time to get political

When I visited Cairo this summer, I had no idea that this would be the reality today. What I saw in front of me coming to this Arab metropol, heavily populated and full of poverty, corruption and injustice, but also friendly people, was a system that was bound to collapse, sooner or later. It seems like there is a critical mass one has to reach, and then, it’s like domino. First Tunisia, then this. Well, enough with the descriptions, it’s time to get political.

I embrace the happenings in Egypt. They are crucial to much needed change in the Middle East. The Middle East is a region full of people with a lot of warmth in them, but it is equally full of intolerance towards things that diverge from what is considered normal. This is, ironically enough, often more acknowledged by people inhabiting the actual region than people in the Western World defending human rights. Somehow, there is a fear of criticising the Middle East. Why? I have no idea. And to add clarity, it’s not about criticising the actual region as a whole or the people living it, it’s about criticising authoritarian rules, dictatorships and what often can be considered to be total negligence towards human rights.

Political prisoners, restrictions of freedom of speech, persecution and harassment of people in the LGBT community, absolute poverty, an absence of a fair social security system. This is the reality in Egypt. Face it. It needs change. You can not build a state on having a state of emergency as a base for 30 years. It just doesn’t work that way. At some point, the reaction comes.

What I noticed whilst I was in Egypt was that everybody wanted change. A clear way doesn’t exist, the only thing people agree upon is the notion that they want to get rid of the current rule, which is completely understandable. Mubaraks rule is not justified in any way, the demonstrations are just one sign of this. Mubarak needs to resign and set up fair elections, otherwise he’s never going to get control over the situation. What has happened now is historical and I do hope this causes reactions in other Middle Eastern countries, who just as much need change. What we are witnessing now is the expression of 30, for some people 50, years of ruling.

Egypt is a country of great potential, but the unjustified and unjust ruling has destroyed a lot of that potential. It’s time to build up the country again, on fair grounds.

POWER TO THE PEOPLE

سلام

193 299:-

Korrekt. För denna nätta summa kan du flyga och åka tåg obegränsat i hela Sverige i ett helt år. Förvisso smidigt och allt sådant där, men ändå. 193 299 kronor? Nu kan jag ju också smyga in lite politik här, haha. Jag skulle inte ha lust att betala så mycket för det undermåliga järnvägsnät Sverige besitter. Jag menar, 3h mellan Stockholm och Göteborg. Det skulle kunna gå mycket smidigare och snabbare, företrädelsevis genom snabbtåg. Att Sverige inte har satsat på detta innan är ganska förvånande. Jag må förvisso vara moderat, men jag har en förkärlek för kollektivtrafik, när det fungerar snabbt och smidigt. Fast i och för sig, annars försvinner liksom vitsen med det på något sätt. Dags för Åsa Torstensson att dra igång lite (mer) projekt!

Click to access prislista-sas-sj.pdf

The Bay is bombed

Today the founders of the file-sharing website The Pirate Bay were found guilty of the charges held against them, and they are sentenced to one year in prison and to pay an indemnity of 30 million SEK. Quite a heavy sum. Although, if the sum of the revenue everything that have passed through their website was to be summed up, it would certainly surpass that amount by a considerable amount. It is of course quite complicated to judge whether or not th sentence is fair or not. Some people argue that music (art) is free whilst some stubbornly refer to the notion of copyright.

In today’s music climate, with MySpace and foremost YouTube being a given part in almost anyone’s life possessing an age under 30, and many over that age as well for that matter, many people have a sense of music and movies as being public goods. The time when you bought things on CD or DVD is gone, many people seem to argue.

What is clear though is that the big corporates such as Warner Bros., Universal and others NEED to adjust to the new climate in this area. They cannot, quite frankly speaking, just sit and watch and expect that things will happen as they did 10 years ago. Technology, or rather the improvement of it, enables many things, file-sharing being one of them. In addition, there are bands and artists who I suppose are quite happy they got exposed on the internet with people copying their music. Without it, they wouldn’t have been known to the wider audience. The fact is that this possibility of sharing music instantly has brought about a revolution in the music industry. Something that the big corporates have not grasped.

iTunes is a perfect example, where people pay 0,99$ for every song they download. It’s legal, it’s safe, it’s convenient. So far, so good. But of course, the incentives for downloading illegaly still remain. However, the new IPRED law in Sweden, enabling corporates to look for illegal downloaders by removing all kind of anonymity on the web. This can result in legal consequences, which, I suppose can be quite massive. This is, of course, complete madness, since it fulfils one more criteria of the Zeitgeist prophesy. Now, doubtful as that movie might be, the thought of it is quite frightening. And to be fair, no argument of national security or anything else can bite on me in regards to private integrity. If we loose that, we are lost. With that gone, security amongst people soon disappears whilst fear, resentment and reluctance prevails.