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Pirate Party Gets Seats in European and German Parliaments

In the Swedish election of June 7, the Swedish Pirate Party won one of Sweden's 18 seats in the European Parliament headquartered in Brussels Belgium.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10259048-38.html

It is now Sweden's third biggest party by membership. Its ranks swelled when four men were sentenced to prison in the high-profile Pirate Bay case in April. People use Web sites like The Pirate Bay to transfer movies and music, a practice that has drawn the ire--and the lawyers--of Hollywood studios and the recording industry.

The Pirate Party is not formally connected with The Pirate Bay, but has officially expressed support for the Web site.

The party wants all noncommercial copying to be free and file sharing to be encouraged. The copyright system, it argues, is out of whack--rather than encouraging the spread of culture, the system now imposes severe restrictions.
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Member of German Social Democrat Party Jumps Ship -- Hops on the Pirate Party Ship

The German Pirate Party has a new reason to celebrate. Not only do they have a member, soon to be two members, in the European parliament, but now they have a member in the German Bundestag (German Parliament). The Pirate Party website posted about this development on their blog.


http://translate.google.ca/translate?hl=en&sl=sv&u=http://www.piratpartiet.se/&ei=m6g0SqSSKpPCsQOm5OSmDg&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=2&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dpirate%2Bpartiet%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26hs%3D6I5

Piratpartiet now in the German Reichstag

Pressmeddelande 20 juni kl 20:20 Press Release June 20 at 20:20

Jörg Tauss, socialdemokrat i tyska riksdagen, har hoppat av sitt parti SPD till förmån för Piratpartiet. Jörg Taussig, a Social Democrat in the German Reichstag, has dropped out of his party SPD in favor of Piratpartiet. Det tyska Piratenpartei har därmed fått sin första ledamot i riksdagen. The German Piratenpartei therefore has its first member of the Riksdag.

– Vi välkomnar att fler ser att kampen för fri kommunikation i ett öppet samhälle är rätt väg att gå, och inte censur, blockeringar och övervakning, säger Rick Falkvinge, partiledare för det svenska Piratpartiet. - We welcome the fact that more can see that the fight for free communication in an open society is the way forward, and not censorship, blocking and monitoring, "says Rick Falk Vinge, party leader for the Swedish Piratpartiet. Det är särskilt glädjande att en befintlig riksdagsledamot ser detta. It is particularly gratifying to an existing MP sees this.