China Rejects US Piracy Claims As "Groundless"

eldavojohn writes "Earlier this month, a United States piracy list fingered China, Russia, and Canada as the first, second and third worst governments (respectively) for enforcing copyright policy in the world. China's Foreign Ministry has rejected these claims as 'groundless' just before meeting with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on Monday and Tuesday in Beijing to address copyright policy. The official Chinese statement read, 'The involved US Congress members should respect the fact and stop making groundless accusations against China.' The plan nevertheless remains to use the visit to pressure China into overhauling its failed attempts to curb piracy, since software piracy in China appears to be a social norm, with the Chinese government possibly even leading by example."

FOSS

[markdavis]

I hope they do start to enforce copyright more on software. It is likely to steer them more towards FOSS solutions and that will ultimately benefit them and everyone else, too.

Re:Afica?!?

[dpolak]

It is BS. They don't like our tarrif based system for music. Buy a blank CD and a portion of it goes to the recording industry. They want us to adopt their laws so they can start the lawsuits the RIAA and MPAA are so famous for. Sorry, we will fight it tooth and nail. Our privacy, unlike the US, is paramount here. BTW, having friends and colleagues that live and work in China, they have told me countless times that companies, such as Micro$oft, encouraged piracy so the population will get hooked on the product and they can increase their market share. One of my friends actually worked for M$ and he confirmed it. That was 6 years ago, he has moved on since.

Re:As compared to what?

[radicalskeptic]

MAYBE, but in your country you walk a block to the local DVD store and choose from a selection of thousands of pirated DVDs, each selling for the equivalent of 1.25 USD per disc? That's what it's like living in any city in China. It's probably impossible to buy a NON-pirated DVD in China (I for one have never seen one!). Technically these shops are breaking the law, but the relevant laws are not enforced.

Another example of the higher level of piracy is Baidu's music search. Baidu is the Chinese equivalent of Google, and using mp3.baidu.com you can find pirated mp3s of pretty much every song you'd want to hear. They block some of the files if you are accessing it from a foreign IP address, though. Check this [tinypic.com] search I just did (from inside China). Can you imagine if Google had a site like this? It would be sued into oblivion (although blogsearch.google.com can get pretty close!)

Even on TV, pirating is rampant. Talk shows and reality shows often take their background music the soundtracks of popular films like the Lord of the Rings or Star Wars, and something tells me they aren't coughing up royalty checks for that.

I love it!

[ratboy666]

Canada is up to #3 Woohoo!

Warner Music Canada, Sony BMG Music Canada, EMI Music Canada, and Universal Music Canada are responsible for (up to) 6 billion worth of infringement themselves. Just a bit more than the 710 million claimed.

http://www.thestar.com/business/article/735096--geist-record-industry-faces-liability-over-infringement [thestar.com]

Then again, its probably statutory damages vs. actual losses.

Still, I'm proud to be on the list again. Thanks!

Re:FOSS

[drinkypoo]

I equally think that the Chinese government's "0 day" copyright protection would make music and movie production a near impossible profit in China

But it doesn't [chinadaily.com.cn].

Just think how much China's Hollywood or music scene would dwarf the United States' if they had an enforced ~20 year copyright policy.

The USA's movie and music scenes are the biggest in the world because most of the world wants to consume our media. Sad, but true. Of course, this could have something to do with the fact that people buy what is sold to them (i.e. advertising works) and that ten US media conglomerates own over 50% of the entire world's media outlets.

Re:I love it!

[dpolak]

Gotta love Michael Geist. He takes the crap out of everything is gives us the truth. He has helped many times in preventing secret and insane laws from coming to be.

From here in China...

[hengdi]

I live in China (Harbin, to be exact).

The ONLY shops here that seem to sell legal software are some of the supermarket chains. In fact, the only legal software I see in any quantity (and not much of that)are PS3 games, since they haven't been cracked yet. These sell for about 300-400 rmb ($40-$60). Compare that to any other computer game of 4-7 rmb ($0.5-$1).

Same thing with movies. I can often buy the DVD release of a movie before it's available in the west, complete with picture insert and so forth, for around $1.

I understand that music is not a big seller since everyone downloads it.

I often discuss this my students (I'm an English teacher) and, quite literally, EVERYBODY buys / downloads / uses copied media. It's part of the fabric of the country. Since the government love to keep the people happy, you aren't going to see any change whatsoever on this in the near future, despite whatever the Chinese government may say.

The only two examples I know of that seem to 'sell' software with any success is WOW, since they have a separate Chinese micro-payment system, and QQ, an instant messaging service, which also handles micro-transactions (you can upgrade your avatar with extra clothes, and many other things - I've never looked to closely).

Re:FOSS

[markdavis]

You are confused. Open Source (FOSS), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FOSS [wikipedia.org] , is a free license that a developer/writer/creator is free to choose or not to choose. Open Source does not mean the destruction of copyright and its existence does not take away your rights to use traditional, closed-source, licenses. In fact, FOSS *depends* on copyright law. Supporters of FOSS are not trying to destroy nor take away copyrights, nor commercial software development. It is just an alternative.

Re:FOSS

[value_added]

The USA's movie and music scenes are the biggest in the world because most of the world wants to consume our media.

Depends on how you measure "scene".

Bollywood [businessweek.com] films, for example, sell more tickets. As for music, there's a fair number of international (read "foreign to the US") artists who routinely sell more records than any of our local pop stars.

Re:As compared to what?

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is the greed of US based evil IP industries who don't like consumer friendly laws.

Re:Sorry but fuck the US then

[dpolak]

We never blame the people, it's always pointed at Corporate America and the government. You as a people need to stand up though. You need to find the truth and educate yourself rather than watching Fox (Bush) News network, or many of the other lying, bull$hitting, anything to take over, media outlets. I understand and appreciate freedom of speech but the crap that goes on and is supported in the US by citizens boggles my mind! Media, corporations and special interest groups are able to change history and pollute it with their own agenda. The advertisements about black history is one prime example. Instead of stating how they have contributed and made advancements on inventions over time, which is fantastic, they flat out stated they were invented by them. That's flat out wrong and distorts history. M$ Encarta was the same, different history depending on whether it was for US or global use. It's no different than the Communist's and in my opinion much worse because it's about money and power for the corporations. This is off topic, but ask yourself why the US and Britain are the only countries in the world where diesel is more expensive then gasoline? It isn't the taxes and it isn't the demand. Diesel is a waste by-product of refining gasoline and since the US has about 5% of their vehicles running diesel, compared to 60% in Europe, it should be half the price in the US. I've ranted enough....

Re:As compared to what?

[Anonymous Coward]

In the rest of the world we go to a "rental" store, borrow an original copy for the equivalent of 1.25 USD, take it home, and make our own copy.

Re:As compared to what?

[dryeo]

As a Canadian I don't understand it too. I've just about never seen pirated material for sale (exceptions like garage sales where a cdr might be mixed in a bunch of legit used CDs). I have seen in the local paper where the police have busted someone for commercial copying software. Someone was recently sentenced to jail for taking a camcorder to a movie.
Where we are different from the States. The courts have interpreted making available completely the opposite of the American courts and it is legal to make personal copies of music, even if you don't own it. And there is no DMCA.
I think it is just America trying to pressure our current pro-American government to make crazy laws taking away our freedoms as usual.
Unluckily America is powerful and so anti-freedom that they've come out the other side where the average American honestly believes they are free.
Example, someone here was just extradited to the States to spend 5 years in pound in the ass prison for selling seeds. By Canadian law this should of been illegal as the most he would of got here was a couple of hundred dollar fine, and that only because America threatens us if we legalize selling seeds.

Re:As compared to what?

[Daengbo]

Tens of millions Thais are online. They're just writing in Thai on Thai sites.

Re:FOSS

[RobertLTux]

And part of the GPL a lot of folks don't get is YOU CAN ACTUALLY SELL YOUR PROGRAMS

also the letter of the GPL states that you must give
1 your patches to the upstream programmers
2 your source to THOSE PEOPLE YOU HAVE SOLD THE BINARY TO

also the GPL does not cover the assets included (sample files and such)

so all you really need to do is include your source (and toolchain instructions) and you should have it made.
(oh btw yes you can have your direct customers giving others a copy of the source but...)

Its working

[future assassin]

http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/5049/125/ [michaelgeist.ca]

Re:you are correct, it's the cost

[Turzyx]

Gah, I should add that music and movie productions are done in our region of the world, and have costs to match.

Re:you are correct, it's the cost

[Anonymous Coward]

I am a professional musician, small time but I pay the bills.

Publishing a record doesn't cost nearly as much as the riaa claims.
They markup the cost of everything to do with production to prevent the artist from getting the correct share (artists get a percentage of profits, so the higher the "costs" the lower the artist/songwriter/etc royalties cost.

$4000 for 4 days of studio time and recording cleanup. (being generous)
$1500 for professional mixing/mastering ( $500 per day for three days straight )
$200 to have a master stamped
$1000 for a basic design for the cd label
$2000 for album artwork ( from a professional designer )

Even if you have to hire an entire team of professional studio musicians, that adds another $6000 ( unless you're paying for "THE BEST" [which no one does now anyway] )

Total cost, $15,000 for a full blown professionally prepped cd master.

Add $1 per disk for press and print, and you can have a 5000 disk run for $20,000.

At $20 a disk, you've broken even after your first 1000 sales.
You can get that many sold at a single concert for a popular band, hell I sell 30 disks every weekend just performing at local bars.

if you manage to sell all $5000 disks, that's $100,000. Or a 500% return.

Sell the same 5000 disks at $5 a pop, ( which I am doing btw ) and you still make a 20% profit, and that's just the first run.

All additional runs cost $1000, and sell for $5,000.

So yeah, production costs are extravagant, if you're out to screw both the artist, and the customers.