Houston Community News >> China MPA Anti-Piracy Contest
1/22/2008 (Variety) BEIJING -- The Motion
Picture Association is teaming up with Chinese anti-piracy regs to
launch the second annual nationwide anti-piracy video contest, which is
aimed at raising awareness about piracy among China's 20 million
university students.
The theme of this year's competition is "Respect Copyrights, Uphold Fair Competition, Protect Originality, Stay Away from Piracy" and the contest is part of the 15th Beijing Student Film Festival.
The MPA links up with the China Film Copyright Protection Association for the competish, which aims to boost awareness of how the creative industries are fundamental to economic growth.
The winning producers of the best one-minute live action or animation short will win an all-expenses paid trip to Hollywood to visit MPA member company film studios.
Last year, over a dozen participating film students received kudos for their films. Liang Jinwei of the Guangxi University for Nationalities, the creator of the winning entry, went to Hollywood for a week to meet film studio executives.
"It is good for China's brightest young people -- the creators of tomorrow -- to reflect on the value of intellectual property," said Mike Ellis, the MPA's senior vice prexy and regional director, Asia-Pacific.
He said piracy was a "massive problem" in China, one that needed as many stakeholders as possible involved in solving it.
By MPA estimates, worldwide, the studios lost $6.1 billion to worldwide piracy in 2005, about $1.2 billion of that from piracy across the Asia-Pacific region, while piracy in the U.S. accounted for $1.3 billion.
China is the center of the piracy industry -- some three billion discs were sold here in 2006, and the market is worth some $2.5 billion, but only a tiny fraction of that was spent on legitimate DVDs.
The theme of this year's competition is "Respect Copyrights, Uphold Fair Competition, Protect Originality, Stay Away from Piracy" and the contest is part of the 15th Beijing Student Film Festival.
The MPA links up with the China Film Copyright Protection Association for the competish, which aims to boost awareness of how the creative industries are fundamental to economic growth.
The winning producers of the best one-minute live action or animation short will win an all-expenses paid trip to Hollywood to visit MPA member company film studios.
Last year, over a dozen participating film students received kudos for their films. Liang Jinwei of the Guangxi University for Nationalities, the creator of the winning entry, went to Hollywood for a week to meet film studio executives.
"It is good for China's brightest young people -- the creators of tomorrow -- to reflect on the value of intellectual property," said Mike Ellis, the MPA's senior vice prexy and regional director, Asia-Pacific.
He said piracy was a "massive problem" in China, one that needed as many stakeholders as possible involved in solving it.
By MPA estimates, worldwide, the studios lost $6.1 billion to worldwide piracy in 2005, about $1.2 billion of that from piracy across the Asia-Pacific region, while piracy in the U.S. accounted for $1.3 billion.
China is the center of the piracy industry -- some three billion discs were sold here in 2006, and the market is worth some $2.5 billion, but only a tiny fraction of that was spent on legitimate DVDs.
(Contributed by Variety)