Internet copyrights

Officials from China's Ministry of Commerce and National Copyright Administration, along with the US Patent and Trademark Office and US Copyright Office, recently met in Beijing to address copyright infringement and the Internet.

The meeting had been scheduled by the Sino-US Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade during last year's Sino-US intellectual property dialogue.

User-generated content and peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing issues were addressed at a meeting that attracted 100 participants from China, the United States, Japan and European Union countries.

New IP search tool

A new search tool for IP-related legal texts, China IP Law Search, was launched last week.

China IP Law Search is a free, bilingual collection of legal references relevant to intellectual property protection in China.

The search tool was introduced by the Ministry of Commerce and the EU-China Project on the Protection of Intellectual Property Rights.

IPR MOU

China and South Korea signed a formal Memorandum of Understanding promising strategic cooperation on trademark and intellectual property rights (IPR) protections between the two countries.

The agreement states that the two countries will exchange information on IPR laws and regulations, co-host international IPR activities and organize training programs on IPR policies and trends.

Video games

Chinese online video game firm Changyou.com Ltd filed a lawsuit against the online video game site Kylin (www.70yx.com) for alleged copyright infringement.

The lawsuit filed by Changyou.com states that Kylin's CEO and chief game developers were its former employees.

Changyou.com asked for compensation of 1 yuan.

Kylin, in a statement, said the accusations were "groundless" and were designed to damage its reputation.

Changyou.com is a subsidiary of the major Chinese Internet portal Sohu.com.

IPR caseload

Courts at all levels across China handled more than 3,300 criminal cases involving alleged intellectual property rights (IPR) infringement.

Actual infringement was found by the courts in nearly 1,000 cases, according to a workshop on IPR criminal jurisdiction recently held in Jiaxing, Zhejiang province.

The seminar was attended by more than 80 people, including government officials, judges and deputies from multinational companies.

(Source: China Daily)