In 2017, the copyright administrative departments at all levels have been following President Xi’s Thoughts on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for the New Era as well as the guidelines from the 19th National Party Congress, firmly implementing Highlights on the Development of the Press, Publishing, Radio, Television and Film for 2017, delivering tangible outcomes, breaking new ground and bold to carry on innovation. Remarkable progress has been made in improving copyright laws, combating piracy and infringement, promoting the use of genuine software, strengthening social service system for copyright, expanding publicity and training on copyright, and encouraging international exchange and cooperation. The progress is seen in a series of indexes and is the result of the industry’s effectively implementing Copyright Law by promoting the creation, application, protection, management and service of copyright.
“Jianwang Campaign 2017”: shut down 1655 websites involving infringement and piracy and supervised 23 major cases
On July 25 2017, the National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC), Cyberspace Administration of China, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and Ministry of Public Security worked together to launch the “Jianwang Campaign 2017” special action to crack down on internet infringement and piracy, regulate the copyright involved in e-commerce platforms and APPs, consolidate the achievements in governing the copyright order on electronic literature, music, cloud storage and advertisement alliance to safeguard the interests of relevant right holders, maintain the order of internet copyright and create a positive environment for internet copyright. By the end of October, the action had obtained a quite good achievement.
A total of 1655 websites involving infringement and piracy were shut down; 274.8 thousand similar links were deleted; 1.51 million pirated products were collected; 314 related cases were investigated. With the help of the public security sector, 37 criminal cases were settled down involving 69 million RMB. A total of 16 typical cases were made public concerning movie, news, music, online games and other industries, of which 4 cases saw administrative penalties by copyright-related law enforcement authorities and 4 cases, the first-instance judgement.
The National Copyright Administration of China, alone or with the National Office Against Pornographic and Illegal Publications, the Ministry of Public Security, the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, supervised 23 major cases and remarkably improved the number of cases settled and efficiency of investigation.
The 13th Five Year Plan on Copyright: deployed 26 key tasks
On January 25, the National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC) formally issued the 13th Five-Year Plan on Copyright (hereinafter referred to as the "Plan"). The overall objective is to speed up the building of a country that is strong on copyright, and to lay a solid foundation for the building of a copyright power nation with Chinese characteristics and reaching world standard. By 2020, the legal system for copyright will have been more completed, the rules of laws will have been further enhanced; the enforcement of copyright will have been strengthened, the protection environment will have been substantially improved; the copyright social service system will have been better, the copyright industry will have been developed rapidly and steadily; the creation, application, protection, management and service ability of copyright will have been strengthened, social awareness of copyright will have been largely increased; international cooperation and exchanges on copyright will have been expanded, and China will have more rights of saying and influence in the international copyright system. The Plan also proposed 26 key tasks related to copyright during the 13th Five Year Plan, and made overall deployment on the state copyright work.
The 26 key tasks include: continue to promote the revision of the Copyright Law, increase the supervision on the enforcement of copyright, promote software legalization, optimize social administration of copyright, strengthen the publicity and training on copyright, and facilitate the establishment of a new type of international relations of copyright featuring win-win cooperation. These tasks cover all aspects of copyright from the creation, use, protection, management, to the service. The number of registrations of works, the number of registrations of computer software copyright, and the number of copyright models across the country were identified, that is, the registration of works will grow by 15% a year on average and reach 2.78 million by 2020; the registration of computer software copyright registration will grow by 10% a year on average and reach 600 thousand by 2020.
Strengthening the network copyright supervision: published 11 copyright protection pre-warning lists of key works
Strengthening the network copyright supervision is a key task of the National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC). This year, the National Copyright Administration of China continued to carry out key copyright supervision on 20 large video sites, 20 large music sites, 8 network drives and 20 large literature sites, and ordered 16 websites to delete 1128 infringing works. A total of 197 copyright protection pre-warning lists of key works have been published, and 24,845 pirated links have been deleted.
On December 16, the National Copyright Administration of China formally issued Notice on Carrying out Copyright Special Protection for the Emblems of Beijing 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. It was decided that copyright special protection would be carried out for the emblems of Beijing 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games since December 16. The Notice stressed that except as otherwise provided by laws and regulations, no entity or individual may use the emblems without the permission of the Beijing Organizing Committee for the 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. The National Copyright Administration of China required that the law enforcement departments of copyright at all levels should strengthen daily supervision on emblem copyright, increase law enforcement resources, and make full use of the copyright monitoring platform and other technical methods to carry out all-round inspection on emblem copyright, find clues of infringement in time, retain evidences immediately, and mobilize elite forces to severely punish wrong doings without hesitation.
Copyright Law enforcement inspection: five provinces (cities) were the focus
In order to further implement the innovation-driven development strategy, accelerate the building of a country that is strong on intellectual property, steadily promote the building of a socialist cultural power, and enhance the rule of law of copyright in an all-round manner, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPC) formed five law enforcement inspection teams, headed by Wang Chen, Jibing Xuan, Zhang Baowen and Chen Zhu, Vice Chairmen of the NPC Standing Committee, and Liu Binjie, member of the NPC Standing Committee and Chairman of the NPC Education, Science, Culture and Public Health Committee. They visited 5 provinces (cities) including Beijing, Guangdong, Fujian, Shanghai and Qinghai to carry out law enforcement inspections, and entrusted the Standing Committees of the People’s Congress of 10 Provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) of Tianjin, Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Shandong, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Chongqing, Guizhou and Sichuan to inspect the implementation of the Copyright Law in their respective administrative regions. The five law enforcement inspection teams listened to seven reports from all levels of government and relevant departments, and visited 40 publishing units, intangible cultural heritage centers, national copyright trade bases, cultural and art companies, internet technology companies, education and scientific research institutions, and intellectual property courts to carry out field inspection, held 10 seminars to listen to advices from copyright-related enterprises and organizations, administrative and judicial organs as well as experts and scholars. The law enforcement inspection report was finally submitted to the NPC Standing Committee for consideration and approval.
Promoting inspection on software legalization: covered 16 provinces (districts and cities)
On February 28, the 6th Inter-Ministerial Joint Conference for Promoting the Use of Genuine Software was held in Beijing. The conference reviewed the 2017 work plan and proposed four requirements, namely, strengthening coordination between members of the inter-ministerial joint conference, strengthening inspection and supervision, strengthening the integration of promoting copyright legalization and informatization, and strengthening publicity and training.
The effort of promoting the use of genuine software has yielded substantial progress in the building of long-term mechanism, namely improving the computer hardware procurement mechanism and the software legalization assessment mechanism at the provincial level (regional level and city level), and set up deadline for software legalization. Moreover, the effort of supervision and inspection has also achieved certain results. The Inter-Ministerial Joint Conference established an inspection group to supervise software legalization in 16 provinces (regions and cities), and entrusted professional institutions to check the use of genuine software in 286 provincial government agencies in 6 provinces (regions) including Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang, Zhejiang, Hubei and Ningxia, involving a total of 22,600 computers.
On August 18, the Review Meeting for the Trials of Domestic Software Application& the 2017 Initiating Meeting for the Trials of Domestic Software Application, organized by the Office of Inter-Ministerial Joint Conference for Promoting the Use of Genuine Software, was held in Yanchi County of the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. The meeting appreciated the effort of launching trails for domestic software application for the first time in Qianxi County of Guizhou Province, Pingshun County of Shanxi Province and Yanchi County of Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, and made deployment of work in this year.
The number of registration of works: a year-on-year increase of 15.04% in the first three quarters
The National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC) attached great importance to the registration of works. Since the Notice on Regulating the Process of Works Registration was issued in 2011, the number of work registration across the country has maintained rapid growth. In June 2017, the National Copyright Administration of China issued Notice on Regulating the Digital Certificate for Works Registration, in which new cases and problems concerning works registration were further regulated.
It is estimated that in the first three quarters in 2017, a total of 1.2598 million works have been registered across the country, increased by 15.04% compared to that in the previous year; 557 thousand software copyrights have been registered, increased by 96.03% compared to that in the previous year. It is estimated that the registration of works will maintain the fast growth during the 13th Five Year Plan.
Copyright demonstration cities: increased to 10
By 2017, the National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC) has conferred 10 “Copyright Demonstration City”, including Jimo City of Shandogn Province and Dongguan City of Guangdong Province, approved the building of two copyright demonstration cities, and conferred 109 “Copyright Demonstration Unit” and 29 “Copyright Demonstration Bases”. A total of 18 provinces (cities) incorporated the building of copyright demonstration city into their work, among which Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong, Shandong, Jiangsu, Henan and some other provinces (cities) took the building of copyright demonstration city as a key task. The work to build a copyright demonstration city effectively promotes the development of local copyright industry, makes full play of the guiding role of the demonstration city, unit and base in self-innovation, increasing the innovating capability of the city and the unit, gathering factors and resources of copyright, and promoting the transformation and upgrading of the regional economy. The work creates a performance evaluation indicator system, and forms a layout that uses the experience of selected areas to promote the work in the entire area.
In July and November 2017, the National Copyright Administration of China also held two training courses for works registration in Suzhou and Beijing, and provided professional training to works registration agencies at the provincial level and relevant staff. The courses have received warm welcome and remarkable results.
Value-added of the copyright industry: exceeded 5 trillion RMB, accounting for 7.3% of GDP
On April 24, the National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC) held the press conference for 2017 Copyright Publicity Week. During the conference, the Chinese Academy of Press and Publication issued The Economic Contribution of China’s Copyright-based Industry in 2015. According to the survey, the value-added of China’s copyright industry in 2015 exceeded 5 trillion RMB, reaching 5005.414 billion RMB, accounting for 7.3% of the total GDP, which is 0.02 percentage points higher than that of previous year. A total of 16.669 million people were employed in the copyright industry in urban areas, accounting for 9.23% of all employed people in urban areas. The export volume of products stood at 263.336 billion US dollars, accounting for 11.58% of China’s total export volume. The survey demonstrated that China’s copyright industry is taking up more proportion in the national economy, and is playing an increasingly important role as a new engine in promoting economic development and optimizing economic structure.
Publicity during the Copyright Week: “4.26” Publicity Week and 4+6+3 training courses
In 2017, the National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC) continually renovated new approaches and methods for publicity to increase the public’s awareness on copyright through omnimedia communication, multi-channel publicity and social participation. During the “4.26” World Intellectual Property Publicity Week, the National Copyright Administration of China held the National Conference on Copyright Protection in Digital Environment, and issued 2016 Annual Report on China's Network Copyright Protection. The China News Media Copyright Protection Union was created jointly by 10 major news agencies stationed by the central government, including Xinhua News Agency and the People’s Daily, new media websites.
The National Copyright Administration of China organized 4 copyright law enforcement training courses, 6 copyright legalization training courses and 3 media workshops for hotspot issues related to copyright. Different training courses on publicity have also taken place all over China. An environment of “respecting knowledge, respecting work, respecting creation and respecting copyright” is taking shape.
Commissioned by the National Copyright Administration of China, the China Copyright Association held four copyright legalization courses for government agencies in Shanghai, Hangzhou and Xining, involving thousands of public officials from the Government General Offices, Industry and Information Technology Departments, Department of Finance and Copyright Offices in 31 provinces (regions and cities).
To promote the software legalization, the National Copyright Administration of China also edited the special issue of Copyright Legalization in China (2017).
Author: Lai Mingfang
Source: China Press Publication Radio Film and Television Journal
Update: December 21, 2017