A woman browses for a song she is fond of, and finds a portal site which “sells” the single for few quarters. She pays the money and downloads the song. Is she still violating the copyright In the complicated world of copyright law, how can we be sure Policy makers, entrepreneurs, film makers, and researchers around the world gathered to draw the bottom line at the International Copyright Technology Conference 2011 at COEX in Seoul, Korea, on November 17.
World-class domestic and international copyright experts including Victor Vazquez Lopez of the World Intellectual Property Organization, Leonardo Chiariglione of ISO Moving Pictures Experts Group, and Thomas Rubin of Microsoft Corporations attended this conference as keynote speakers. The experts debated and sought cooperation on the latest copyright technology trends and policies, as well as copyright issues raised in the new business environment rapidly changing due to new technology.
Choe Kwang-shik, Minister from the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of the Republic of Korea
“Copyright protection and utilization serve as the core foundation in supporting the development of the contents industry, a new growth engine industry for the next generation. They have also surfaced as key issues in the field of international trade,” continued Choe Kwang-shik, “Korea’s status as a leader in copyright, due to the consistent efforts of its government and people, has made great advances. With the recent popularity of the Korean pop culture called the Korean wave, especially in K-pop, Korea’s contents industry is expanding widely throughout the world market as well as in Asia. The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism considers it extremely meaningful to be organizing the international Copyright Technology Conference (ICOTEC) 2011 with the world Intellectual Property Organization under the theme “Copyright First!”
The President of the Organizing Committee of ICOTEC 2011, Chung Hong-taek added, “The conference will serve as a platform for participants to discuss the direction for global copyright policy in the smart generation. Furthermore, participants will debate the latest copyright technology trends, the variety of copyright regulations in different countries, and the future of the copyright industry.”
The Korean government has pushed hard for people to respect the rights of creators, legally distributing content, and legally using copyrighted content. As a result, there has been a steady decrease in copyright damages in Korea. Noting that it is the right time to improve awareness among Korean people on copyright protection, the conference sought to exchange domestic and foreign copyright technology.
Policy Challenges at the Interface between Copyright and Technology
Victor Vazquez Lopez, Senior Legal Counsellor of WIPO
“Copyright needs to evolve in order to address current technological realities or risk becoming irrelevant, adding that there is no single magical answer to the development of a successful policy response to the challenges facing copyright in the digital age. A combination of law, infrastructure, cultural change, institutional collaboration, and better business models all contribute to the development of a successful policy making,” Senior Legal Counselor, Culture and Creative Industries Sector of World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) said. He stated four main principles that should guide the development of a successful policy response to digital challenges facing copyright. “One is the facilitation of ways to diffuse creativity and knowledge, including the stimulation of a flow of rich and diverse content. Two is the establishment of a reliable copyright infrastructure and regulatory framework. Three is the promotion of inclusive policies, guaranteeing an equal access to knowledge for everyone. The last principle is the adaptation of copyright law to the constantly-evolving new market trends and technological developments.
Standards for Management and Protection of Content Rights
Chairman of ISO Moving Pictures Experts Group (MPEG), Leonardo Chiariglione said at his keynote speech, “Standards for media-analogue and digital- are an established necessary element underpinning the successful adoption of new services based on content distribution technologies. Content management and protection has had a different history as the relevant technologies have been invented and deployed as an ad hoc and proprietary technology more functional to the creation and management of a customer bases that to ensuring rights compliance. The last few years have shown that digital media are a firm and expanding communication tool for our wieldy or society will simply choose a path of minimum resistance. Standardization of content management and protection technologies can help making them more effective, ubiquitous and acceptable.”
Leonardo Chiariglione, chairman of ISO Moving Pictures Experts Group
The Vice President of Warner Brothers Entertainment added a few words as well. Lucia De Noronha Rangel shared Warner Bros.’ anti-piracy operations. “We have people in several countries in the world and aggressively go after thieves that steal our content and harm the entertainment industry, its workers, creators, and governments by not paying taxes. We work on education that piracy is a crime with consequences.” Warner Bros. is highly active on other copyright protection measures as well. They are asking collaboration from several pirate sites, and have had met with success in turning a pirate site into a legitimate one, and working with technology and digital rights management to provide content to consumers in several platforms and portable medias allowing consumers to buy content anywhere.
Copyright at the Speed of Light
Thomas Rubin, Microsoft
Thomas Rubin of Microsoft spoke on Creative Content and Cloud computing. As a Chief IP Strategy Counsel, he spoke, “The past decade was market by the transformation of creative content from the analog world, where most works existed in physical form, to the digital world, where most works were reduced to binary code consisting of 0’s and 1’s. Content industries and copyright policy were transformed as a result. As great as that digital revolution was, the current decade is being marked by an even more revolutionary transformation as those digital works are flowing through vast global networks utilizing technology known as cloud computing. The rise of cloud computing is altering all aspects of the creative industries from content production to content distribution to content consumption. In short, cloud computing presents a watershed opportunity for content creators to achieve efficiencies and scale, and to reach new audiences as never before.” Mr. Rubin’s presentation heavily focused on how business practices and public policy can, and must, evolve to ensure that the full potential of cloud computing is realized for the benefit of creators and the public alike.
Professor Yoo Chang-dong of Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology added, “With the emergence of cloud computing technology and expanding internet, the issue of plagiarism which has received evermore attention must be defined and cleared up for the development and protection of the multimedia content industry and individual creativity. Fingerprinting systems, which are used to detect copy or near-duplicate contents, are not suitable for detecting plagiarism of multimedia content.” In his keynote speech, he discussed various difficulties in identifying multimedia plagiarism and proposed various identifying strategies involving the issues of measuring similarity between multimedia contents.
Experts from more than 50 countries came to carry on an in-depth discussion on copyrights. President Chung Hong-taek believes that this is only the beginning. “The first International Copyright Technology Conference 2011 will be a valuable steppingstone to enhance Korea’s status in becoming a leading country in copyright protection. To establish a healthy environment for both creators and users of cultural content, we cordially ask for your active participation at the future conferences as well.”
