Recently, several Finnish mainstream media outlets have targeted Finnish SOTT.net, accusing it of copyright law infringement. Among those who have made these allegations are Sanoma Oyj (the owner of Helsingin Sanomat - the largest subscription newspaper in Finland and the Nordic countries), STT (Finnish News Agency) and Yleisradio (the main Finnish Broadcasting Company). Some have even accused us of "outrageous business" because we reproduce and comment on articles from other sources.

While we understand that media companies want to defend their business, considering the massive amount of news offered today and the near monopoly-status these companies enjoy in the Finnish information market, their "outrage" on this issue seems somewhat excessive, if not specious. More to the point, while copyright laws play an important role in any supposed democratic society, the interpretation of these laws is far from unambiguous.

The first point everyone needs to understand is that SOTT.net operates within the limits of fair use, based on the non-commercial and research nature of our content (see quotes below). Secondly, the Finnish mainstream media, (like the mainstream media of other EU nations) serves as a mouthpiece for vested political and corporate interests and, in pursuing that aim, often acts hypocritically and accuses others of that which they themselves are guilty of (e.g. the restriction of freedom of speech and "trolling").

This article should not be taken as an act of revenge or a war of words, but rather as an exercise in contextual social research. Such research is very much in keeping with the mission statement of SOTT.net - to explore social phenomena within various contexts. So what is the context in this case? The evidence from our research strongly suggests that the Finnish mainstream media would like Sott.net to quietly fade away from the information scene. It is obvious that the various mainstream media outlets seek to maintain their self-styled role of the official "bugle of truth", enjoying the exclusive confidence of citizens. It is equally obvious that those in the ivory tower are not pleased with the fact that we analyse world events that are either ignored or 'spun' by the mainstream, engage in critical commentary on "official" news, bring alternative perspectives and interpretations to generally "accepted truths" and expose mainstream media propaganda campaigns.

Shining the Light

SOTT.net is often compared to a lighthouse that shines the light of truth into the darkness of media lies and manipulation. The English website has been live since 2002 and our readership is counted in millions (2014 approx. 18 million users). The Finnish site was established recently to reach a wider audience of non-English speakers, so that they too might benefit from our research. We have already received a lot of positive feedback, especially about our contextual commentary that accompanies most articles and our regular original content. Most sincere media experts and writers on social issues have been pleased when their articles appear on our website because it means they reach a wider and more diverse audience.

As a result of the litigious rants from Finnish media companies' lawyers, the future of the Finnish SOTT.net site hangs in the balance - our research project has lost important material due to the removal of a vast number of articles. Working voluntarily and in their spare time, the small number of editors are already overwhelmed in trying to collect evidence in order to "connect the dots". After reading this article we hope readers will offer their opinion on this matter [e-mail sott@sott.net]. Do you feel that there is a demand and need for a multi-lingual angle to Sott.net including the Finnish SOTT site? The English pages will naturally retain their operation, thus answering the needs of millions of readers.

The Health and Wellness show on the SOTT Radio Network covers topics of health, diet, science, homeopathy, wellness culture, and more. Tune in weekly!

Today we'll be covering the topic of vitamin D and sun exposure. What are beneficial levels of vitamin D? Is exposure to the sun good or bad? What are other sources of vitamin D? These questions and more, as well as the pet health segment, as always.

Running Time: 01:58:00

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There are a number of reasons why the reality of extraterrestrial visitation on our planet remains largely unacknowledged or dismissed by many otherwise rational, intelligent and educated people. One reason is the desire of the scientific, religious and political elite classes to maintain the status quo. After all, if such a thing as the existence of ETs not only visiting but actually interacting with us, and all that that entails, were to be publicly divulged in any meaningful way, it would probably change a lot of people's thinking on the big questions, and thereby run the risk of dis-empowering the ruling class, whose positions depend on the rather rigid shaping and control of popular belief.

The official position by the U.S. government, for instance, has been that there are no ETs visiting us. According to official reports from groups like the Condon Committee, and numerous statements made by government agencies since, there is nothing serious to consider as regards the subject of the UFO phenomenon.

This week on Behind the Headlines we spoke with geopolitical analyst Stephen Lendman. Born in 1934, Stephen is a Harvard University graduate and a prolific writer on major world and national issues. His articles have appeared on many news websites and he maintains a personal blog at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

Stephen is a regular guest on alternative news radio shows and hosts his own show on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network three times weekly. The author or editor of four books:Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive For Hegemony Risks World War III, Banker Occupation: Waging Financial War on Humanity, How Wall Street Fleeces America, Privatized Banking, Government Collusion and Class War and The Iraq Quagmire: The Price of Imperial Arrogance, Stephen is a 2008 Project Censored winner and 2011 Mexican Journalists Club international journalism award recipient.

Running Time: 01:27:00

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Winter in the northern hemisphere officially ended in March, and yet May 2015 saw heavy snowfalls in parts of Norway, Russia, China and the US. Europe recorded its highest ever (official) May and June temperature - 44°C in Spain - during a brief heatwave, before the mercury plunged to as low as 8°C the following week. Like much of Siberia, northern China went from warm, dry weather - including sandstorms and wildfires - in April, to blizzards by the end of May, while spring snowfall and cold temperature records were broken in Russia.

There were at least four major tornado outbreaks in the US last month, generating some 460 tornado reports. Will the US break its 2011 record for highest number of tornadoes in one year? With the storms came hail, rain, and snow - lots of it. Texas was inundated with record-breaking rainfall that bought its 3-year-long drought to a chaotic end. There were also destructive tornadoes in New Zealand, Mexico, and Germany, which saw two tornado outbreaks.

California's record-breaking drought continues, but Los Angeles saw its daily rainfall record smashed in May. Other parts of the US under water were Louisiana, Oklahoma and Alaska, which saw its 'worst flooding in decades', in part due to yet another bizarre spring heatwave. An 'apocalyptic' storm in Moscow flooded streets, while hailstorms turned streets into rivers of ice in Spain, Mexico, and Turkey, where cars were washed away in the coastal city of Izmir. Several huge sinkholes opened up - in the US, Turkey, the Canary Islands and Russia - swallowing gardens, street intersections, golf greens, and cars.

Another deadly earthquake - officially considered an aftershock - rocked Nepal on May 12th, just three weeks after the country was flattened by its worst seismic event in 80 years. Wolf Volcano in the Galapagos erupted for the first time in decades, followed a couple of days later by an explosive eruption of Mount Shindake in southern Japan. Next up was a magnitude 8.5 earthquake off the Japanese coast, the country's strongest since that magnitude 9.0 earthquake in March 2011.

Some are asking 'when, if ever, will the climate change'? Our answer to that is: open your eyes; it's changing NOW!

On this show, our hosts Harrison Koehli, Elan Martin, and fellow Sott.net editors discussed the latest release from Red Pill Press. Out of print since 1967, Dr. Kazimierz Dabrowski's Personality-Shaping Through Positive Disintegration introduces readers to his theory of positive disintegration. Dabrowski's theory is miles ahead of the disease-based, Freudian-tinged, materialistic psychology of today. We talked about the book, the theory, and why Dabrowski is still so important. TPD is a psychology of transformation that helps make sense of onself AND the world.

The book is available on Amazon (print and Kindle), and you can watch two videos of Dabrowski here.

Running Time: 02:14:00

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On Behind the Headlines this week your hosts are going beyond the Western media's sound and fury to examine the real story behind the 'FIFA corruption scandal', the latest Russian-Chinese military (and political) maneuvers, the return of anthrax on the eve of PATRIOT Act renewal in the US, and the latest madness in Ukraine.

We'll also have updates on the US's 'creative destruction' in the Middle East and the extreme weather and planetary upheaval breaking out all over the world. Tune in from 2-4pm EST / 11am-1pm PST / 7-9pm UTC / 8-10pm CET

Running Time: 01:47:00

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Broadcasting from deep in the heart of the American Empire, join your hosts Harrison Koehli and Elan Martin, and fellow Sott.net editors, as they discuss everything from current events and the latest machinations and manipulations of the global elite to history, science, and religion, and how it all fits together.

This week, join our hosts as they discuss the latest ISIS antics, vaccine legislation, and more.

The Truth Perspective is brought to you by the SOTT Radio Network and SOTT.net, your one-stop source for independent, unbiased, alternative news and commentary on world events.

Live every Saturday from 2-4pm EST / 11am-1pm PST / 8-10pm CET.

Running Time: 01:33:00

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Try and find any public information that shows that Sepp Blatter is guilty of any of the charges of fraud or corruption that have ever been brought against him. You won't find it. The only thing Blatter seems to have been "found guilty of" is "political correctness", aka crimes against Western, liberal, capitalist, secular, atheist, war-loving culture.

For example, Blatter advised gay football fans planning to go to Qatar - a brutal dictatorship supported by the West and ruled by Sharia law, where homosexuality carries the death penalty - to "refrain" while there. That's pretty good advice in my opinion.

Blatter also allegedly suggested that women footballers dress in a more feminine way to improve attendance rates. While that carries more than a hint of sexism and misogynism, this is sound business advice in this capitalist, sex-obsessed, free market driven, morality-free, money-is-all-that-matters Western world.

As to his "bizarre winner's speech"; on what basis can this be considered "bizarre" when compared to the paramoralistic verbiage regularly spewed by the average Western politician? Blatter says "we need more women in FIFA" - just like every goddam political party leader in the Western world. He also mentioned god. How exactly is that bizarre when 2/3 of the global population believes in some kind of god? But I forget, he is being targeted by the liberal, godless, materialism-worshipping and warmongering West. No god here please, unless he supports war and genocide.

The good ol' US of A is at it again. Fighting injustice, dispensing truth, kickin' corrupt corporate butt and taking names. No evil-doers are safe, not even outfits that most people in the US Justice Dept. have probably never heard of, like FIFA, the International Federation of Association Football.

If, like most of the rest of the world, you think that this 'scandal' has anything to do with the US government's desire to see justice served, then I have a chemical weapon storage facility in Syria to sell you. This 'scandal' is nothing more than a bare-faced and embarrassingly pathetic attempt by the US empire-builders to prevent Russia from hosting the 2018 soccer world cup. Like a petulant, spoiled child that has been told 'no', this is the US government's version of throwing a tantrum and screaming "I HATE YOU!"

The official story is that, over the course of several years from the 1990s, the 14 indicted officials had accepted bribes for voting to award FIFA events to particular countries, primarily Qatar, South Africa, and various Latin American nations. But these days, no US government-inspired 'scandal' is worth promoting if it doesn't target Russia, the American empire's favorite whipping boy.

Russia was awarded the 2018 World Cup in 2010, at a time when the US government still thought it could 'contain' Russia. With last year's events in Ukraine however, all bets were off and Putin's Russia leaped to an all time high in the league table of states in need of 'regime change'. So while there is no doubt that FIFA is as perfidious as any other global corporation, there is obviously more to this situation than mere bribery.

So given that corruption within FIFA has been an open secret for years, the question becomes, why now? FIFA is scheduled to elect its next president today, with the incumbent Sepp Blatter, who is up for reelection, viewed as a pro-Russian because he presided over the awarding of the 2018 games to Russia. Blatter's opponent is vice president Prince Ali of Jordan, Jordan being a US client state that has been used as a staging ground for Western-backed 'Syrian rebels' (aka ISIS) to attack Syria. Coincidentally (or NOT!) just one day before the US DOJ indictments, US Senators John McCain and Robert Menendez sent a letter to the FIFA congress urging it to remove Russia as the host country for 2018. Their schizoidal rationale was that: "allowing Russia to host the World Cup would bolster the Putin regime at a time when it should be condemned".

Now, isn't it 'funny' that the world's pre-eminent financiers and supporters of terrorism and brutal dictators have the cojones to call the Russian government a "regime"? Isn't it a hoot that the same global mafia bosses who orchestrated the overthrow of the Ukrainian government last year and ushered in a civil war that has cost the lives of at least 5,000 civilians have the effrontery to accuse Russia of "violations of Ukraine's territorial integrity"? But the hypocrisy doesn't end there. The two signatories to the above letter are far from squeaky clean. McCain is an ardent supporter of Muslim terrorists who has spent the last 4 years loudly advocating for US tax payers' money to be sent to 'Syrian rebels' aka 'ISIS'. In April this year, Menedez was indicted by the same US DOJ on corruption charges for using his Senate office to push the business interests of a friend in exchange for cash and gifts.

Another detail in the background here is the fact that FIFA was considering suspending Israel due to their treatment of Palestinian footballers. The 'scandal' has proven so glaringly 'fortuitous' for Israel that even the Times of Israel had to call it out and admit that the distraction of the 'scandal' will leave the Palestinian authority's attempt to have Israel banned dead in the water.

But take a moment to fully grasp the extent of the desperation of the Anglo-American empire builders in their attempt to vilify Russia. The very idea that Russia might enjoy the positive propaganda of hosting the 2018 World Cup caused such fulminous frothing of the mouth at the US State Dept. that the organisation that had awarded the games to Russia had to be taken down, including its president.