Huffington Magazine Issue 5 | Page 78

PIRATE BOOTY JESSICA GOW/AFP/GETTY IMAGES FULLY OPERATIONAL HUFFINGTON 07.15.12 As the Pirate Party has evolved, the movement that informs it is no longer only focused on file-sharing; it has developed a much broader platform inspired by a belief in the power of sharing in all aspects of life and a great deal of faith in technology. “The Pirate Party started out as a protest movement against the copyright industry’s effort to clamp down on sharing, but we’re starting to see the same pattern occurring in the rest of politics,” says 22-year-old animator Zacqary Adam-Green, who is secondThe Pirate Bay’s first server, which was confiscated during a in-command in the New York branch of police raid in 2008, sits on display at the Technical Museum the Pirate Party. “So we’re also working in Stockholm. Nils Olander, the museum’s curator, purchased the server from police in early 2009. on increasing participation in democracy and introducing more peer-to-peer principles in the economy.” camp; she long worked as a book publisher Many Pirates, for example, believe and a translator, and saw piracy as a threat that information technology should be to the livelihoods of artists like herself. used to make government more transShe began to second-guess herself after parent; they suggest that the laws being writing a blog post attacking piracy, and considered in legislatures be posted onfinding the responses she got persuasive. line throughout the entire process of de- After researching the issue for the next bate and amendment. Most of them also two weeks she changed her position. believe that services like Wi-Fi, educa“At the time, everyone in publishtion and health care should be freely acing was very negative; they were alcessible, without corporate interference. ways complaining that new technology Falkvinge is now a roving ambassador was going to destroy culture,” she says. for the Pirate Party and his successor in “Once I started talking to the Pirates, I Sweden, Anna Troberg, runs the party itsaw that they were much more positive self. Troberg is a convert to the pro-piracy — they were trying to find new solutions using technology.” No matter how quickly the party spreads from here, though, and no mat-