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Foolowing the European election success of the Swedish branch, a new political party has been instituted in the UK.
Involvement now will help form policy in its early stages.
Draft Manifesto:
Involvement now will help form policy in its early stages.
Draft Manifesto:
Manifesto
Current documents are draft copies yet to be ratified by the party though a vote and finalised by party members.
The articles on this wiki may not represent the official views of the Pirate Party of the United Kingdom.
The Pirate Party UK will campaign for
We wish to change global legislation to facilitate the emerging information society, which is characterised by diversity and openness. We do this by requiring an increased level of respect for the citizens and their right to privacy, as well as reforms to copyright and patent law.
Ours is a control and surveillance society where practically everyone is registered and watched. It is counterproductive to a modern judicial state to impose surveillance on all its citizens, thereby treating them as suspects. Democracy pre-supposes a strong protection for citizens' rights.
A society where cultural expressions and knowledge is free for all on equal terms benefits the whole of the society. We claim that widespread copyright is actively counter-productive to these aims by limiting both the creation of, and access to, cultural expressions.
Trademarks, Patents and Copyright
Trademarks are primarily useful as consumer protection devices. We feel trademarks mostly work fine today, and do not suggest any changes here.
Privatised monopolies are one of society's worst enemies, as they lead to price-hikes and large hidden costs for citizens. Patents are officially sanctioned monopolies on ideas. Some corporations race to hold patents they can use against smaller competitors to prevent them from competing on equal terms. As a result, other corporations are forced into the race simply to defend against future attacks from competitors. This is a self-perpetuating negative cycle in which a few miscreants make gains at the expense of everyone else in the system. A monopolistic goal is not to adjust prices and terms to what the market will bear, but rather use their illgotten rights as a lever to raise prices and set lopsided terms on usage and licensing. We want to limit the opportunities to create damaging and unnecessary monopoly situations.
When copyrights were originally created, they only regulated the right of a creator to be recognised as the creator. It has since been expanded to cover commercial copying of works and has limited the rights of private citizens and non-profit organisations. This shift of balance has prompted an unacceptable development for all of society. Economic and technological developments have given unjust advantages for a few large market players at the expense of consumers, creators and society at large.
Millions of songs, movies and books are held hostages in private vaults, not wanted enough by their focus groups to re-publish but potentially too profitable to release. We want to free our cultural heritage and make them accessible to all, so that our culture can benefit from positive network effects.
Ideas, knowledge and information are by nature non-exclusive and their common value lies in their inherent ability to be shared and spread.
We dispute claims that copyright is a necessary basis for cultural development. We point to the works of composers like Handel and Mendelssohn; to writers like Dickens and Shakespeare; and to the rise of free software as evidence that copyright is not a necessary foundation for artistic and commercial advancement in any age.
We are concerned about the abuse of the language, particularly with regard to the word "property". We are suspicious of use of the phrase "intellectual property" to refer to copyright, patents and trademark as these things are legal constructs and not otherwise scarce. We agree with Richard Stallman's take on the phrase, that it "systematically distorts and confuses these issues, and its use was and is promoted by those who gain from this confusion."
Democracy, Citizens. Rights and Personal Freedoms
The rights of the Individual
We believe in the importance of rights such as freedom of speech, the right to privacy, freedom of opinion, and the right to obtain information.
All attempts by the state to curtail these rights must be questioned and met with powerful opposition.
All powers, systems and methods that the state can use against its citizens must be under constant evaluation and scrutiny by elected officials.
It is fundamentally unacceptable for the state to use surveillance powers against regular citizens who are not suspected of any crime.
Each citizen must be guaranteed the right to anonymity which is inherent to our freedoms. This extends to the right of an individual to control use of his or her personal data.
Technology
Communication
We believe that technology can be a force for good, helping people in disparate locations communicate with one another. This communication is only possible when the standards governing that communication are Open and Free. The growth of the world wide web and the death of propriety networks such as MSN and AOL, shows that open standards work and should be encouraged.
Europe
Pirate Party UK has no opinion on whether Britain should or should not be a member of the European Union.
Stance on current legislation
Pirate Party UK takes a stand against special legislation for terror-related crimes.
We oppose moves to introduce identity cards for citizens, and are wary of the state's use of national databases.
Immaterial laws are a way to legislate material properties for immaterial values.
We believe that 'format shifting' should not be an offence.
We believe that DRM should not be allowed to remove or restrict in any way a person's fair use rights, and that people should have the right to remove DRM whenever it does. For this reason, manufacture and possession of tools that remove DRM should be legal.
Proposed Legislation
We suggest an initial reduction of commercial copyright protection, i.e. the monopoly to create copies of a work for commercial purposes, to five years from the publication of the work.
All non-commercial gathering, use, processing and distribution of culture shall be explicitly encouraged. Any product containing DRM shall display clear warnings to inform consumers of this fact.
Contractual agreements implemented to prevent such legal distribution of information shall be declared null and void. Non-commercial distribution of published culture, information or knowledge - with the clear exception of personal data - must not be limited or punished. As a logical conclusion of this, we oppose the principle of blank media tax laws.
Pirate Party UK believes that the end of copyright is inevitable and that the United Kingdom should enjoy lasting strategic benefits and immediate economic gains from being an early adopter of such reform.
Patents and Private Monopolies Harm Society
Patents have many damaging effects. Pharmaceutical patents are responsible for human deaths in diseases they could have afforded medication for, research priorities are skewed, and unnecessarily high, and rising, cost of medicines in richer parts of the world.
Patents on life and genes, like patented crops, lead to unreasonable and harmful consequences. Software patents promote unhealthy patterns that retard technological development and constitute a serious threat against the IT sector.
Patents are said to encourage innovation by protecting inventors and investors in new inventions and manufacturing methods. In reality, patents are increasingly used by large corporations to hinder smaller companies from competing on equal terms. Instead of encouraging innovation patents are being used as "mine fields" when waging war against others, often patents the owner has no plans on developing further themselves.
We believe patents hampered the pace of the industrial revolution and have continued to be abused to the current day. They actively stifle innovation and the creation of new knowledge. Besides, just by looking at all business areas that is not patentable it is clear that patents simply are not needed - the market forces derived from being first-to-market is quite sufficient for fostering innovation. Inventors should compete fairly with natural advantages like innovative designs, customer benefits, pricing and quality, instead of with a state-awarded monopoly on knowledge. Not having to pay small armies of patent lawyers will free resources that can be used for creating real innovation and improve products at a faster rate, benefiting us all in the end.
Apart from abusing patents, corporations attempt to create monopolies by other means. By keeping information on things like file formats and interfaces secret, they try to create vendor lock-in, thereby limiting competition with a blatant disregard for the value of a free and fair market. This practice leads directly to higher prices and a lower rate of innovation. Whenever the publicly funded sector procures information systems or produces information itself, it must actively counteract the formation or continuation of these private monopolies on information, knowledge, ideas, or concepts.
Private monopolies shall be combated.
Economic Policy
Crime and Punishment
Electoral Reform
It only makes sense for a small party like the PPUK to support electoral reform as the current system favours massively the big players, but that fact notwithstanding, electoral reform in changing the UK's electoral system to a much fairer open list-based proportional representation system is a worthy policy for the PPUK. It empowers people to have their votes count a lot more than the current system, and I'd also argue that the large number of safe seats in the FPTP system makes MPs more likely to be corrupt and arrogant, and not really care about their constituents.
The PPUK supports changing the UK's electoral system to a regional open list-based Proportional Representation system. Constituencies, as they are now known, would be increased in size at least tenfold, as would the number of MPs representing the new larger constituencies. It may be justifiable to increase them in size even more. Then, within each large constituency ('region'), the MPs to represent that region would be selected by open list-based proportional representation. No minimum percentage of votes will be required for a party to get an MP elected into the Commons; merely a high enough percentage to earn at least one of the seats available in that region.
In addition, voting should be made mandatory, and a 'none of the above' box should be added to voting slips. The day of a general election MUST be a public holiday. This should help to re-engage voters in the elctoral process, and give them an incentive to educate themselves about the political issues of the day. This is important if people are not to be allowed to fall into apathy, which is a very dangerous situation which allows minority interests and/or just plain bad leadership to gain control without much resistance.
Closing words
We wish to guard citizen's rights, their right to privacy and basic human rights. When the government routinely put its citizens under surveillance, it invariably leads to abuse of powers, lack of freedoms and injustices. We demand a correction of these injustices. We demand justice, freedom and democracy for the citizens.
Today's copyright and patent laws lead to harmful monopolies, the loss of important democratic values, hinders the creation of culture and knowledge, and prevents them from reaching the citizens. We demand the abolishment of patents and fair and balanced laws of copyrights, rooted in the will of the people, to enrich people's lives, enable a healthy business climate, create a knowledge and cultural commons, and thereby benefiting the development of society as a whole.
Our work with this is now focused on parliamentary means and therefore we seek a mandate from the people to represent them in these issues.
We stand united around our protection of the right to privacy, our will to reform copyrights, and the need to abolish patents.
Current documents are draft copies yet to be ratified by the party though a vote and finalised by party members.
The articles on this wiki may not represent the official views of the Pirate Party of the United Kingdom.
The Pirate Party UK will campaign for
- Protection of an individual's Right to Privacy
- The Freedom to pass on Ideas and Culture
- Radical Reform of Copyright and Patent Law
We wish to change global legislation to facilitate the emerging information society, which is characterised by diversity and openness. We do this by requiring an increased level of respect for the citizens and their right to privacy, as well as reforms to copyright and patent law.
Ours is a control and surveillance society where practically everyone is registered and watched. It is counterproductive to a modern judicial state to impose surveillance on all its citizens, thereby treating them as suspects. Democracy pre-supposes a strong protection for citizens' rights.
A society where cultural expressions and knowledge is free for all on equal terms benefits the whole of the society. We claim that widespread copyright is actively counter-productive to these aims by limiting both the creation of, and access to, cultural expressions.
Trademarks, Patents and Copyright
Trademarks are primarily useful as consumer protection devices. We feel trademarks mostly work fine today, and do not suggest any changes here.
Privatised monopolies are one of society's worst enemies, as they lead to price-hikes and large hidden costs for citizens. Patents are officially sanctioned monopolies on ideas. Some corporations race to hold patents they can use against smaller competitors to prevent them from competing on equal terms. As a result, other corporations are forced into the race simply to defend against future attacks from competitors. This is a self-perpetuating negative cycle in which a few miscreants make gains at the expense of everyone else in the system. A monopolistic goal is not to adjust prices and terms to what the market will bear, but rather use their illgotten rights as a lever to raise prices and set lopsided terms on usage and licensing. We want to limit the opportunities to create damaging and unnecessary monopoly situations.
When copyrights were originally created, they only regulated the right of a creator to be recognised as the creator. It has since been expanded to cover commercial copying of works and has limited the rights of private citizens and non-profit organisations. This shift of balance has prompted an unacceptable development for all of society. Economic and technological developments have given unjust advantages for a few large market players at the expense of consumers, creators and society at large.
Millions of songs, movies and books are held hostages in private vaults, not wanted enough by their focus groups to re-publish but potentially too profitable to release. We want to free our cultural heritage and make them accessible to all, so that our culture can benefit from positive network effects.
Ideas, knowledge and information are by nature non-exclusive and their common value lies in their inherent ability to be shared and spread.
We dispute claims that copyright is a necessary basis for cultural development. We point to the works of composers like Handel and Mendelssohn; to writers like Dickens and Shakespeare; and to the rise of free software as evidence that copyright is not a necessary foundation for artistic and commercial advancement in any age.
We are concerned about the abuse of the language, particularly with regard to the word "property". We are suspicious of use of the phrase "intellectual property" to refer to copyright, patents and trademark as these things are legal constructs and not otherwise scarce. We agree with Richard Stallman's take on the phrase, that it "systematically distorts and confuses these issues, and its use was and is promoted by those who gain from this confusion."
Democracy, Citizens. Rights and Personal Freedoms
The rights of the Individual
We believe in the importance of rights such as freedom of speech, the right to privacy, freedom of opinion, and the right to obtain information.
All attempts by the state to curtail these rights must be questioned and met with powerful opposition.
All powers, systems and methods that the state can use against its citizens must be under constant evaluation and scrutiny by elected officials.
It is fundamentally unacceptable for the state to use surveillance powers against regular citizens who are not suspected of any crime.
Each citizen must be guaranteed the right to anonymity which is inherent to our freedoms. This extends to the right of an individual to control use of his or her personal data.
Technology
Communication
We believe that technology can be a force for good, helping people in disparate locations communicate with one another. This communication is only possible when the standards governing that communication are Open and Free. The growth of the world wide web and the death of propriety networks such as MSN and AOL, shows that open standards work and should be encouraged.
Europe
Pirate Party UK has no opinion on whether Britain should or should not be a member of the European Union.
Stance on current legislation
Pirate Party UK takes a stand against special legislation for terror-related crimes.
We oppose moves to introduce identity cards for citizens, and are wary of the state's use of national databases.
Immaterial laws are a way to legislate material properties for immaterial values.
We believe that 'format shifting' should not be an offence.
We believe that DRM should not be allowed to remove or restrict in any way a person's fair use rights, and that people should have the right to remove DRM whenever it does. For this reason, manufacture and possession of tools that remove DRM should be legal.
Proposed Legislation
We suggest an initial reduction of commercial copyright protection, i.e. the monopoly to create copies of a work for commercial purposes, to five years from the publication of the work.
All non-commercial gathering, use, processing and distribution of culture shall be explicitly encouraged. Any product containing DRM shall display clear warnings to inform consumers of this fact.
Contractual agreements implemented to prevent such legal distribution of information shall be declared null and void. Non-commercial distribution of published culture, information or knowledge - with the clear exception of personal data - must not be limited or punished. As a logical conclusion of this, we oppose the principle of blank media tax laws.
Pirate Party UK believes that the end of copyright is inevitable and that the United Kingdom should enjoy lasting strategic benefits and immediate economic gains from being an early adopter of such reform.
Patents and Private Monopolies Harm Society
Patents have many damaging effects. Pharmaceutical patents are responsible for human deaths in diseases they could have afforded medication for, research priorities are skewed, and unnecessarily high, and rising, cost of medicines in richer parts of the world.
Patents on life and genes, like patented crops, lead to unreasonable and harmful consequences. Software patents promote unhealthy patterns that retard technological development and constitute a serious threat against the IT sector.
Patents are said to encourage innovation by protecting inventors and investors in new inventions and manufacturing methods. In reality, patents are increasingly used by large corporations to hinder smaller companies from competing on equal terms. Instead of encouraging innovation patents are being used as "mine fields" when waging war against others, often patents the owner has no plans on developing further themselves.
We believe patents hampered the pace of the industrial revolution and have continued to be abused to the current day. They actively stifle innovation and the creation of new knowledge. Besides, just by looking at all business areas that is not patentable it is clear that patents simply are not needed - the market forces derived from being first-to-market is quite sufficient for fostering innovation. Inventors should compete fairly with natural advantages like innovative designs, customer benefits, pricing and quality, instead of with a state-awarded monopoly on knowledge. Not having to pay small armies of patent lawyers will free resources that can be used for creating real innovation and improve products at a faster rate, benefiting us all in the end.
Apart from abusing patents, corporations attempt to create monopolies by other means. By keeping information on things like file formats and interfaces secret, they try to create vendor lock-in, thereby limiting competition with a blatant disregard for the value of a free and fair market. This practice leads directly to higher prices and a lower rate of innovation. Whenever the publicly funded sector procures information systems or produces information itself, it must actively counteract the formation or continuation of these private monopolies on information, knowledge, ideas, or concepts.
Private monopolies shall be combated.
Economic Policy
Crime and Punishment
Electoral Reform
It only makes sense for a small party like the PPUK to support electoral reform as the current system favours massively the big players, but that fact notwithstanding, electoral reform in changing the UK's electoral system to a much fairer open list-based proportional representation system is a worthy policy for the PPUK. It empowers people to have their votes count a lot more than the current system, and I'd also argue that the large number of safe seats in the FPTP system makes MPs more likely to be corrupt and arrogant, and not really care about their constituents.
The PPUK supports changing the UK's electoral system to a regional open list-based Proportional Representation system. Constituencies, as they are now known, would be increased in size at least tenfold, as would the number of MPs representing the new larger constituencies. It may be justifiable to increase them in size even more. Then, within each large constituency ('region'), the MPs to represent that region would be selected by open list-based proportional representation. No minimum percentage of votes will be required for a party to get an MP elected into the Commons; merely a high enough percentage to earn at least one of the seats available in that region.
In addition, voting should be made mandatory, and a 'none of the above' box should be added to voting slips. The day of a general election MUST be a public holiday. This should help to re-engage voters in the elctoral process, and give them an incentive to educate themselves about the political issues of the day. This is important if people are not to be allowed to fall into apathy, which is a very dangerous situation which allows minority interests and/or just plain bad leadership to gain control without much resistance.
Closing words
We wish to guard citizen's rights, their right to privacy and basic human rights. When the government routinely put its citizens under surveillance, it invariably leads to abuse of powers, lack of freedoms and injustices. We demand a correction of these injustices. We demand justice, freedom and democracy for the citizens.
Today's copyright and patent laws lead to harmful monopolies, the loss of important democratic values, hinders the creation of culture and knowledge, and prevents them from reaching the citizens. We demand the abolishment of patents and fair and balanced laws of copyrights, rooted in the will of the people, to enrich people's lives, enable a healthy business climate, create a knowledge and cultural commons, and thereby benefiting the development of society as a whole.
Our work with this is now focused on parliamentary means and therefore we seek a mandate from the people to represent them in these issues.
We stand united around our protection of the right to privacy, our will to reform copyrights, and the need to abolish patents.
So much is intertwined between government and private enterprise now, its hard to say who should own what.
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