Fireside Chat: Peter Sunde
This is a modal window.
The media could not be loaded, either because the server or network failed or because the format is not supported.
Formal Metadata
Title |
| |
Title of Series | ||
Part Number | 29 | |
Number of Parts | 177 | |
Author | ||
License | CC Attribution - ShareAlike 3.0 Germany: You are free to use, adapt and copy, distribute and transmit the work or content in adapted or unchanged form for any legal purpose as long as the work is attributed to the author in the manner specified by the author or licensor and the work or content is shared also in adapted form only under the conditions of this | |
Identifiers | 10.5446/31885 (DOI) | |
Publisher | ||
Release Date | ||
Language | ||
Production Place | Berlin |
Content Metadata
Subject Area | ||
Genre | ||
Abstract |
|
00:00
Moment (mathematics)Broadcasting (networking)VideoconferencingMultiplication signRoundness (object)TheoryCASE <Informatik>SpiralMaxima and minimaXMLUMLComputer animationLecture/Conference
01:13
BitVideo gameQuicksortMultiplication signPoint (geometry)Decision theoryPhysical systemCASE <Informatik>Prisoner's dilemmaPower (physics)Lecture/Conference
02:40
Interpreter (computing)DataflowMathematicsMeeting/Interview
03:06
Copyright infringementCASE <Informatik>Self-organizationLecture/Conference
03:50
Latent heatCASE <Informatik>PressureExistenceElectronic mailing listLevel (video gaming)Moment (mathematics)Meeting/InterviewLecture/Conference
04:40
CASE <Informatik>Pattern languageTraffic reportingReal numberPoint (geometry)AnalogyInternetworkingRight angleOpen sourceLevel (video gaming)BitFamilyForm (programming)Wage labourMeeting/InterviewLecture/Conference
05:28
PlanningMultiplication signWebsiteDifferent (Kate Ryan album)Moment (mathematics)Sign (mathematics)Lecture/Conference
05:55
State of matterMoment (mathematics)Right angleIdeal (ethics)Direction (geometry)MathematicsLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
06:25
BitProjective planeView (database)Computing platformMereologyThomas BayesDistanceMeeting/Interview
06:58
Computing platformMereologyRight angleCopyright infringementCellular automatonFocus (optics)Computer clusterLine (geometry)Disk read-and-write headMultiplication signOrder (biology)Operator (mathematics)Speech synthesisCategory of beingMeeting/InterviewLecture/Conference
07:51
MereologyRevision controlFormal languageOffice suiteSoftware developerMultiplication signPirate BayPower (physics)Meeting/Interview
08:34
Surface of revolutionPower (physics)Content (media)Game controllerInternetworkingDistribution (mathematics)MathematicsLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
09:06
BitExpected valueSoftware developerNoise (electronics)Copyright infringementMathematicsLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
09:44
Sound effectQuicksortDirection (geometry)MathematicsAnalytic continuationData miningForm (programming)Musical ensembleVideo gameInformationDifferent (Kate Ryan album)Perspective (visual)Order (biology)Pirate BayMeeting/Interview
10:49
Data miningOffice suiteCopyright infringementException handlingView (database)MereologyHybrid computerLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
11:26
VideoconferencingOffice suiteRight angleInformationSpeech synthesisBitCausality
11:56
Office suiteMusical ensembleRight angleLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
12:25
Instance (computer science)PressureState of matterDifferent (Kate Ryan album)Meeting/InterviewLecture/Conference
13:05
Power (physics)Category of beingMathematicsTraffic reporting
13:51
Real numberContext awarenessView (database)Civil engineeringProcess (computing)Data structurePower (physics)Game controllerPhysical systemInternetworkingCore dumpAddress spaceMultiplication signMoment (mathematics)Similarity (geometry)Lecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
14:52
Inheritance (object-oriented programming)Position operatorSimilarity (geometry)Negative numberMultiplication signLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
15:43
Lattice (group)Instance (computer science)MathematicsForm (programming)Different (Kate Ryan album)Perspective (visual)Content (media)Conjugacy classComputing platformNegative numberMeeting/Interview
16:28
Mathematics10 (number)Figurate numberFacebookLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
17:10
Computing platformFacebookSmartphoneView (database)Open sourceCartesian coordinate systemMereologyInternetworkingLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
17:53
Information securityInternetworkingComputing platformUniverse (mathematics)Video gamePoint (geometry)MathematicsOrder (biology)Lecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
18:46
CausalityInternetworkingOpen sourceBitRight angleMultiplication signMereologyCycle (graph theory)Exception handlingMathematicsPhysical lawLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
20:02
DataflowFamilyRule of inferenceInformationMeeting/InterviewLecture/Conference
21:08
Multiplication signGoodness of fitFrame problemMeeting/InterviewLecture/Conference
21:33
Process (computing)Bus (computing)Device driverQuicksortDemosceneReal numberService (economics)Right angleVideo gameMultiplication signMeeting/InterviewLecture/Conference
22:30
Prisoner's dilemmaVector spaceLecture/Conference
22:59
Goodness of fitPrisoner's dilemmaSign (mathematics)Lecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
23:35
Data structureNormal (geometry)Video gameSineRight angleMessage passingMultiplication signLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
24:00
Prisoner's dilemmaMathematicsMultiplication signBitPhysical systemOpen setRight angleLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
24:33
Touch typingPrisoner's dilemmaData miningFundamental theorem of algebraMultiplication signLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
25:04
Device driverMultiplication signPrisoner's dilemmaEmailLecture/Conference
25:39
Transportation theory (mathematics)Prisoner's dilemmaSeries (mathematics)Medical imagingGroup actionDifferent (Kate Ryan album)Process (computing)Lecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
26:14
Right angleElectric generatorInformationInternetworkingRainforestMeeting/Interview
26:51
outputNatural numberSign (mathematics)TheoryNormal (geometry)Process (computing)Goodness of fitLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
27:32
System callSpacetimeOffice suiteLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
28:19
Physical systemMereologyString (computer science)Lecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
28:49
Hand fanGame controllerFocus (optics)Term (mathematics)Multiplication signLecture/ConferenceMeeting/Interview
29:14
Multiplication signHand fanSelf-organizationTwitterMereologyService (economics)Meeting/InterviewLecture/Conference
29:52
WordArithmetic meanInheritance (object-oriented programming)Surface of revolutionMeeting/Interview
30:28
Maxima and minimaIdentity managementMetropolitan area networkMultiplication signBit
31:06
Meeting/Interview
31:32
RandomizationField (computer science)Different (Kate Ryan album)BitSystem callProjective planeReading (process)MathematicsRoundness (object)CodeLecture/Conference
32:25
Computer animation
Transcript: English(auto-generated)
00:01
Oh, it's nice to be back on the stage. I've missed it.
00:23
You haven't been for, like, two minutes. You're not Gillian C. York. She's been on everything. That is true, and we're very happy about that. She should be on everything, and she's up here next for Spy Animals. I'm happy about that. In case we all make you all laugh enough, that's going to happen in the next half an hour. Peter, I would just like to start by saying the last time
00:42
I saw you at a conference, I didn't see you there in person. I saw you there with a video broadcast. It was at the conference in Malmo. And you were speaking from a place that was not to be known. And I would just like to first of all say how happy we are to have you here in person, and I think we should all give another big round of applause.
01:02
Thank you. So Max already introduced you, and I'm sure most people in the room know you for the things that you've done. And I'm sure that the last two years, you know, we followed a little bit the path that you've taken
01:21
and a lot of those things have changed, because something very impactful, of course, happened in your life, which is that you spent 11 months. Six months. The time flies really slowly. Six months in prison, yes. I mean, that's a life-changing experience. And I would like to begin with a question.
01:40
How do you know? I would like to begin with a question. The point in time, I mean, there were a lot of court cases that you had where you tried to appeal the decision and you tried to make people see that this was a wrong decision, obviously, made to try to send you to jail, but where was the point in time for you?
02:02
How early on was that? Was that when you already founded the Pirate Bay, or was that maybe shortly before you knew that the sentence couldn't be revoked, that you decided that this is something you would be ready to go for jail for? Well, I think that we kind of understood quite early on that there's going to be some sort of legal case, but we were quite sure that it was totally legal, what we were doing.
02:22
And I'm quite certain still that it is. It was never about the legality of the system. It was about who rules the courts and the politics, and we were not those people. But it's not like you take a stance one day, say, I'm going to go to jail for this, or whatever.
02:40
It's just like, things gradually change, and it grows bigger and bigger and bigger. And then in the end, either you have to skip everything but then usually it's too late, or you just go with the flow, which I tend to do in most things, anyhow. So you said it was a matter of interpretation, a legal interpretation that the Swedish courts took, which ...
03:02
I wouldn't say interpretation, actually. I said that they wanted to find us guilty and that they found some way of doing it. I'm actually one of the few people ever convicted of aiding with aiding with possible copyright infringement. Why do you think the Swedish government wanted to set a precedent with you like that? The thing that happened, I don't know how many people follow the court case,
03:21
but what happened is that the Hollywood industry was really upset about what we were doing. So they went to the White House, and the White House said, Sweden, come here, you have to answer to our complaints, and threatened Sweden with trade sanctions, both with the US and also within the World Trade Organization. So if Sweden did not do what the US said,
03:41
they would have to stop trading with the countries of the world. And Sweden is not a very big country, and it's a lot of wimpy people running the politics sometimes. So they just went back to Sweden and said to the prosecutor, which they're not allowed to talk to the prosecutors about specific cases, but they told them the consequences of what will happen
04:01
if you don't make sure that these people are not running this thing anymore. So it was on a very high level. So there was a lot of international lobby pressure, basically, to which ... Yeah, and the funny thing was, Sweden thought this was, they're not really used to this. They were pressured by the United States government to be put on the same list as Cuba and Pakistan at the moment,
04:22
which is very ... Not really happens in a Scandinavian country. So they were not used to dealing with this. So they denied, of course, as they think you should do, you should deny all of the existence of pressure and so on, whereas the Hollywood Motion Pictures Association were super happy. They bragged about it, like, we made them do what we wanted to. So they pulled down the pants of the Swedish government
04:43
and made us realize what was going on. So everything was just kind of a show. So basically, no one in Sweden took the court case as a real court case, and there was a lot of controversy around that. Do you think, though, maybe like one last point about Sweden, that it's actually right down to that international pressure?
05:03
I mean, Sweden is known to be one of the most liberal countries in Europe and an upholder of rights in many ways, whether it's labor rights or the forms of human rights. And yet, on the other hand, you're not the only internet activist to be persecuted in Sweden. And I've made this analogy sometimes
05:21
that Sweden sometimes seems like this perfectly happy family that has a bit of a corpse rotting in the cellar when it comes to its liberal approach. Well, Sweden is as every country in Europe is changing. It's because of globalization and because of the right-wing movement that's going on in most of Europe, with the new immigration-hating Poland parties and so on. All of these things happen,
05:41
and we're kind of going to a place where we will be equal countries, but it will be like the minimum thing we want equally. So there's no big difference between Sweden and Germany anymore. Just a sign of the times of where things are turning to at the moment. And the same goes with the European Union wanting to be a federal state, and it's going to be one big country in the end, basically.
06:03
That's how it's going to be. It has some purpose as well, but there's also not a chance for small countries to stand up for actual ideals, because it's too expensive. Right. I mean, that is definitely a very daunting direction that we're heading on. Oh, I want to take my shoes off, too. You can. I totally will.
06:21
So, I mean, you've given a couple of interviews in the last couple of months where you've voiced yourself quite critically about some of the projects that you also helped initiate, especially Pirate Bay, and that things are kind of taking a turn for the worse.
06:40
Can you explain a little bit why you've sort of distanced yourself from the platform? Well, I think it's like if you're honest about your views and your ideology and the things you want to achieve, you should actually be able to criticize the things you're doing when it starts going wrong, and stand up for mistakes you've done and so on. And that's the only way I could honestly live with myself. I don't like what's going on right now.
07:01
I was part of that. I'm taking a stand, saying this is not what I want to do anymore. This is wrong. But is that because you've changed personally, or is it because the platform changed itself as well? Of course, in many ways. Maybe you can pinpoint what it actually was that made you feel like this is nothing you want to stand behind anymore. There was a lot of things. There was a focus on less talk about piracy,
07:22
less talk about freedom of speech and so on from the side of the operators of Pirate Bay, which is the most crucial thing to do, which is why you have a big platform, in order to use the leverage, that attention, into something which will actually change something else. And we did that all the time with Pirate Bay. We played so much with Pirate Bay as a concept,
07:41
and we didn't care about the consequences for ad sales or whatever that you could be interested in. It was never about that at all. And you can have your head up high if you go for more line. And the current people that are running Pirate Bay are more interested in less conflicts.
08:01
They actually removed the best part of the Pirate Bay, which was the legal threats part, where all of the legal threats that Pirate Bay received was published, with our answers, which were hilarious and super fun to read, where we told Hollywood to fuck off and use language like that, which was amazing. And which I think is also one of the biggest things that made Pirate Bay big, is to actually be aggressive on the offense
08:23
instead of being defensive, trying to hide. And it totally changed. And at the same time, Pirate Bay has no new development. It's been the same thing for 10 years. And it's standing in the way of innovation, because it has all of the attention, all of the power. It was a revolution in itself, and for many people, you know, opened the door to seeing,
08:43
you know, the whole way that we approach content distribution in the internet in a different way. But then it didn't take off to actually change, I'm going to say this carefully, but change the powers that are when it comes to the control over which content we receive where. Why do you think that, you know, what stopped it becoming that?
09:03
I think it's lousy people running it, to begin with, and I'm including myself here. It's like we're not, none of us were organized in any way. We're not administrative people. We didn't have like these high expectations. We didn't want to start a party. There's someone else started a party. None of us voted for them. It's like none of these things mixed them together.
09:23
And I believe that, you know, if you're not good at doing something, you should just stand aside. And that's why things didn't change, because there was not the right people at the right place. There are other people who are the right people, but there definitely didn't have the attention that we had. So we were actually a little bit in the way of other people's attention,
09:41
I would say. And yet you've just mentioned at the development of the Pirate Party, many things come off from there. Like if you sit back and you look back the next 10 years, what do you think, you know, what, I mean, there's a lot of critical things that we have to say in the session, but what are the positive effects that it has had where you sort of look at them and say, yes, I'm glad that we contributed toward that change?
10:01
Well, there's a lot of things that are really cool that happened, but mostly like to make people realize that you can do something else than status quo, because we really show that. Like we really made a lot of people realize that, OK, what I'm seeing here is not necessarily the truth. And then you also have the direct consequences of people being able to vouch for like a bigger cultural life.
10:23
You have a bigger cultural impact. People are spreading music and information all over the world. I was just in Brazil and people are super happy about Pirate Bay because no one serves Brazil as a country because there's no market, there's no money. So in order to get any form of cultural influence from other countries, you have to download.
10:40
I think that's an important point, which I sometimes fail to recognize, because this one can be a different perspective, talking about them here in Europe, where we have different forms of access to different things. A friend of mine that's also here at the conference comes from Kenya, said, oh, I want to shake your hand later, because thanks to you, we have access to all these movies where I come from. But that actually is not only, like that's even the same thing that goes on in Europe.
11:02
Like you have the whole Balkan countries, which have a different view on this as well, because they did not have access. No one cares about the poor countries, except people that are fracturing, because it's about community, it's not about money. It's not a market, it's something else. And that's what I'm proud of with Pirate Bay, is that we did not care about the money, it was always about the higher purpose.
11:21
And so, getting back to the Pirate Party, you also ran for office. Yeah. Is that something you would still do today? No. Why? I kind of, I like to try things, and I like to play with things, and the thing I wanted was to get a little bit of attention for the causes that I am interested in,
11:43
so freedom of speech and informational stuff, and also animal rights and all of these things. I made a really funny campaign video, which you should not Google and check, because it's really awful, but it's really funny. Basically me trying to be romantic and kissing the camera, and with some romantic music, saying nothing about politics.
12:02
But it made the Finnish newspapers write a lot about the weird guy that's running for office for this small party. And they asked me about my politics, my ideology. So I already did that, I'm done with that, so I'm going to do the next thing. So it's not to do with the rise and fall of the Pirate Party in Europe, it's more to do with your personal experience.
12:22
Well, there was no big rise, it was a small rise. Now there's a rise in Iceland and other countries, which are doing the things that I'm really happy to see, that they're actually putting a real political agenda there for their party. It's not just one or two or three things that the Pirate Party in Sweden had, for instance. It's a real political belief with a full ideology,
12:41
which is more honest and much better. So there might be something coming out of that. It seems to be working in Iceland, but it doesn't seem to be working so well in other European countries. Germany is another good example for that. Why do you think it's working in Iceland? Is it because they had to with the failed state scenario that they had there? Like, the pressure was too big, and it's not big enough here for it to work?
13:04
I think there's a lot of things that come together. Definitely, the financial crisis on Iceland, it's a small country, so it's faster to do things that only need to come in so many people. And then they have really good people in the party that are known from before and people trust, so there's a lot of layers on top of this.
13:21
The Pirate Party in Germany was quite big for a while, and then it imploded because people got really into the idea of having power, which is not what you should be after. If you're a party, you should be after change, and maybe power is a necessary step to do that. But they were focusing on the wrong thing. It's what I saw from the outside. But one thing that is kind of the problem here
13:42
is also that if you compare with the green movement, the Pirate Party, they didn't really have this grand idea of the world. They only had a grand idea of these small topics that they care about. It's very autistic in that way. I only care about this. I don't care about the rest. And I think that's why it works much better in Iceland,
14:02
because you have all the big view, you put it into a context of a real ideology. And you didn't really do that in Germany. Yeah, I mean, the attempt is there, of course, to diversify, but then, yeah, I guess it's a process bringing up that expertise. I was just wondering for a moment, because you could say that, yes, it's still true as much today as it was in the 80s,
14:22
that climate issues and the future of our Earth, basically, are probably what's going to be most important to uphold this civilization that we've built up or not in the next couple of hundred years. But at the same time, of course, our civil liberties and what kind of democratic systems we live in, what happens to our data, and who has control over what power structures would, I would say,
14:42
be at the core of the issues the private party or other internet activists are trying to address are also very central to the world that we live in today. They are, definitely. But there is a similarity here, again, to the green movement. It's like the climate change is somewhat visible. Like, you can actually show some things,
15:01
and then you can discuss is it really because of the climate change or not. The surveillance, you don't know anything, you don't see it. It's an invisible enemy. You're going to see it when it's too late. And that's a hard thing to kind of cope with. It's really hard to get attention for that. And who cares about copyright? It's super boring stuff. Like, it's going to take forever, stopping this and this and this. It's a kind of negative thing.
15:22
As the green parties were in the beginning, they were really negative. They just wanted to stop things. They didn't want to change things or have a positive spin on things, which I think is a big problem that the private parties are not realizing. And it goes for most activists as well. We're really negative. I'm super negative. I'm doing a fun spin on that for myself, but it's super negative to see all of this.
15:42
But at the same time, you're a doer. I mean, like, at least watching, you know, from afar, yes, it might be a very negative outlook, but you also do stuff to change stuff, yeah? And I think, for instance, like, flatter is such a story wrongly told because people like to speak about the failure of flatter and how it's not really been a success. But I think if you look at it from a slightly different perspective,
16:02
I think it's been such a kickoff for different forms of micropayment. I know people that earn most of their wages through the platform, but it's also just spurred the idea that you can contribute to paying for content in a different kind of way. Why do you think people tell this story in such a negative light? Like, why are haters hating on flatter? Well, I don't get most of that hate, actually.
16:23
I don't hear that that much. Maybe it's better here in Germany, especially in Berlin, because it's like, people are comparing, like, if you do this, either it becomes the new Facebook or it's a failure, which is not kind of the thing. There's no nuances. And for me, it was never about making sure that everyone got tens of thousands of euros each month.
16:42
It was about an actual change of the story. It's like, who's the creator? It was not about paying the same people as before. It's like, why aren't the commentators on articles getting money for the things they contribute with? And you will not get a lot of money, but why is that not creativity? Why is that not actually putting something down?
17:04
So that's what I wanted to be after, and that's why I think flatter is awesome, because it's inviting everyone. It's not excluding. It's one of the few including platforms that actually solves most of the issues that we've been talking about. But then you have the problem, and that is that Facebook and Google and all of the other big players on the market,
17:21
they just say, no, we don't want it here. We want to make money ourselves on our own platform. We're going to do our own thing. We're not going to open it up. So then you don't have the possibility of competing because of the ecosystem being monopolized by a few companies. Yeah. I was just saying to you earlier, I've just come from another panel where I was speaking with three 16-year-olds about their view of the internet, having of course grown up in a world where they know nothing but,
17:42
but also having grown up in a world where they know nothing much but, the smartphones that they use with the applications that they use, which are all commercial applications, thinking about open source technology, doesn't exist in that universe, and thinking about data security and protection, and also sharing of content outside of these commercial platforms,
18:03
also doesn't exist very much. That is the face of the internet today. Yeah. We failed miserably on helping them to get to a point where actually they have a much better life and a much better outlook on what's going to happen in the future. Now they don't even think about what the future is.
18:21
It's just like, it's like this, and I'm imitating them. Like, I'm going 15-year-olds. I'm only, I give up on other stuff. Like, we are 15-year-olds. We don't have a possibility of changing. This is the world. That's how it is? Yeah, that's how it is. And, I mean, how do you see it today? I mean, we all know, of course, the internet has become centralized,
18:42
it's being ruled by these big corporations, and of course there's still another side of the free and open internet, but it seems to be shrinking, and it also seems to be like grass out of our hands in many ways. Yeah. Lost cause? It is a lost cause. That's pretty tough.
19:02
No, but I'm honest. Like, I've always been a realist. Some people say pessimist. I would say I'm even a little bit optimistic when I say it's lost cause. How so? Yeah, because that feels better to say. But seriously, like, the thing we're doing is like, we are still proud that we stopped ACTA. We're still proud that we stopped SOPA and PIPA and all of these things.
19:22
But like, 10 of them already passed when I said this, almost. Like, we had TTIP and all of these things, they're just like a new name and it's going to pass, and we're happy if we can stop parts of it. But we lost the fight. Like, you know, where's our rights? We're only limiting things all the time. We don't have, like, our new rights. Finland, an exception to this,
19:41
actually made it a human right to have access to the internet. So when there's people that want to filter the internet, those laws coming from the European Union can't be implemented in Finnish law, because it goes against the Finnish human rights. So by having a positive change, giving your rights, you don't have this problem of all of the negative things that you have to stop all the time. And we're really bad at this, so now it's too late.
20:02
We can't stop all of the things coming. We didn't stop the things that already came, so we can't go back on that. But then what do we do if this is all too late? Like, do we, I don't know, like, go become farmers and not do this anymore? That's awesome. Really? Is that what's next? I think that's the new thing, you know.
20:21
But also, you can do two things with this. Either you become, like, a farmer or whatever, which is a good thing. But then you can also, like, you're not going to believe this, but I did ninjutsu when I was a kid, because of my ninjutsu. My brother was really into it, so I did a little bit as well. And one of the things you learn, also my friend Linus is here,
20:40
he's telling me that also in Aikido, is what you learn is, like, when someone tries to punch you, you should use kind of their movement against you to make them fall over. So you don't use your own strength. You use, like, the strength of the other person. So I'm going with the flow. So if you're going to have surveillance, I'm going to have the most amount of surveillance in the world, because you have to go the other way around. Like, you have to follow them around.
21:01
So there's so much information, they can't find anything. So you have to play with their rules and fuck them over with their own rules. How? Like, that's what I'm figuring out. OK. But I'm starting now, 2030. That's when it's going to start. So I'm figuring out what's going to happen in 15. So you're skipping the next 15 years. They're lost. Because they're gone. Yeah, they're gone. And why are you picking up again in 15 years?
21:21
Why is that a good time frame, do you think? It's MMXXX. 2030. It's just awesome. What is going to happen, though, within those next 15 years to make sure that we can pick up again in 2030? Well, I, like, there's so many things happening that you can't even grasp all of it.
21:41
Like, we're going to have a huge collapse in people's jobs. We're going to lose so many jobs. So we're going to have a discussion about how to make sure that people have something to do in the days. You know, we're not going to have taxi drivers. We're not going to have bus drivers. We're not going to have people working in supermarkets. We're going to have real-life problems that have nothing to do with kind of the tech scene. The tech scene is just like the catalyst for all of this.
22:02
The surveillance is not going to be such a big problem for most of the people. It's going to be a problem for the people that are trying to change things. So you shouldn't try to change things, because then you're going to have a problem, right? So there's going to be so much things that are happening, and I think there will be some sort of collapse or some sort of backlash. And I think it's going to happen in, like, maybe 10, 15 years, I'm hoping at least.
22:21
And then that's when you actually could kind of make the swing go back. And in the next 15 years, you're going to spend the time doing? Art. OK. That's my new thing, because everything is art, and I'm a prankster, so they like that in the art world. OK, nice.
22:44
I'm also doing a TV show. A TV show? About activism. Well, that's a pretty... I mean, that seems like there's still some hope there if you're doing a TV show about activism. I'm going to show what's wrong with activism. I also wrote a sitcom when I was in prison. I mean, like, I know this is very...
23:02
And people don't think I'm real, but I am. I did. It's a really good sitcom, actually. Is that going to be... Like, is somebody going to film that and put that on? People want to buy it and make it. I don't know. Maybe. It's really good. Do you want to talk about that experience? I wasn't actually going to ask about it, because, no, I'm being in prison.
23:21
Like, did you... I can't even imagine, really, what that must have been like. Well, it was weird coming in, and the first thing I have to do is sign an autograph for the guy working at the prison, for his kids. And then people started calling me Jesus, because I was there for their sins, you know. So there was a lot of things that were not, like, normal,
23:41
which is typical in my life. I don't have a lot of normal things going on in my life, and I tend to, like, maybe find that or something, I don't know. Did you think about how to, like, structure those six months to make that time pass in a certain way? I read a lot of stuff. Like, I read a lot of books, and I complained a lot about the human rights violations
24:02
of the Swedish government, which they were real upset about. That's why a lot of people got fired, because I had a bigger mouth than they had. And I tried to use kind of the time I had to do some actual change within the prison system, which I did a little bit. But I realized there are so many problems in society that it's so much to fix.
24:21
And looking back on it now, how would you say that's impacted on you as a person and the way you're going to live in the future? Honestly, it didn't impact me that much. Not yet, at least. Not that I'm feeling right now. But I really know how to kill people with a knife. I also know how to smuggle cocaine and how to not do it. That's kind of what you learn in prison.
24:42
How do you not do it? So a friend of mine, he smuggled seven kilos of cocaine across the border. Turned out it was only 37 grams. He got screwed over. He was happy, only seven years in prison instead of 25, 30. So he taught me a lot. Yeah, OK.
25:00
I have good friends now. Are you in touch with people from that time? Did you meet people that you built relationships with? Well, they're still in prison. OK. I get an email every now and then when they have like a day off or something, but yeah. A day off prison? Yeah, you can go, you know, you can have a leave after some... No, it's in most countries in the world.
25:21
There's some people I don't want to be in contact with. Some other people are like, I'm really upset about what happened to them. Like, there's a guy that went to prison like 40 times for not having a driver's license. We calculate it's like two million euros in costs for his driver's license missing. It's really, it is interesting.
25:40
I mean, yeah, here in Berlin, half the people are in prison because they got caught in the public transportation without a ticket, which is insane in so many ways. Before, you just mentioned that you were doing a TV series about activism. Oh, you want to go to something actually like good. Let's talk about your TV series about activism.
26:01
What is the idea behind that? No, it's like the thing that we're trying to do is like a dirty jobs activism edition. So I'm going to go to different activist groups doing different things, not just tech activism, and then work with them for like a week or two and film and complain about things they're doing wrong and learn something that they're doing that's interesting.
26:20
Or like people who go into restaurants and they're like, you're not running your restaurant right. You're going to go and be like, you're not running your campaign right. Like you show how to cook that for you. Or like you should do this and this and you should do, you know, I have lots of ideas and there's a lot of things I want to make people realize, like what's going on in Brazil with the rainforest, what's going on with like gay rights in Uganda, all of these things which are really awesome and smuggling information in and out of North Korea
26:42
seems like something I really want to do. So that's kind of the things I want to show on TV. For the people who are not from like the internets, like older generations or people that don't care about activism, kind of edutainment. It's fun to see and it might actually educate people as well. Isn't activism kind of, you know, if you look at who is an activist,
27:02
what is activism? On the one hand, people are being criminalized. Then you're doing it right. Normally that's a sign of doing something good. Exactly, and on the other hand, people are professionalizing, which means that it's basically turning into a lobbyist job
27:21
and maybe changing a nature of, you know, why like people pursue that as a career rather than a belief. Which one of those two are you targeting in your TV series? Well, I think obviously the guys that are crazy enough to like go cross borders and get shot or something, that's the thing I'm interested in. Like that's also the best kind of TV to watch.
27:41
You don't want to see people that are like changing papers or like in an office. So I more definitely want to show the more aggressive people or more like people that are out there, because I tend to find that more interesting. But then, you know, there is a space for the other guys as well. I wouldn't really call them activists, like people that go into politics because of an ideological belief.
28:03
We need them. We really do. But we need kind of many people. We have a multitude of like an ecosystem of that. So a lot of people call themselves activists when they're like an entrepreneur doing this social entrepreneurship, which I hate so fucking much. Why do you hate it so much?
28:21
Like, Aral was here yesterday talking about basically why he's doing this thing indie without venture capital, because he is part of the system and he's taking money, which means that he doesn't really have like a totally, oh. Do you want one too? I don't drink alcohol. OK, then that's just for me.
28:41
Yeah, you can go. Yeah, please do. No, but I think that if you take money, there's always strings attached. So I'm impressed by the people who don't take that. But if you do kind of a startup and you have like money from a venture capitalist company, either the kind of human side of you want to help those guys as well, because you're working together. So you have a focus of trying to do your thing plus their thing so they're happy.
29:04
And at the same time, they could also come in and destroy the things you're doing if you're too far away from what they want. So you have like someone controls you a little bit. Yeah, tension between interest and capital. I myself, I'm not a fan of the term social entrepreneurship for two different reasons. One being that I would wish we live in a world
29:22
where all companies would consider themselves social as well, because they are part of the society and it shouldn't be an add on to it. And I also increasingly see the trend that especially, you know, like governments or donor organizations are like, yay, social entrepreneurship, because it's being used to replace services
29:40
that should be inherently offered by public institutions and the government to citizens. It's a way of outsourcing social services, basically. It goes hand in hand with the trend of capitalism. Like basically, you're making people think that they can be an entrepreneur and they don't have to be employed, which makes the unions useless. And it's going towards a super capitalist society
30:02
by the storytelling of social entrepreneurship will change the world. We will revolutionize by having this new plastic thing. You know, it's not going to revolutionize anything. Like the words are so useless now. The meaning of the word revolution, like it's not there anymore. The same thing goes for the social entrepreneurship thing. It's just, it's a pointless buzzword.
30:23
And I'm so fed up with it. Yeah, so I'm going to just have a quick look about the time, because I was going to leave a little bit of time for one or two questions from the audience, but I'm getting, Max, what's going on? You're waving at me.
30:43
OK. Well, I think two questions might be OK. Time has flown. It's nearly time over. All right, then. Are there any questions from other people than me, Peter? Please give me a show of hands and Max will come to you with a microphone. Raise your hand. Nope. No questions.
31:00
Are there any questions, please? There's a question over here. OK, we'll take one here and one over here. Two people in blue shirts, first you and then you. Why did you stop to develop Hemless and where did the $150,000 of crowdfunding money go?
31:22
So, we stopped. Hemless was, for those who don't know, we started doing in kind of competitor to WhatsApp after the Snowden revelations. And we worked on that for two years, I think, before we closed down and that's where the money went, salaries for people. So, the code will be released, what has been created.
31:42
We realised, like, we cannot compete with only $150,000. It was not enough to actually compete with WhatsApp getting bought for $22 billion. It's a little bit different. That's kind of the people you have to compete with. It was kind of a failed project, but at least we tried. And that's kind of what's not going on otherwise in the world.
32:03
A lot of people demand change, but they don't do a lot, and I try to actually do stuff. Sometimes you fail, and that's fine. And I think it's good to have the courage to try and fail rather than to not try. I think we should give you another really big round of applause for that. We look forward to seeing you on TV and in person
32:21
a lot more in the next month. Thank you.