Tag: Free Culture

“RAMSHACKLE GLORY is a retired anarchist punk band that was based out of Tucson, AZ. This is our last release. Our band lasted from 2010-2016. We put out three full length albums, one split album with the folk punk band Ghost Mice, and toured every year. We donated money to a large number of anarchist and radical political projects, and distributed a lot of free political literature on a variety of topics. We stood up for our values as much as we knew how to. I’m proud of everyone in our band for doing what we did together. This project was hard on all of us in different ways, but in the end we took care of each other as much as we know how to. That isn’t something to take for granted. I actually think it’s all we have. Thanks to everyone who helped us, tolerated our mistakes and our crankiness, and listened to our music. You have funny taste. So do I.
Love, Patrick Schneeweis (June 1, 2016)”

“THIS PROJECT was a significant part of my life these past 6 years and I’m thankful for it. At times it was an inspiring and affirming reprieve from normal life. Having the platform to attempt centering both anarchism and queerness in punk spaces meant a ton to me, personally. These weren’t clear objectives, we didn’t have those, but such attempts would manifest and at times it felt important and useful. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t, like most of the ludicrous things that anarchists do. Aside from the obvious thanks to my bandmates for being the brilliant collection of beautiful weirdos that they are, I want to thank all the rad folks who set up tables at our shows and all the kids who took that part of what we were doing seriously. Thanks to those who tried to practice some kinda consent on the dance floor. Thanks to all the hosts. (Sorry if you had to hear us yelling at each other about violence, insurrection, and techno-transhumanism or whatever at 3 in the morning on your porch.) Love your buds with all you got. Brush your teeth. Fuck authority.

For a world without borders, cops, or cages,
Luke (December 2, 2016)”

Pat the Bunny is my favorite singer-songwriter. This is a compilation of all the songs he recorded in the first iteration of his musical identity, when he was a teenage drifter anarchist addict singing under the name Johnny Hobo. These songs were all released as a series of demo EPs of super ghetto–but still so beautiful–recording quality, and this is an attempt to improve the quality of all those recordings made in squats and encampments across the country on his travels, to bring them all together in one magnificent album of semi-acoustic anarchist anthems. ♥ Neonn

“My predictions of what we would be allowed this time were all surpassed by the crowd around me, who were blessed with the inexperience necessary to push beyond the limits of what was possible. So-called “knowledge” becomes a liability when one context is mistaken for another. The same series of motions that wins someone a boxing match will lose them a knife fight.

I was mistaken that night. I thought we were on a different field playing a different game. The truth is I don’t know the world I act within well enough to justify a moment of certainty. Of course I deceive myself into many such moments, because the scale of chaos that swirls around me is beyond comprehension. But if you ask me the point of undertaking the small acts of resistance I find within my reach, I must admit: “Probably nothing, but possibly everything.”

And those are the best odds I can expect to play if I am in the
habit of believing in troubling things like freedom. I might never
know the results of what we do, but I have trouble thinking they
could be worse than if we had done nothing at all.”

“Media that spy on and data-mine the public are capable of destroying humanity’s most precious freedom: freedom of thought. Ensuring that media remain structured to support rather than suppress individual freedom and civic virtue requires us to achieve specific free technology and free culture goals. Our existing achievements in these directions are under assault from companies trying to bottleneck human communications or own our common culture, and states eager to control their subjects’ minds. In this talk–one of a series beginning with “The dotCommunist Manifesto” and “Die Gedanken Sind Frei”–I offer some suggestions about how the Free World should meet the challenges of the next decade.”

❝ These are strange times indeed. While they continue to command so much attention in the mainstream media, the ‘battles’ between old and new modes of distribution, between the pirate and the institution of copyright, seem to many of us already lost and won. We know who the victors are. Why then say any more?

Because waves of repression continue to come: lawsuits are still levied against innocent people; arrests are still made on flimsy pretexts, in order to terrify and confuse; harsh laws are still enacted against filesharing, taking their place in the gradual erosion of our privacy and the bolstering of the surveillance state. All of this is intended to destroy or delay inexorable changes in what it means to create and exchange our creations. If STEAL THIS FILM II proves at all useful in bringing new people into the leagues of those now prepared to think ‘after intellectual property’, think creatively about the future of distribution, production and creativity, we have achieved our main goal.

It has been an exciting and demanding year for us and we really hope you’ll enjoy the work we’ve done. It would not have been possible without the thousands of donations you have given us. We have a plan for the future and if you would like to continue to support us, go here. Thank you. ❞