[FYI] (Fwd) DW: Sweden Outlaws Discussion Archives?

[Horns@t-online.de (Axel H. Horns)]

Ich bin kein Experte in schwedischem Recht, aber ich habe das 
Gefuehl, irgendwer hat da irgendwas missverstanden.

Axel H Horns


------- Forwarded Message Follows -------
Priority:      normal
Date:          Sat, 31 Oct 1998 17:35:23 -0500
Reply-to:      clift@publicus.net
From:          Steven Clift <clift@publicus.net>
Organization:  Democracies Online
Subject:       DW: Sweden Outlaws Discussion Archives?
To:            Multiple recipients of list DO-WIRE <DO-WIRE@TC.UMN.EDU>

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Sweden Outlaws Discussion Archives?

In my "Democracy is Online" article
<http://www.e-democracy.org/do/article.html> I concluded with:

  Perhaps the most democratizing aspect of the Internet is the
  ability for people to organize and communicate in groups.
  It is within the context of electronic free assembly and
  association that citizens will gain new opportunities for
  participation and a voice in politics, governance, and
  society."

Today I was attempting to access an e-mail list archive for the
OldNorseNet <http://www.hum.gu.se/arkiv/> and ran into this:

  Our discussion lists archive

  1998-10-24.
  Due to a new swedish law (harmonizing to the EU directives)
  we are no longer allowed to publish archives of our
  discussion lists. This will be a severe obstacle for the
  democracy and the free debate.

  Back to Faculty of Arts homepage

While I need to gather more information, the fact that open, public
discussions among people online are illegal to archive, perhaps even
to have is quite startling.  Restrictions on electronic assembly and
association, including the ability of forum hosts to offer the value
of resulting discussions in an archive, is an even more severe
restraint than free speech restrictions on far right expression we see
in many European countries.

Below are a number of URLs and some text that I ran into.  "Jag talar
inte Svenska" and I couldn't find a Babelfish for Swedish to English
on the net, so if our Swedish subscribers could update us on this
story that would be much appreciated.


Steven Clift
Democracies Online
P.S. I'll likely be in Stockholm for a few days between Jan 11 - 15.
I'd like to meet with those involved on both sides of this issue to
learn more.


>From <http://www.bitos.org/kampanj/veta_mer.html> I found
amazing stuff from: http://www.pul.nu/


Directly from: http://www.pul.nu/sid2eng.html

Swedish law limits freedom of speech on the internet The 24th of
October Sweden got a new law on personal data, "PUL", which is based
on EU legislation. The law makes it illegal to give names public on
the net, without the mentioned persons "unmistakable consent". The new
legislation threatens freedom of speech.

The law makes it illegal to critique people on trade union or other
organisations home- and chatpages. The punishment: Up to two years in
prison.

The law makes an exception for "journalistic purposes", but not for
information purposes. Similar legislation is alreday, or will be,
adopted in other EU-countries. The legislation is based on the EU data
directive.

This site analyses the law and it's consequences for freedom of speech
on the net. But also how it will effect swedish trade unions and
organisations with homepages on the net.

It also gives an example on how Swedish communities already are
affected by the recent legislation. The Community Gällivare in the
arctic part of Sweden has had a long fight with the Swedish Data
inspection on the right to publish protocols from municipal board
meetings on the net. The problem: The protocols contain names of
people.

CONTENT

The Gällivare case and the fight about names on the internet

ENGLISH LINKS

European Commission Legal Advisory Board: Regulation of internet
content

European Union about illegal and harmful content on the Internet

Illustration: Martin Odell c

"Time to bring back anonymity"

The Quote "Time to bring back anonymity" comes from Ms Anitha
Bondestam, general director of the Swedish data inspection. In a
English brochure from 1995 she argues for more anonymity - and
welcomes the EU data directive on which the new Swedish legislation is
built.

                                      ______________________

About the illustrator

Martin Odell is a Swedish illustrator who works for Magazines such as
"Journalisten", given out by the Swedish union of Journalists and
Statstjänstemannen, given out by the union of public employees

About the site

This page is a part of the site "Personuppgiftslagen och
yttrandefriheten", produced in June 1998 by Christoph Andersson and
Susanne Bertman as a final project for the course "Global electronic
journalism", given at JMK, Stockholm university
http://www.jmk.su.se/global/ global98/private/christop/
finalpro/pul.htm

A updated version of this site, swedish version only, can be found on
these two addresses: http://www.pul.nu http://www.fgj.se
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   3454 Fremont Ave S, Mpls, MN 55408 T:+1.612.822.8667

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