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China Blasts Bogus US Report On China's IP Policies... As US & China Seek New IP Agreement

from the left-hand,-right-hand... dept

Tue, May 25th 2010 3:57am — Mike Masnick

It seems the left hand doesn't always know what the right hand is doing on the diplomatic front, apparently. Late last week, the US and Chinese patent offices signed an agreement promising cooperation, including sharing information and best practices between the two. At the same time, however, it appears the Chinese government is pretty steamed about being included in the USTR's silly special 301 report (which is basically mocked by everyone outside of the the USTR and the entertainment or pharma industries). To make matters worse, last week's announcement by a group of elected officials in Congress under the banner of the "anti-piracy caucus," which blamed China for not stopping file sharing on Baidu, seems to have pushed gov't officials over the edge. China is pissed off and accusing the USTR of blatant lies:

"The involved U.S. Congress members should respect the fact and stop making groundless accusations against China."

While it's difficult to take the word of Chinese officials on this matter seriously, we again have to wonder if US politicians (and industry reps) have any idea what they're setting themselves up for. As we noted recently, under pressure from US companies and politicians, China has begun cracking down on infringement, but has done so almost exclusively against foreign companies. Ticking off China even more on this issue doesn't seem like a particularly wise strategy.

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Filed Under: china, copyright, us

11 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 25 May 2010 @ 5:15am

once again mike, all i can say is that understanding china is not your forte.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 May 2010 @ 5:18am

Re:
If you make a claim, could you please have the courtesy to elaborate on it instead of blatantly putting it out there as trollbait?
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Richard (profile), 25 May 2010 @ 5:21am

Re:
and coming up with actual facts or logic to support your criticism is not yours!
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abc gum, 25 May 2010 @ 5:35am

Re:
Thank you for your thoughtful and enlightening comment. As always, you bring exciting and informative discourse.
/s
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Anonymous Coward, 25 May 2010 @ 5:51am

Does it count if USTR is right, but for the wrong reasons?
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xs (profile), 25 May 2010 @ 6:35am

Re:
We can start discussing that question when that situation occures.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 May 2010 @ 6:55am

Re:
Once again little ac, all I can say is that understanding the Masnick is not your forte.

Which is French!
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Hephaestus (profile), 25 May 2010 @ 7:43am

" including sharing information and best practices between the two. "

Oh joy the Chinese patent office is going to end up being as screwed up as ours ....
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crade (profile), 25 May 2010 @ 7:47am

If there is one thing I love about chinese government policy it is how they always add a little humour when they make your political attacks blow up in your face.
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NAMELESS.ONE, 25 May 2010 @ 10:14am

What does IP do for your country
This is perhaps the angle china might take and id say good for them.

IF all this IP crap does is benefit the UK and USA then its going to be a hard sell in any Country to citizens

and the bribery and treason in the back ground making it happen has to stop.

I do not go to the usa and peddle your politics but perhaps we should all be collectively forcing the usa to elect different leaders. This way you Americans can get a truer sense of the Lack of democracy you are facilitating

AND FOR TAM HERE'S SOME CAPS
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Anonymous Coward, 25 May 2010 @ 6:44pm

Re: Re:
it is hard to explain without doing a whole deal on chinese politics and structure, but lets just say that there are entire departments of the chinese government whos only job it is to put down, deny, and question reports that look bad against the government. that the agreement was signed out of sync with the 301 report only means that department a and department b have likely not discussed the implications or decided on future responses to the incredibly biased reports such as the special 301 report. the chinese government isnt exactly the monolith that many try to make it out to be, it is still a huge collection of moving parts that dont all move at the same speed and dont all talk to each other every day.
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