First of all, I would like to place my project under the “social issues” section of the website instead of the “economy” section, since I would like to focus my project on the conflicts between the copyright owners and copyright infringers.
Infringement of copyright could attract both civil and criminal actions. In the past 10 years, there have not been many major changes in the civil copyright laws. Hence, I would focus on the criminal laws that are related to the copyright issues, while also deal with some of the civil elements.
Photocopying
For the photocopying section, the photocopying shops owners might face criminal charges, if he or she commits any of the following acts under section 118(1) of the Copyright Ordinance:
(1) A person commits an offence if he, without the licence of the copyright owner-
(a) makes for sale or hire;
(b) imports into Hong Kong otherwise than for his private and domestic use;
(c) exports from Hong Kong otherwise than for his private and domestic use;
(d) possesses for the purpose of, in the course of, or in connection with, any trade or business with a view to committing any act infringing the copyright; (Amended 64 of 2000 s. 7)
(e) for the purpose of, in the course of, or in connection with, any trade or business- (Amended 64 of 2000 s. 7)
(i) sells or lets for hire;
(ii) offers or exposes for sale or hire;
(iii) exhibits in public; or
(iv) distributes; or
(f) distributes (otherwise than for the purpose of, in the course of, or in connection with, any trade or business) to such an extent as to affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright, (Amended 64 of 2000 s. 7)
an infringing copy of a copyright work.
While for the people who take copyrighted materials to the shops for photocopying, he or she might face the criminal charges under the same section if he or she photocopies the materials to make money.
However, if a person only photocopies the materials for personal use, for instance, students photocopying books for revisions, the copyrighted owners can sue that person through civil actions under section 22 and 23 of the Copyright Ordinance.
S.22
(1) The owner of the copyright in a work has, in accordance with the following provisions of this Division, the exclusive right to do the following acts in Hong Kong-
(a) to copy the work
S.23
(1) The copying of the work is an act restricted by the copyright in every description of copyright work; and references in this Part to copying and copies are construed as follows.
(2) Copying of a work means reproducing the work in any material form. This includes storing the work in any medium by electronic means.
File sharing on the internet
Since then, other online users might face similar criminal charges if they share copyrighted materials on the internet without the consent from the copyright owners, under the following ordinances:
S.118(1)(f) Copyright Ordinance (introduced in 2000 to deal with the new ways of copyright infringement on the internet)
(1) A person commits an offence if he, without the licence of the copyright owner-
(f) distributes (otherwise than for the purpose of, in the course of, or in connection with, any trade or business) to such an extent as to affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright, (Amended 64 of 2000 s. 7)
S.119(1)
(1) A person who commits an offence under section 118(1) is liable on conviction on indictment to a fine at level 5 in respect of each infringing copy and to imprisonment for 4 years.
In March 2006, the government introduced the Copyright Amendment Bill 2006, which aims to “To further improve Hong Kong’s copyright protection and copyright exemption
regimes”, to the Legislative Council.
In December, the Government sought public views on strengthening copyright protection in digital environment by issuing a consultation paper on copyright protection. It is the second phase of the government’s review of the Copyright Ordinance following the introduction of the Copyright (Amendment) Bill.
Joseph Wong, Secretary for Commerce, Industry and Technology, said in a press release that the consultation paper aims at providing better copyright protection on the internet. The Amendment will widen the scope of criminal liabilities of file sharing on the internet. Not only the uploaders will face criminal charges, downloaders of copyright materials might also be charged for copyright infringement. The use of copyrighted photos or graphics on the internet might also attract criminal liabilities.
Many of the Hong Kong online citizens are not happy with the government’s series of actions. It creates hot debates on different forums, such as the Hong Kong Discuss Forum and Hong Kong Golden Forum. The Hong Kong Discuss Forum even dedicates a whole section for discussion about the Amendment and Consultation.
Many of the forums’ users express their concerns about potential criminal charges. Some of them think that the government is only protecting the benefits of companies while neglecting the importance of free flow of information. Some acknowledge that copyright infrigement is not right, however, the government should not make it a criminal offence. While the movie and music industries are the strong advocates of the Amendment, some people think that people should not respect their copyrights since most of the film makers and song writers just copy the ideas from other countries. In general, users from these forums support the “public domain” idea and against the introduction of criminal offence.
Some users of the Hong Kong Golden Forum even plan to demostrate on the streets to express their oppositions to the government’s actions.
Format
I think I will follow the New York Times format in reporting copyright issues, such as “China Says U.S. Complaint Won’t Solve Piracy”, and “Schmidt says YouTube ‘very close’ to filtering system”. It will mostly be text-based. If there is any audio interview or graphic, it will be placed near to the paragraph which relates to it.
I have learned from reading James Foust’s “Writing and Editing Online” chapter in his book Online Journalism – Principles and Practices of News for the Web, that although the many of the online journalisms are mostly text-based, it is important to exploit the internet’s potential. Foust suggested some layering features, which I find
very useful in my project. I would divide the project into 2 big “chunks”, the photocopying section and the file sharing on the internet section and some smaller “chunks” within the big ”chunks” , so as to make the project easier to follow. As the 2 sections can be read independently, by layering the project in this way can “truly take advantage of the Internet’s nonlinear capabilities”, as suggested by Foust.
Apart from some other text-formatting features in Mindy McAdams’s “Writing for the Web”, I have also learned from the website on how to write a good ”chunk”. I will definitely refer to the website when I start writing for the content of the project.
