Ravi S. Narasimhan

IPR protection

By Ravi S. Narasimhan (China Daily)
Updated: 2005-10-27 05:53

Whenever I call, or bump into, expatriate friends who have left the country, the first thing they say they miss about China is cheap (my editors have long taught me to use "inexpensive" - more economically correct) DVDs and cheap, (never mind economically-correct adjectives) wonderful food.

(Some pine for the gorgeous women, but that's another story, or column.)

I have mixed news for them. Yes, DVDs are available. But the bad news is that the number of new titles is fast dwindling, as is the number of vendors.

If Roman Holiday (for the young or uninformed, it's a 1953 hit starring screen greats Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn) is on the top-10 list of my neighbourhood vendor's offerings, you know something's out of sync and the inventory is not what it used to be.

Clearly, sustained raids by anti-counterfeit officials are having an effect. Their reported strategy of going after the source, factories which do the recording, is having an effect at street level choking off supplies.

Yes, China is moving aggressively in protecting intellectual property rights (IPRs) and some of us are paying for it - literally.

So that brings us to a moral/ethical issue: Is it fair that holders of IPRs in rich countries demand the same payment from customers or consumers wherever they live, whatever they earn?

Let's take a movie theatre in Beijing, for example. A top ticket costs about 100 yuan (US$12) for a Western blockbuster. If you're unlucky enough to be saddled with a date (never mind a family), you cough up double. Throw in the popcorn and coke and taxi fare, it's a princely sum of 300 yuan (US$37).

Now, the average salary for a fresh graduate in a major city is about 3,000 yuan (US$370). So the dubious pleasure of watching Mr and Mrs Smith ham it on the big screen, would set him, or her, back three days' earnings.

Me, the one time I went to see a movie, the aforementioned, was on a Tuesday, the only day of the week where tickets are sold at half price (and my date paid). Since then, I tried getting a day off on that day of the week, but no luck.

Any surprise that counterfeit DVDs are sold? And any wonder I don't feel guilty when Tom Cruise can get away with US$20 million for the awful War of the Worlds? No wonder I feel we live in different worlds.

And to continue on a moralistic note, the most aggressive touts seem to be in the embassy area, some of whose inhabitants are the most vociferous on IPR protection - and their regular customers seem to be people who live in the neighbourhood.

Which brings us to an economic issue.

The number crunchers have seen the big picture and at least one major Hollywood studio has been promising that (official) DVDs here would soon be priced at a "fair" price and be made available as soon as possible. The bait is "superior quality" and, of course, "satisfaction" for the buyer.

Mind you, my street-corner vendor is no slouch when it comes to QC - he warns me beforehand if the "quality" is not good; and refunds me if I get no "satisfaction."

But I digress, let's talk about real economics.

Major global publishing houses, realizing the rich potential - and the poor purchasing power - in the Indian sub-continent came up with an equitable solution. The official average price of bestselling books is a fraction of what it is in the West - even better, cheaper (no, "inexpensive") paperbacks seem to be available faster.

Earlier this month in India, I bought a hardcover edition of Salman Rushdie's latest, Shalimar the Clown, for about 110 yuan (US$14). The listed price in Britain is 16.99 pounds (US$30).

Is there a lesson in this somewhere? Economically or ethically?

You tell me. I know the answer.

Email: ravi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 10/27/2005 page4)