The BBC has a decent and short article on the growth of Pirate Parties in Europe (noting that the German Pirate Party has gained the support of 13% of first-time male voters). The latest news is that Pirate Party is getting a second seat in the European thanks to the signing of the Lisbon Treaty. The positive of this? The passing of legislation by the EU that attempts to strengthen consumer rights in regard to telecom. Now, what can’t this happen in the United States?

In related news, Net Neutrality is facing attacks from Republicans (such as John McCain). While this isn’t surprising, I’m amazed at how uneducated some of these politicians are about 1) the internet 2) what Net Neutrality actually is. To be against it, is similar to saying that it is ok for cable television providers to privilege some channels over others. So if Comcast has a deal with NBC-Universal, then it can opt to provide HD quality broadcasts only for NBC programming.  That would prove to be a headache problem for consumers AND content providers. This is a reason why Adam Smith and Henry Ford were (kinda) pro-government when it came to things like infrastructure (something that the Republicans forget when they praise the virtues of deregulation and privatization)! Not that I’m necessarily advocating Smith or Ford, but such attitudes of the GOP illustrate their continued hypocrisy as they advocate so-called free trade.

Once again, like I’ve mentioned before in previous posts, I’m not someone who believes that the Internet is an information utopia. Companies like Google have a lot to gain from Net Neutrality since it makes data mining easier (especially as they push services such as Analytics and other web optimization packages). Combined with their status as the de facto search engine for most Internet users, this raises concerns about privacy. This is why I think the growth of the Pirate Party is a good thing. It’s stance on privacy as well as knowledge of how the Internet actually works means that it has the potential of acting smartly when it comes to legislation.

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