thoughts on freedom
Few days ago one of largest torrent trackers in Latvia file.lv was closed by police. Police seized about 40 servers and arrested two persons – server administrators and owners. They are accused in breach of copyright and illegal distribution of copyrighted material. If found guilty they can face large or even imprisonment. Police also opened criminal cases against some biggest uploaders.
On Saturday, August 2, Latvia hold a referendum on amendments to the Constitution to give people the right to dissolve Parliament. To pass, the referendum needed 757,607 “yes” votes or half the voting population. Though referendum failed to win enough support. Only 560,000 Latvians or about 43% of Latvia’s 1.5 million eligible voters took part (in total 40% of the electors casting "yes" ballots and 3% casting "no" ballots).
More info:
Latvian referendum fails to gather enough votes
Latvia referendum to amend constitution fails for lack of votes
European Monitoring centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction just released survey on cannabis. It reveals interesting data. Anyvay, cannabis is controversial phenomena in European [counter]culture.
Over 13 million Europeans have consumed it in the past month. Globally, nearly 50,000 tonnes of cannabis herb or resin are produced for consumption every year.
You can find full report at EMCDDA site.
On Monday (May 26) European Commission’s DG Information Society and Media published wide research on European projects in field of information technologies and communications: The Future of the Internet – A Compendium of European Projects on ICT Research Supported by the EU 7th Framework. Book can be downloaded free of charge (it comes as PDF file).
I’ll just remind about another free book with very similar title – The Future of the Internet and how to stop it (also can be downloaded free of charge as PDF) .
Parliament of Latvia is going to prolong ombudsman’s term of service from 4 years to 5. Changes in term would take effect with year 2010 when next ombudsman takes his post.
Changes in legislation also provides that procedure of ombudsman’s dismissal may be initiated by at least one third of Members of Parliament. After term of service rights to return to previous post are also granted. All those steps are taken to ensure ombudsman’s political independence.
To take an effect these provisions should be adopted by Paliament in third (last) reading.
Upd. Provisionas are adopted by Parliament and will enter into force on June 11, 2008.
Lifehacker has an article about the best ways to protect your files and do it for free. Worth reading if you value your privacy.
Historian, author, and playwright Howard Zinn gives interview to AlterNet whre he speaks about his life beliefs, democracy, anarchism etc. and why anarchism “shouldn’t be a dirty word”.
The term anarchism has become associated with two phenomena with which real anarchists don’t want to associate themselves with. One is violence, and the other is disorder or chaos. The popular conception of anarchism is on the one hand bomb-throwing and terrorism, and on the other hand no rules, no regulations, no discipline, everybody does what they want, confusion, etc
Neo-Nazis are Russia’s problem for more than 10 years if not even more. Cases of racially based crime crise each year. Though officially confronted by government forces they are often (unofficially) backed my local authorities. I remember visiting Voronez around ’99 and i saw advertisements of RNE (Russian National Unity – neo-Nazis movement / party) in trolley buses – obviously placed there with authorization.
On one hand it might seem strange that officials oppose grass-root Nazis at the same time the whole state with certainty marches towards Italy-style Fascism. But on the other hand, I assume, government find there are dark sides of Nazi movement. First of all – officials don’t want uncontrolled movements even if they share some common ideals. And, secondly – they don’t want to support someone openly declaring themselves to be “Nazis”.
Current.com has nice peace about neo-Nazis in Russia made by Christof Putzel: From Russia with hate. And what an irony – Russia and Russians abroad just broadly celebrated May 9 – the end of the World War II and what they love to call – “Day of Victory over the Fascism”. Though for me Fascism seems to be alive and living well in the heart of Russia.
Vilnius Zine Fest is a two-day event for all zine-lovers which is expected to be full of cool things to read and watch, good music and hot discussions, inspirations and practical experiences. It takes place at 17th and 18th May in Vilnius, Lithuania. More info about zinefest – http://zinefest.noblogs.org/.
After releasing music in Bittorrent sites famous band Nine Inch Nails gives away their new albumfor free. Allyou have to do to download the album – enter your e-mail address. Pretty cheap, isn’n it?
the music is available in a variety of formats including high-quality MP3, FLAC or M4A lossless at CD quality and even higher-than-CD quality 24/96 WAVE. your link will include all options – all free. all downloads include a PDF with artwork and credits.
Album “The Slip” is licensed under a creative commons attribution non-commercial share alike license. That means you can share download, share it, reven emix it for free – as long as it’s done for noncommercial purpuses.
Liberty Voice