Miss China 2005
Americans Arrested for DVD Piracy
In a report from Xinhua I learned that two Americans were to serve as much as 30 days in jail for selling pirated DVDs overseas on eBay and a website called Three Dollar DVD. Randolph Hobson Guthrie III, Wu Dong, Cody Abram Thrush, and Wu Shibiao sold only $840,000 of DVDs:
Based on evidence provided, a judge of the Shanghai No 2 Intermediate People’s Court found that they had sold about 133,000 pirate DVDs worth more than 3.3 million yuan (US$393,000) to more than 20 countries including the United States, Australia, Britain and Canada and earned nearly 1 million yuan (US$120,900) from the business.
The case was given top priority and last year was categorized as one of the country’s top 10 IPR (intellectual property right) cases by the State Intellectual Property Office.
Investigators swung into action when the Bureau of Investigation of Economic Crimes under the Ministry of Public Security received a report from the US Embassy in China last April about two Shanghai-based Americans selling pirated DVDs abroad and immediately started to co-ordinate with their United States counterparts.
Note to self
Do not mention China-Taiwan relations as a point of conversation to someone actually from Taiwan. Even asking “what do you think of …” is a very bad thingTM.
Cambodian Killing Fields Privatized
According to a recent article in Time, the site of the genocide at Choeung Ek is to be turned into a private tourist attraction:
According to a contract signed on March 18, the new operator, JC Royal Co., is expected to “increase revenue for the state and develop and renovate the beauty of Choeung Ek killing fields.” JC Royal is to pay the municipality of Phnom Penh $15,000 a year. In return, it will be allowed to jack up entrance fees, charging foreign visitors up to $3 instead of the current 50 cents.
Hopefully this Japanese company will do a better job of taking care of a war atrocity memorial than the usual Japanese “it wasn’t so bad… ” or “it didn’t happen like that” …
China & Japan: Still at War
Enraged over Japan’s bid to join the UN security council and a new textbook approved in Japan that minimizes atrocities comitted during the second world war, Chinese people took to the streets of Beijing to call “Japanese pig, come out” in front of the Ambassador’s residence. As many as 10,000 students took place in the mostly peaceful demonstration under police guard. Said Cheng Lei,
“Japan doesn’t face up to its history. We want to express our feelings so the Japanese government knows what we think.”
Updates:
Some other Asian blogs are covering this, notably Danwei and Simon World!