As a writer who pens books and the occasional song lyrics, Huang Jiwei has discovered an interesting contrast. For the lyrics he wrote years ago for the pop song Friends, he receives payments whenever the song is played in karaoke bars or used as a ring tone for mobile phones. But for reproductions of his articles and books on websites, Huang gets nothing.

“These bills of remuneration for the lyrics show respect for the writer’s copyright, even though each bill is usually worth no more than 0.1 yuan,” Huang said.

For copyright protection of song lyrics, Huang recommended the Music Copyright Society of China, which is entrusted with remuneration for composer copyrights. That is, for every piece of registered music, the society is responsible for finding out who is making money of it, and for collecting payments for the copyright holder, while taking a commission.

For written works such as books, the Intellectual Property Protection Center under the National Copyright Administration collectively manages remuneration for writer copyrights.

So why aren’t writers such as Huang receiving their due pay? At a press conference in February, Wang Ziqiang, the Spokesman of the copyright watchdog, explained it is because of the unavailability of a feasible standard of payment. The Supreme People’s Court, China’s highest judicial organ, promulgated a judicial interpretation in 2002 stipulating that authors must be paid for the online reproduction of their short articles previously published in newspapers and magazines but it carries no such statement as “reproduction forbidden.” The court failed to make follow-up stipulations, according to Wang.

“The payment standard practiced by the National Copyright Administration now only applies to reproduction between print media,” Wang said. “But the good news is that the State Council is working on a landmark regulation on the rights of communication on the Internet, which is expected to be released later this year.”

China launched a four-month-long campaign against Internet piracy and copyright violations beginning in September 2005. The special operation resulted in the shutdown of 76 websites and the handling of 172 cases, including 28 serious ones involving movies, music, games, books and software sold or shared illegally over the Internet. Half of the 28 serious cases investigated, according to Yan Xiaohong, Deputy Director of the National Copyright Administration, were reported by international copyright organizations or copyright holders.

However, Yan admitted that the deterrent of one campaign would be short-lived. In order to curb these illegal activities, “an enduring mechanism is needed to protect copyright on the Internet with more efficiency, ” he said.

This “enduring mechanism” will include one law, two treaties, two regulations and two administrative protection measures, Yan continued.

By name, these are the Copyright Law, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty that China is going to sign this year. The Regulation on Protection of Communication Rights Through the Information Network is in process, the Regulation on Collective Administration of Copyright was released in January 2005, the Administrative Measures on Internet Copyright Protection were released in May 2005, and the Rules for the Implementation of Copyright Administrative Punishment were revised and released in September 2003.

Zhang Lu, a senior executive of Beijing-based Taihe Rye Music Co. Ltd., said they had consulted their lawyer about suing over illegal music swaps and finally gave up because of the absence of concrete legal articles. “If the State Council’s regulation on online communication rights makes improvements and stipulates specifically on this violation to guide us in lawsuits, it will be a great help to us.”

Chen Cun, a Chinese writer who sued a digital library for reproducing his works without authorization or payment in 2004, also embraced the news. “What concerns me most is the punishments when websites don’t fulfill their obligations of paying authors remuneration.”

Chen said he believes that laws and regulations are far from enough, and that increasing the cost of copyright violations and implementing punishments with a heavy hand seem more important. “A thief will reconsider if he will be fined 1,000 yuan for every 100 yuan he filches, and the same is true with online piracy,” he added.

As to Internet users’ habitual downloads of pirated music, Deputy Director Yan said the government is determined to destroy every illegal website for unauthorized music downloading services.

Moreover, the official pledged China’s copyright watchdog will seek technical help and be equipped with advanced search engines to learn which music downloads are not authorized and where the servers of illegal files are located.

However, Wang Bin with the Internet Society of China has reiterated on many occasions that in order to curb downloading services of pirated music, movies, software and other products, it is important to “technically enable copyright holders to monitor the use of the products and cut their sometimes unduly high price. “