The sentence from the lawsuit in Sweden filed by entertainment corporations against the site "Pirate Bay" has been announced: one year of prison and a 2,7 million Euro fine for the 4 founding members of the most famous file-sharing site on the Internet. But the "pirates" will appeal... this unpleasant event is a brutal reminder of how diverse legal notions that fall under the banner intellectual property: copyright, brands, patents, etc... have been abused over the years. It also reminds us to what extent the mass media rarely presents a nuanced perspective or proposes a voice other than that of their majors with their sacrosanct property.
Copyright is first and foremost an unlimited source of profit for the culture industry, but rarely represents any kind of financial return for the vast majority of artists. These immaterial rights are basically a pretense for stricter regulation on the use of cultural and traditional resources. Other primordial sectors like agriculture or health are threatened (limited production of generic-brand medicine, associated seed manufacturing and pesticides...). And in the eyes of global merchandising, nothing may be spared: colors, plants, DNA sequences... anything can be slapped with a patent!
Convinced that property is nothing but an imaginary idea begging to evolve or disappear into the past, "Imaginary Property" will emphasize the multiple resistances that have asserted themselves in different sectors of society, from free software to independent and collective creation, passing by new legal solutions that are more open and non-commercial. So let’s raise the pirate flag for a month in honor of the many filibusters without which our imaginary and concrete liberties would have long been trapped!