Pconline.com.cn - copyright infringement

[Stéphane205018]

As I once read in a newspaper: for china "copyright" simply means: "the right to copy"

Chinese people actually know all about copyright laws and they do
follow them, but only for Chinese products! Stealing from
foreigners are considered normal and are encouraged...

for one thing, copyrights are not widely enforced in China. Most
of the people do not speak english so emailing them in english is
of no help. I just came back from visiting some relatives in Hong
Kong and China. In both countries you can buy knockoffs and
counterfeit CDs, DVDs and brand name products like Gucci, Polo etc.
Hong Kong is ahead of China in dealing with this, but still has a
long way to go. Corruption in China is very rampant, so it'll take
many years and a major change to the government for things to get
better.

--
Phil Askey
Editor / Owner, dpreview.com

 

[brokenz]

I would think that another way to get their attention is to visit
the site, record the advertiesments they have on their site and
contact the vendors (like SANDISK) and inform them that their
products are being boycotted until they stop advertising with this
pirate!

I just visited the pconline website and the advertiser who took the
most expensive biggist banner on the middle top seems to be
Canon....

So you are suggesting to boyscott Canon?

--
Gilbert

I doubt many of these advertisers are even aware that they are advertising with a thief. I've seen Dell for example. Why would they risk the bad publicity? I personally wouldn't advocate boycotting Dell, Canon, or Sandisk. Just contacting them so they know they are helping to support piracy online.
--



Trust that little voice in your head that says, 'Wouldn't it be interesting if....' And then do it. -Duane Michals

 

[Dennis Lathem49692]

I would think that another way to get their attention is to visit
the site, record the advertiesments they have on their site and
contact the vendors (like SANDISK) and inform them that their
products are being boycotted until they stop advertising with this
pirate!

I just visited the pconline website and the advertiser who took the
most expensive biggist banner on the middle top seems to be
Canon....

So you are suggesting to boyscott Canon?

With all the coverage Phil gives Canon I would think that Canon would not even think twice about dropping support for this pirate site.

I am not adverse to sending Canon a note about this. I also perfer Sandisk CF cards and they will get email from me before the end of the day as well.

--
CDL

See Profile for gear stuff
Pbase Supporter

 

[jeff-c]

Talk about heresay and generalization.

No doubt copyright is not widely repsected but there is copyright law and the government is trying, although not to the satisfaction of ones being violated.

Phil's approach is wrong in my opinion. Just emailing the hoster won't help you far. If you're serious about catching them, go hire a local lawyer.

A large portion of the Chinese industry is based on copying western
technology and products without paying for it. I believe there
isn't even a Chinese law that forbids violating foreign copyrights.

BTW, a while ago I read the story of several large chinese ships
and even buildings which design & technical wise are exact clones
of western world originals. No doubt they didnt payed the
architects for the blue prints. Must be a funny sight, visiting
Bejing suddenly you see the office building where you work every
day..

And there's this rumour about several Chinese industrial cities
being renamed after western countries. So they can label the
products made in these places "Made In Germany, proc" or something
like that.

 

[brokenz]

No doubt copyright is not widely repsected but there is copyright
law and the government is trying, although not to the satisfaction
of ones being violated.

Phil's approach is wrong in my opinion. Just emailing the hoster
won't help you far. If you're serious about catching them, go hire
a local lawyer.

A large portion of the Chinese industry is based on copying western
technology and products without paying for it. I believe there
isn't even a Chinese law that forbids violating foreign copyrights.

BTW, a while ago I read the story of several large chinese ships
and even buildings which design & technical wise are exact clones
of western world originals. No doubt they didnt payed the
architects for the blue prints. Must be a funny sight, visiting
Bejing suddenly you see the office building where you work every
day..

And there's this rumour about several Chinese industrial cities
being renamed after western countries. So they can label the
products made in these places "Made In Germany, proc" or something
like that.

I deal with a manafacturing facility in China. It is the truth.
--



Trust that little voice in your head that says, 'Wouldn't it be interesting if....' And then do it. -Duane Michals

 

[The yukon]

The site was slow at loading but it did load eventually..

Why can't Phil ask his chinese readers on their help for this matter? They can probably help him out more effectively.

 

[The yukon]

That they are supporting online plagiarists. Dell needs to know about this too.

 

[GilbertC]

http://www.sipo.gov.cn/sipo_English/flfg_e/xgfg_e/t20020416_5077.htm

In case you guys are interested to read.

"Article 2 Works of Chinese citizens, legal entities or other organizations, whether published or not, shall enjoy copyright in accordance with this Law.

Any work of a foreigner or stateless person which is eligible to enjoy copyright under an agreement concluded between the country to which the foreigner belongs or in which he has habitual residence and China, or under an internationa1 treaty to which both countries are party, shall be protected in accordance with this Law.

Works of foreigners or stateless persons first published in the territory of the People's Republic of China shall enjoy copyright in accordance with this Law.

Any work of a foreigner who belongs to a country which has not concluded an agreement with China, or which is not a party to an international treaty with China or a stateless person first published in an country which is a party to an international treaty with China, or in such a member state or nonmember state, shall be protected in accordance with this Law."

Hope that helps~
--
Gilbert

 

[Rock Lee]

Makes me angry to read such things. > (

 

[Vance Fry175512]

This copyright law is purely for show value. I lived in China for a year. Most people there don't respect any kind of intellectual property. VCDs and computer software were the biggest problem it seemed. Nobody even considered buying the legal versions. It's probably a part of the culture more than it is anywhere else. (Actually, there is a kind of Chinese proverb that says that it's better to imitate the masters than to come up with something new and inferior.)

Phil, I really think you're going to be fighing a losing battle here. (Heh, maybe if you hired a hacker "hitman" to go after their site or something you might have a chance.) All of the big Hollywood/music/software studios have been trying to shut down this culture of copying for years. The Chinese gov't is starting to get better, but I think it'll still be awhile before they get around to shutting down websites for IP infringement. (Unless, of course, those sites are IP crooks AND gov't dissadents...)

Anyhow, I live in Taiwan now. Much better here, but still has its problems.
Good luck with the "shame" tactic.

Vance

http://www.sipo.gov.cn/sipo_English/flfg_e/xgfg_e/t20020416_5077.htm

In case you guys are interested to read.

"Article 2 Works of Chinese citizens, legal entities or other
organizations, whether published or not, shall enjoy copyright in
accordance with this Law.
Any work of a foreigner or stateless person which is eligible to
enjoy copyright under an agreement concluded between the country to
which the foreigner belongs or in which he has habitual residence
and China, or under an internationa1 treaty to which both countries
are party, shall be protected in accordance with this Law.
Works of foreigners or stateless persons first published in the
territory of the People's Republic of China shall enjoy copyright
in accordance with this Law.
Any work of a foreigner who belongs to a country which has not
concluded an agreement with China, or which is not a party to an
international treaty with China or a stateless person first
published in an country which is a party to an international treaty
with China, or in such a member state or nonmember state, shall be
protected in accordance with this Law."

Hope that helps~
--
Gilbert

 

[=VALOR=]

I think the only solution is to either watermark all pictures (not the best idea, ruins the site), or trick the b*stards.

Here are some ideas:

1) Make all photos into a flash file, which of course has Dpreview appearing nicely (maybe even animated). This will stop the "save as" command. Use flash 5 for compatibility.

2) But this doesnt get rid of the Printscreen problem. I was thinking that it would be intersting to try and code, inside the flash file with the photo, a printscreen response command. When the user clicks printscreen, the image turns white for example.

3) In flash, all images appear white by default. If you want to see any of them you must press, simulanesouly: ASDFGHJK and the SPACE BAR. This disables all of their damn fingers and they cant hit the printscreen button. At least you would need 2 people then to pirate pictures.... Ok this is kind of silly, but im just brainstorming.

4) Block out all traffic from China?

5) When the b*stard hits printscreen, crash his computer or browser with an infinite repeating flash movie (which previosuly existed, but is waiting for the printscreen to be pressed) or Javascript code.

=VALOR=
http://www.valor4ever.com

 

[my wong]

China is going to host the Summer Olympics in 2008 and is "cleaning up" in haste to present a more acceptable image of itself to the world -- at least on the surface. The laws don't work there as here, and so don't stop at writing to the ISP. I wonder if writing to whatever org is in charge of enforcing that copyright statement might not set some gears in motion.

Yin

 

[Arjun Prabhu]

on a lighter note....

I hope they dont copy-translate-paste the news-item itself!!

 

[my wong]

Shame tactics, of course, don't work. It doesn't even work in the US with eBay sellers doing the same thing with our images and text content, and eBay never ever replying to even one of our complaints. Hey, if eBay doesn't care enough to go after them,....

Phil, why not simply prevent image leeching and replace with an ad message (might as well get some free ad value out of this) as I did for the eBay violators?

Kind regards & Good luck,
Yin

 

[carguy84]

http://www.dpreview.com/misc/advertising.asp#stats

Or block it for a few months if you don't want to shut everyone out forever. I would think after having their site running with old content for a while their advertisers would start wondering what was going on with the impressions.... According to your stats, less then 2.7%(their exact % is not on the page) of the people visiting this site are from China, screw them all for not having national Copyright laws...Maybe that will get them writing to their officials.

I have a very low regard for people who steal intellectual property and on that same level, those who tolerate it. If it came down to it, I'd block out a country in a heart beat since my whole site is content driven.

Chip-

--
I'm a 'break-even' photographer.

 

[Phil Askey]

Would make (zero) difference to those who want to steal our content, proxy servers are available all over the world.

http://www.dpreview.com/misc/advertising.asp#stats

Or block it for a few months if you don't want to shut everyone out
forever. I would think after having their site running with old
content for a while their advertisers would start wondering what
was going on with the impressions.... According to your stats,
less then 2.7%(their exact % is not on the page) of the people
visiting this site are from China, screw them all for not having
national Copyright laws...Maybe that will get them writing to their
officials.

I have a very low regard for people who steal intellectual property
and on that same level, those who tolerate it. If it came down to
it, I'd block out a country in a heart beat since my whole site is
content driven.

Chip-

--
I'm a 'break-even' photographer.

--
Phil Askey
Editor / Owner, dpreview.com

 

[Ian Johnston]

That they are supporting online plagiarists. Dell needs to know
about this too.

Sandisk has my email.......

 

[eag]

Would make (zero) difference to those who want to steal our
content, proxy servers are available all over the world.

Still, make your story on an html page and send all Chinese traffic to that page. Advise them to do what they can, tell them to mass email that place. Thinking of it now, I know someone here has got to have a mass-emailer. Tell them to target pconline China. Get them nice and angry.

 

[eag]

fight fire with fire:

[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]

 

[JeremyLFW]

those are certainly good ideas which i've tried myself to avoid similar right-clicking or print screening, but they don't work. around 5-10a ago, i still had AOL, and it couldnt' save images from the brwoser and large images needed scrolling on an 800x600 screen so all one has to do is buy (or in their case, pirate) a copy of SnagIt and then they will not have to do any button pushing at all to copy images. all you can really do is make it hard for them to copy, but there is always a workaround.

What you could try doing is implementing a streaming protocol for stills; I believe that I used Windows Media Services 9 to prevent ppl from saving audio and video and just view it. print screen usually doesn't work because of overlay (they get black), so they would have to resort to frame grabbers. certainly more of a pain for them and us since we have to open a player. converting each image into an SWF forces print screening on them too vs using .

disabling copy functions for text is also possible; you could even render all reviews as huge graphics given the fixed width of the site. again, they can simply retype or use OCR, but it is much more difficult. it might also have bandwidth costs too, but it isn't something i wouldn't consider (double neg!).

in all these cases, they cannot directly copy, and thus you have some protection of authenticity and impose more effort required to copy on their part.

you could also issue password protection although that would be an amazingly difficult task given the number of honest visitors to be accounted for.

I think the only solution is to either watermark all pictures (not
the best idea, ruins the site), or trick the b*stards.

Here are some ideas:

1) Make all photos into a flash file, which of course has Dpreview
appearing nicely (maybe even animated). This will stop the "save
as" command. Use flash 5 for compatibility.

2) But this doesnt get rid of the Printscreen problem. I was
thinking that it would be intersting to try and code, inside the
flash file with the photo, a printscreen response command. When the
user clicks printscreen, the image turns white for example.

3) In flash, all images appear white by default. If you want to see
any of them you must press, simulanesouly: ASDFGHJK and the SPACE
BAR. This disables all of their damn fingers and they cant hit the
printscreen button. At least you would need 2 people then to pirate
pictures.... Ok this is kind of silly, but im just brainstorming.

4) Block out all traffic from China?

5) When the b*stard hits printscreen, crash his computer or browser
with an infinite repeating flash movie (which previosuly existed,
but is waiting for the printscreen to be pressed) or Javascript
code.

=VALOR=
http://www.valor4ever.com