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Pirates of the Chinese Hutongs

Laura Robertson

CBN News

April 13, 2007

It would be nearly impossible for any tourist to go into a major Chinese city without hearing the following: "Buy CD, DVD!" "Look-a-look-a! Buy DVD, I give you good price!" You see handfuls of Americans and Chinese shuffling through piles of DVDs, all allegedly of "good quality."

But many in the U.S. government and motion picture industry hope to change that. Earlier this week, the U.S. brought two complaints to the World Trade Organization (WTO) against China. One accused China of not allowing U.S. entertainment products, like movies, CDs, and books from entering the Chinese markets, while the other claimed that China does not protect the copyrights of the U.S. products that are already in China.

In a nutshell, Chinese censorship of the entertainment industry has spawned a huge market of video piracy.  Therefore, the U.S. claims this situation violates international trade norms, and has caused them to lose about $2.2 billion each year, according to their lobbyists. The huge marketplace of Chinese consumers, combined with the inability of the film companies to profit from any of their products is a pretty depressing reality for the film industry.

In China's defense, a leading lawyer for Microsoft says that they have seen improvements in the area of software piracy, and other industries, like pharmaceuticals aren't seeing the same quantity of copyright infringements in China. Furthermore, China reported seizing 110 million illegal DVDs in 2006, and China's Supreme Court recently increased the penalty for exporting DVDs, which are other steps in the right direction.

These steps are not enough to rectify the problem from the U.S. perspective, especially considering the huge barriers to getting their films into the country.

It would be easy to categorize this situation as a black-and-white case, but, like most things, it's a little more complex.  Furthermore, even though you're a lot more likely to find a man on the street with his selection of DVDs and CDs in Shanghai than Cheyenne, the problem isn't just limited to China.

Overall, the American public gets two messages about video piracy.  You may have seen this YouTube trailer on piracy at the theaters with a pretty clear message: video piracy is a crime. This YouTube clip has a vastly different message for the audience: piracy is sharing, and sharing is caring. (author's note: no, I'm not endorsing illegal piracy, but little cartoon cookies crack me up every time)

Regardless of the way people might feel about video piracy in the States, there's really no excuse for buying pirated goods. We can legally rent or buy just about any DVD or CD we could ever want (though I can think of more than one movie that we might have been better off without) at a fairly low price.  There's also a clear delineation between the legal, and the illegal products.

In China, it's not always so clear.  Pirated DVDs and CDs are often in legitimate looking stores, and many stores sell copies of legitimate and pirated goods together, so it can be even more confusing to know what's legal, and what isn't.

Other times, it's extremely obvious that you're buying a counterfeit DVD, and China didn't become number 2 on the list for top ten worst countries for video piracy by unassuming consumers.  Even at the stores where authorized and counterfeit DVDs co-exist, it's pretty easy to tell the difference. Once I saw a copy of the Disney cartoon, "Lady and the Tramp" rated R for nudity and violence, so chances are this one wasn't approved by the official Walt Disney Company. On the other hand, had I wanted to buy "Lady and the Tramp," or countless other movies, legally in China, I probably wouldn't be able to.

My first trip to China, a friend and I even followed some man down a mysterious alleyway into his attic to look at a vast DVD collection. For some reason it seemed completely normal at the time, but looking back, I can't believe what an idiot I am! I would never follow a stranger to his house in any U.S. city, but somehow, something about the adventure of uncovering hidden treasure caused me to lose my senses.

For most people, though, buying a pirated DVD in China is about as exciting or adventurous as going to the grocery store. From the prevalence of merchants in the streets, it seems to be a pretty well-established industry, with thousands of employees, that doesn't seem to be going away any time soon.

While ideally, the U.S. government, Chinese government, film industries, and Chinese consumers could all find a satisfactory answer for this situation, chances are, we're not going to see huge changes any time soon. The WTO generally likes to take its time with these types of matters, and regardless of the outcome, it's probably unlikely to change the situation on the ground.

As tourists gear up to visit Beijing in 2008, chances are, they, too, will hear the chorus of merchants enticing them with the lure of cheap DVDs.