Mumbai: The Motion Picture Association (MPA), in partnership with the US Embassy in Beijing, co-hosted a reception and award ceremony during the 7th annual US Ambassador’s IPR Roundtable, a high-level government and industry forum on the protection of intellectual property rights (IPR) in China where US Ambassador to China Clark T. Randt Jr. presented awards recognizing the creativity of the winners of three IPR Public Awareness Competitions backed by the MPA and other IPR stakeholders.
The reception was attended by Chinese government officials, industry experts, and the winners of student anti-piracy campaigns co-organized by the MPA. They were joined by representatives of China’s leading User Generated Content video-sharing sites (UGCs), which are currently cooperating with the MPA in its on-going effort to fight online piracy, a growing threat to domestic and international copyright owners.
Yang Tingting, a student of Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, won a China-wide short video production competition on the theme Respect Copyrights, Stay Away from Piracy organized jointly by the MPA, the organizers of the 15th Beijing Student Film Festival and the China Film Copyright Protection Association. The contest was open to students at more than 300 universities throughout China and challenged filmmakers to take a fresh look at the value of intellectual property to society and to individuals.
Xu Hua-bin won an anti-piracy campaign jointly organized by MPA and the China Association for Educational Technology. The competition challenged the creativity of students aged between 6 to 15 years in China’s elementary, middle, and junior high schools to take a fresh look at the value of intellectual property to society and to individuals.
Yu Qi-an’ won an MPA co-organised online anti-piracy digital video contest with the theme Love Genuine, Protect Intellectual Property Rights that engaged the creativity of the online community.
The winners of all three competitions recently travelled to Hollywood to visit MPA member company film studios, learning how movies were produced in the US.
"While we talk about the protection of IPR, it is important to remember it is not only about the creative industries," said Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) executive vice president Greg Frazier, who would also deliver a keynote speech at the Roundtable. "The businesses related to developing and marketing intellectual property are primary engines of economic growth."
The most recent International Intellectual Property Alliance study on the economic value of the US copyright industries shows the enormous positive impact those industries have – the US total copyright industries accounted for an estimated US$1.38 trillion of the 2005 US GDP (more than 11% of the total), while employing 11.3 million workers, almost 8.5% of the total US workforce.
"One of the best ways to help improve understanding of the value of intellectual property is to invite people to create work of their own," said MPA president and managing director Asia-Pacific Mike Ellis. "The three young people honored tonight are the tip of the iceberg – thousands more spent a lot of time and effort on their entries. The awareness created is good for China, good for the creative industries and good for all the individuals who took part in the competitions."
