Rewards offered

Beijing is offering large rewards to enlist citizens to report Olympic logo infringement cases in the run-up to the Games. A person who steps forward with information will be rewarded with five percent of what lawbreakers are fined, according to a regulation jointly issued by the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Industry and Commerce and the Legal Affairs Department of the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games.

The largest rewards will be 100,000 yuan, the regulation said.

The drive was launched to step up crackdown on the copyright infringement and unauthorized usage of Olympic logos such as the official mascots of the Beijing Games, the Fuwa, emblems for the Beijing Olympics and Paralympics Games, Beijing's Olympic slogan and the symbol of the Olympic torch relay.

Last year, the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Industry and Commerce dealt with 95 such infringement cases and imposed 1.03 million yuan in fines.

The trademark logos are owned by the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games, and only authorized companies are allowed to manufacture products bearing the logos.

Push to digital publishing

Leaders have called for updating the country's traditional paper-based publishing industry by digital means in light of the rapid development of information technology.

A special investigation group, composed of members of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), arrived in Shanghai at the beginning of this month to conduct field research about China's publishing industry.

"Digital publishing ushered in a new era of the publishing industry's development," Jiang Shaogao, deputy director of the ESCHC, said. "It will profoundly reform the production and consumption concepts of the publishing industry and upgrade the industry."

Ma Shengrong, another member of the CPPCC National Committee, called for IPR protection in tandem with accelerated reform of the digital publishing industry. Despite the rapid progress of digital publishing, corresponding legislation still lags behind its development," Ma said. "If we do not protect IPR properly from the very beginning, the digital industry will not enjoy sound development in the long run."

China's first jumbo jet

China's first jumbo passenger aircraft company, which was a major part of the nation's large jet program, was officially launched in Shanghai earlier this month.

Vice-Premier Zhang Dejiang said at the inauguration ceremony that the large jet program will improve China's independent innovation capabilities and to meet the needs of the rapidly expanding domestic civil aviation market.

The new jumbo jet company, China Commercial Aircraft Co., has registered capital of 19 billion yuan (about 2.7 billion U.S. dollars), with the central government and the Shanghai government among the major shareholders, according to Xinhua News Agency's report.

Shareholders of the new company also include China Aviation Industry Corporation I (AVIC I), the country's largest aircraft producer, and China Aviation Industry Corporation II (AVIC II).

Tudou.com punished

The Shanghai No 1 Intermediate People's Court has ordered the Website www.tudou.com to give 50,000 yuan to NuCom Online (Beijing) Co Ltd for infringing its copyright of the film Crazy Stone.

The plaintiff said the website had allowed visitors to watch the film online free of charge without NuCom's permission. Tudou.com argued that the film was uploaded by a netizen and it had only provided memory space on the Internet. The court ruled that the website planned with and helped others to infringe the film's copyright.

Beijing awarding inventors

The Beijing municipal government will give special awards to patents for inventions that have made significant contributions to the development of Beijing this year, the Beijing Intellectual Property Office said.

Beginning in 2008 the Beijing municipal government will biennially award 5 million yuan for the inventions. The initial prize will be 1 million yuan The winning "significant patent" will be selected from patents in the following areas: inventions from important industries in Beijing, patents for inventions that contribute to energy savings and pollution control, as well as patents for inventions which play an important role in solving problems in municipal administration, public security and traffic jam.

Liu Dongwei, vice-director of the office said Beijing takes an open attitude towards the participants. "Inventors can be Beijingers, employees working for Beijing registered companies, and even those from other provinces and foreign countries."

Hi-tech torch lighter

The successful Olympics torch relay to Mount Everest showcased high technology applied to the 2008 Beijing Games, Minister of Science and Technology Wan Gang said.

This is China's special contribution to the Olympics and a good marriage of the Olympics and science and technology, he said, adding the key device used during the torch relay was a small hi-tech small lighter.

"It can burn in temperatures of minus 40 degrees Celsius and 0.3 atmospheric pressure, and it can also withstand hurricanes," he said.

"The hi-tech lighters and other devices used for the torch relay were developed after two years of joint lab and field research by experts from the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Tsinghua University and the National Mountaineers Team," he said.

(China Daily 05/19/2008 page9)

2013-07-17