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Friday, August 18, 2006
The Chinese Pirates of PR...  It must be viral. I remember once in Japan while visiting a Nuclear waste Disposal Facility (Yes, you're right. That glow in my cheeks should not be showing through my jeans...) and seeing about 1,000 Japanese workmen standing at attention in an enormously deep man-made cavity in the earth. Several dump-trucks slowly raised up their beds and saluted the men with "10,000 Metric Tons" printed on huge signs. The supervisors then poured rice wine on a mound of dirt and congratulated everyone on this new metric milestone before dismissing everyone. It was the first in a series of weird and wonderful Public Relations events meant to capture everyone's attention. It seems the Chinese are not immune to this little ceremony bug: They recently launched the "100-day Campaign." Ten ministries and national departments, including the Ministry of Public Security, the State Administration of Press and Publication, the National Copyright Administration, and the Ministry of Culture all joined in. The campaign is meant to stave off criticism regarding the enormous quantities of stolen Intellectual Property Rights available in China. So far China has "closed down" 3,000 shops in this crackdown on pirated CDs, printed works, DVDs and computer software in the last month. They have also snagged 8 million illegal publications in the same period. And this week in a China first warrants for two bootleg DVD makers was issued. But, don't shout "gambei" (Chinese toast meaning "dry glass") just yet. Last week Chinese movie makers accused Chinese TV stations of airing up to 1,500 pirated Chinese movies a year, costing Chinese movie studios up to $9.4 million in lost revenues. More than 100 movies were documented by the Chinese Movie Copyright Association (yes, it is an oxymoron as strong as Military Intelligence) in the first six months of this year. "And most of them are very recent," Meng Yu, the association's legal director, was quoted as saying. In July, China Educational TV was ordered to pay $6,000 (The horror!) to another Chinese channel for showing one of its movies without permission. Don't get indignant yet either. DVDs running from .55 cents USD to $1.20 (that will get you the "good stuff") are not without their flaws:. Check out Crus of the Aders (looks a lot like Kingdom of Heaven to me)  found in a grocery store by Kennysia. Put that in your player and smoke it! Just an aside: don't you think it is cool that we can buy our veggies and our "Aviation Goods" at the same store? In a country where the annual average income just rose to a tad over $1,700 a year it is hard to imagine that this problem is going to go away anytime soon. I remember high ranking civil servants at a Chicago VA Hospital happily filling up purses on 3 for $5.00 DVD copies sold by destitute disabled veteran patients yet to get their claims processed by the system. Neither the veterans nor the Chinese are genetically mutated thieves. They are just poor. I have not wavered from my stance that I think the problem will self-correct, in part, when the standard of living goes up. I am an artist, but I think that creativity beyond my means is going to be needed rather than useless costly suits and raids meant to alter behavior in the meantime. And frankly, I am not sure that poor knockoffs are worse than further cutting off a population, already being isolated from outside arts and ideas by the State, from western values. China Asia Blogging China Blogs China Blog Blogging Music Downloads Copyright Protection Pirating Banned Blogs Japan Lonnie Hodge Movies DVDs For an in-depth and well documented view of this issue check out the China Law Blog Blogger News Network is advertiser-supported, and your visits to our advertisers help BNN to meet its expenses. Help keep us afloat! posted by Lonnie at 5:07 AM |
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