Chinese piracy of Hollywood blockbusters has been a cliché for years. But US piracy of Chinese movies is now becoming serious as well.
According to a Beijing Youth Daily report, 150 movies from twenty Chinese studios are being offered for free download from American websites.
"In addition to the 150 movies, the sites also provide links to CCTV's Spring Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival variety shows." the Chairman of China Movie Copyright Protection Association, Zhu Yongde, told the Paper.
There is already physical pirating of Chinese VCDs and DVDs in Europe and the US.
Zhu Yongde says, by comparison, the US web sites have "a much broader reach and our losses are thus much greater." He went on to say that "There is a firewall and the websites cannot be opened in China, but outside the country they are available."
On 29 August, the China Movie Copyright Protection Association was founded jointly by several industry associations. The Association's Chairman, Zhu Yongde, says since the association was founded, it has done much to strengthen the copyright protection of movies. This particular case of copyright infringement was discovered just two months ago.
A memorandum signed by the China media watchdog, SARFT, the Ministry of Culture and the MPAA(Motion Picture Association of America) earlier in July provided a mechanism for conducting meetings and reporting on the piracy situation every three months. However, there is no specific provision to follow when such piracy is found in America.
The China Movie Copyright Protection Association has invited an American legal representative to investigate this case and to prepare to bring a lawsuit over the infringement.
(CRI November 3, 2005)
