China Once Stole Foreign Ideas. Now It Wants To Protect Its Own (economist.com) 56
China's courts are now handling more than 550,000 intellectual-property cases a year -- making it the world's most litigious country for IP disputes -- as the nation's own companies, once notorious for copying foreign designs and technology, find themselves on the defensive against a domestic counterfeiting epidemic fueled by excess factory capacity.
The problem runs from knockoff "Lafufu" plush toys (cheap copies of Pop Mart's wildly popular Labubu dolls, which prompted a nationwide crackdown and a Shanghai police bust of a $1.7 million stash in July) to copied motorcycles and solar panels. Judges in Shanghai, the preferred venue for IP litigation, are working through cases at a rate of roughly one per day, and it still takes three months for a case to land on a court's docket.
Chinese companies are also increasingly clashing abroad: patent-related cases involving Chinese businesses in America surged 56% in 2023, according to data from GEN, a Chinese law firm. Luckin Coffee and Trina Solar have both filed suits against foreign-based copycats.
The problem runs from knockoff "Lafufu" plush toys (cheap copies of Pop Mart's wildly popular Labubu dolls, which prompted a nationwide crackdown and a Shanghai police bust of a $1.7 million stash in July) to copied motorcycles and solar panels. Judges in Shanghai, the preferred venue for IP litigation, are working through cases at a rate of roughly one per day, and it still takes three months for a case to land on a court's docket.
Chinese companies are also increasingly clashing abroad: patent-related cases involving Chinese businesses in America surged 56% in 2023, according to data from GEN, a Chinese law firm. Luckin Coffee and Trina Solar have both filed suits against foreign-based copycats.
The Business Plan (Score:5, Insightful)
Steal until you have it all, then hire a security guard.
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Following the footsteps of the U.S.. Started without copyrights or patents while they used all the foreign ones without payment. Then when they built up enough that they wanted to protect their own they amended the constitution to add them.
Re: The Business Plan (Score:4)
The part about copyright comes before the amendments.
The laws have changed but the constitution has had it as available from the start.
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Depends on what you mean. Through the 1950's and into the 1960's the US refused to recognize copyrights on works that were first published in foreign countries.
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The US has been party to such treaties for as long as everyone else has.
Re:The Business Plan (Score:5, Insightful)
I get it- America touched you in the bad place. It's fine to be mad at it for that. But just making shit up to make yourself feel better about it? That's weak sauce.
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Domestic copyright, and even foreign copyrights that were domestically registered were absolutely enforced by those who registered them.
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China is, and was, a party to those agreements, and was held to that standard.
Prior to China being a party to those agreements, they operated in the same wild west as the rest of us.
There is no Western/Eastern shit, here, merely a point in history.
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Copyright and patent protection bare literally baked into the un-amended Constitution.
Yeah but the OP isn't wrong in practice, only in theory. Forget about even the outside, Holywood got started because of people wanting to escape patent enforcement for film making patents in New York.
It's a thing: up and coming countries have absolutely no incentive to follow the strictures of IP. But once they've risen, and start generating IP, the attitude changes. It's a widely repeated pattern. The US went through it o
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1) Moving west would not have absolved them of the patents held by the Edison Trust.
2) This is evidenced by the fact that the lawsuits continued, and just 7 years later, the Edison Trust's practices were ruled illegal.
Hollywood may have moved west because they didn't like operating in the same town as the Edison Trust- no idea... but the idea that it made it so that they could infringe on patents, which are Federally protected, is absurd.
Allow me to present a more
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On one hand, we're talking about civil law. Party A sues party B.
On the other hand, we're talking about local law enforcement working with federal law enforcement.
One of those, you can shield, or provide a sanctuary, ya? One of them, you can't, ya?
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It's a thing: up and coming countries have absolutely no incentive to follow the strictures of IP. But once they've risen, and start generating IP, the attitude changes. It's a widely repeated pattern. The US went through it once upon a time too.
There were not international agreements to respect intellectual property until the late 19th century.
An up-and-coming country has the same amount of obligation to respect foreign intellectual property as an established country- and that's whatever they have agreed to by international treaty.
The US violated everyone's international property prior to the Berne Convention, and so did everyone else.
That's why the Berne Convention happened.
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The IP theft of early Hollywood is well documented. The main reason they went to Hollywood was that it was far away from the patent holders.
More than that though, US history is littered with examples of what is basically IP theft. During WW2, the UK helped develop the atomic bomb, and supersonic aircraft. The deal was that in exchange, the UK would get access to all the US work... Except, the Americans just decided they weren't going to do that, after getting all our data.
As Steve Jobs famously said, good a
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The IP theft of early Hollywood is well documented. The main reason they went to Hollywood was that it was far away from the patent holders.
No, the myth is well propagated.
Moving to another part of the country does not shield you from Federal law.
Hollywood moved west, and continued to fight the patent troll behavior of the Edison Trust, eventually winning, with the Edison Trust eventually being dissolved for antitrust behavior.
More than that though, US history is littered with examples of what is basically IP theft. During WW2, the UK helped develop the atomic bomb, and supersonic aircraft. The deal was that in exchange, the UK would get access to all the US work... Except, the Americans just decided they weren't going to do that, after getting all our data.
More mythical dumbfuckery.
During WW2, initially, the UK did not want to share development on atomic weaponry, so the US created its own program.
Eventually, it independently passed the UK, and the UK asked to join.
As
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It should, however also be noted, this kind of industrial espionage was normal for all players before the international intellectual property regime started evolving in the late 1800s.
The French and the British engaged in it against each other as well.
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Yeah, this is hilarious - a communist regime that once thought nothing about intellectual property, until they discovered that they have some that they'd like to monetize
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Who knew that when you build an economy on the back of "stealing IP from foreigners is perfectly fine, even encouraged"... people would decide "why just from foreigners?"
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Yeah, this is hilarious - a communist regime that once thought nothing about intellectual property, until they discovered that they have some that they'd like to monetize
Is that funnier than a capitalist regime doing the same (i.e. America previously). I don't get the joke...
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To be honest, the US was like that too. Back when copyright was on a country by country basis, the US would often print "pirated" versions of books because none of the US publishers had to respect English copyright. It's why you can often find both the English first printing, and a US first printing of a book - and there can be different values associated with those copies.
Many publishers set up shop in the US to pirate English books for this reason - the colonies were not going to respect English copyright
Yes, the building is on fire. Don't panic. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Yes, the building is on fire. Don't panic. (Score:4, Informative)
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It required international convention to change that. Do you think US authors' copyright was automatically respected in the UK prior to the Berne Convention?
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The US did not respect foreign rights until the late 19th century. I forget the name of the convention, but critically- neither did the UK. For domestically registered rights- they absolutely were respected.
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yes, the US is investing in being awesome by legislating having to repeat "I'm awesome" as often as possible, making saying "I'm not awesome" come with real consequences
let's see how it works out
Re:Yes, the building is on fire. Don't panic. (Score:4, Insightful)
Your thoughts on the US empire are off target, in my opinion. Most of this crap with the Trump administration is not new. I watched a very similar thing play out during the Bush years. Liberals went too far left, and the everyday Joes decided to elect an utterly unremarkable born-into--wealth basic bro, because he "vibes" with a big chunk of the electorate. Queue up 8 years of mostly sh&*y right wing policy mixed in with a small amount of reasonable policy correction, and then the country swings the other way. There's been a few unique things about the Trump train, but overall this feels like a mostly normal political cycle in the US.
The US will eventually fall out of the top spot. It happens to all hegemons given enough time. But, at this point, I think that it's the wrong conclusion.
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Beyond that, it's entirely fucking wrong.
The entire world "stole" technology prior to international conventions on intellectual property, which were a late-19th century invention- and precisely for that reason.
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The thing is, copyright, trademark, and patent are all useful laws...when in the proper proportion. Unfortunately, the powerful always want to extend them beyond all reason. E.g., the term of a copyright should be related to the up-front costs of developing the item patented. No law has EVER done that, or even really tried to do so. (It's probably hopeless to try, as the rewards for gaming the system would be too large.)
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Hollywood moved west to get rid of that day's equivalent of the Eastern District of Texas.
The Edison Trust was a patent troll.
They were later declared as such, and dissolved by the Supreme Court.
Your story is complete bullshit.
Chinese bloody invented nerve-splicing (Score:2)
Give me the mainland for a nerve job any day. Fix you right, mate
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communism (Score:2)
Communism: What is yours is mine, and what is mine is mine.
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The billionaire class simply grab everything they can for themselves and then sue into oblivion anyone who objects.
guess thats another idea Americans (Score:2, Troll)
A national of thieves⦠(Score:2)
â¦now stealing from itself. I blame the perverse incentives and totalitarian government structure. When the Chinese throw off their retched leaders, real honesty and business can be done.
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Re: A national of thieves⦠(Score:1)
Corporate welfare is a massive problem in America- both at for profit and nonprofit companies. We need to get the money out of politics, starting with handouts to big organizations of all types.
Non-Paywall (Score:1)
https://www.businesstimes.com.... [businesstimes.com.sg]
Shame on you, China! (Score:4, Funny)
You dare to call yourselves communists?!
Chinese stole almost as much US IP as Jews (Score:1)
It's a good thing the West never stole ideas! (Score:2)