. Unfortunately, reports about the pirate parties are often one-sided and claim that the pirates' goal is unlimited free downloads - that is not actually true and is a very one-sided reduction of their goals. In the 1980s, the Green parties were founded to make protection of the environment part of the political agenda. In the same way, the pirates stand for civil rights and a reform of copyright.

In principle, I'm happy that a party wants to deal with these topics. Just like with environmental policy in the 1980s, the traditional parties have a huge deficit in these areas. However, when looking at the details, it can be rather difficult to develop possible solutions. Karan found a very interesting interview with Christian Engström, first member of the European Parliament for the Swedish Pirate Party and talks about why she does not want to join the piraty party just now.

For example, she criticizes that the piraty party wants to shorten the duration of copyright from currently 70 years after the death of the creator to five years after creation. In the comments on her blog article, there's also a very interesting discussion the "Long Tail" phenomenon that's especially true for music (and that even GEMA doesn't really seem to be aware of).

Unlike Karan, I hope that artists and creators of arts will join the pirate party or at least share their experiences with them, so that the party can call for a copyright that serves creators as well. How about reading the article and thinking about what you could do to further this cause.

Karan: Why I'm not joining Pirate Party yet (in German)