I think this professor does a pretty decent job of outlining why Western expectations and predictions about China have been so off-the-mark time and again. People claiming the Chinese desire Western-style democracy take note. This is a coming down to a clash of diametrically-opposed political ideologies.
Indeed.
A parallel example: I keep waiting for the day when, with the now daily news coverage of this hacking incident or that cyber-war warning, somebody points out that our legal-based strategy of criminalising hacking isn't going to work against the main state threat, China. They simply don't see intellectual property theft as theft. It's a cultural Buddhist thing, where sharing of ideas / intellectual property is assumed and therefore you cannot 'steal' it. As an example, this is why Chinese copy cellphones, clothes etc are so blatant in mimicking logos, trademarks and model types. If you look at cheap ripoffs from elsewhere (Eastern Europe, Africa), they always change something slightly to avoid an identical appearance - not so Chinese versions.
Buddhism? Really?
I'm pretty sure they don't make minor alterations to logos and such because it's so easy to get away with it.
...and it's so easy to get away with because in China, it isn't legislated against in the same was as it is under countries with Western-based legal systems (which is almost everywhere else). Combine that with "theft of intellectual property" not being seen as a crime by the populace, and you get the proliferation of IP theft and direct copies (as opposed to slightly-altered ripoffs) that you have from China.
I'll look up the source when I get back to work.
The film industry in the US moved to California because they didn't want to pay Edison on patents for the early version of movies, and it was easier to get away with it there. Hell, if I remember correctly, some guy walked out of his boss' office in England, got on a boat, sailed to the US and set up shop with his boss' water mill design right around the start of the Industrial Revolution. Patents and trademarks only start to be desired in an area once the people in that area have something they would protect. Right now, the vast majority of the scare information (which is really what IP laws are trying to create) is in the hands of people not in China. When China starts to get a really serious quantity of people with information they want to be able to charge for, expect their stance on the issue to change.
Right now, all China really has is a lot of people without original research/work who would love to have the benefits of someone else's research but can't afford the absurd prices those people will charge for it (indeed, its fairly likely that even if they could afford it that the prices are high enough to make it unprofitable to purchase a license to use the information). You could substitute any number of things in for China, include upper middle class American teenagers (and software), its not a uniquely Chinese issue and the solution is unlikely to be particularly uniquely Chinese either (in that they'll start noticing patent law once it helps them more than it hurts them).
I think there's a lot of truth behind this--of course, it assumes that China, as it continues to devope, continues to grow economically, continues to industrialize will emulate the United States capitalist rules-of-engagement, which is certainly possible (but by no means guaranteed). Should China continue in this route, then yes, both the citizenry and the government will change their view of things like patent law over time.
It's probably hard to apply, but if anything, Confucianism rather jealously guards things that would be construed as intellectual property (though back then, it'd only be applicable to books, and authors were paid by very different methods in Confucius' time). COnfucianism is far less concerned with compassion and egalitarianism than Buddhism, and far more on obeying the obligations and rules of your station within society. Not really something that would promote ignoring the perceptions of intellectual property, particularly in a society that recognized them.
Right now, all China really has is a lot of people without original research/work who would love to have the benefits of someone else's research but can't afford the absurd prices those people will charge for it (indeed, its fairly likely that even if they could afford it that the prices are high enough to make it unprofitable to purchase a license to use the information). You could substitute any number of things in for China, include upper middle class American teenagers (and software), its not a uniquely Chinese issue and the solution is unlikely to be particularly uniquely Chinese either (in that they'll start noticing patent law once it helps them more than it hurts them).
Er, which is basically the same argument as the original video aimed to debunk, namely "they'll become more like us as they develop". To which I say: not necessarily.
I would also suggest that your parallel of the similarities of IP problems around the world misses the point that cultural trends elsewhere ((i.e. with upper middle class American teenagers) also are based on a version of "IP theft isn't theft". Many of the spurious arguments about "music should be free", "information wants to be free" and the popularity of open-source principles on the web are only a short hop and a skip away from the Chinese mentality. Sure, plenty in the West use them as self-justification for going against what cultural norms tell us to do (i.e. do not steal), but there is a definite and growing subset of people who genuinely believe in this stuff...they are creating their own cultural norms which justify it. In the West, however, as you point out they may not fully realise the consequences, and may well be normalised into "do not steal" later on when they see it as affecting them more.
What happens if that particular cultural bias doesn't exist? There is nothing for them to normalise into. Apparently they will all become social democrats by Pacific osmosis...
Right now, all China really has is a lot of people without original research/work who would love to have the benefits of someone else's research but can't afford the absurd prices those people will charge for it (indeed, its fairly likely that even if they could afford it that the prices are high enough to make it unprofitable to purchase a license to use the information). You could substitute any number of things in for China, include upper middle class American teenagers (and software), its not a uniquely Chinese issue and the solution is unlikely to be particularly uniquely Chinese either (in that they'll start noticing patent law once it helps them more than it hurts them).
Er, which is basically the same argument as the original video aimed to debunk, namely "they'll become more like us as they develop". To which I say: not necessarily.
The alternative is to suggest that they will do something entirely new in human history. This is not unreasonable, but needs a hell of a lot more evidence than has been presented in this thread.
I would also suggest that your parallel of the similarities of IP problems around the world misses the point that cultural trends elsewhere ((i.e. with upper middle class American teenagers) also are based on a version of "IP theft isn't theft".
Ignored in the sense that people (with certain exceptions I'll get to shortly) tend to drop it as soon as they end up on the other side of the fence? Well, that is part of why I mentioned the film industry. If instead you meant the argument that IP theft isn't theft when the party you're copying from has already broken the social contract where society lets them have a temporary monopoly on something trivial to reproduce so that they'll keep doing that then you're just talking about the other side of IP law (which, admittedly, doesn't get much airing these days).
Many of the spurious arguments about "music should be free", "information wants to be free" and the popularity of open-source principles on the web are only a short hop and a skip away from the Chinese mentality.
The difference between the mentality that produces the statement that "information wants to be free" and the principles behind open source and that "music should be free" (or that someone should be allowed to "borrow" a trademark) are vast. The first is based in a social obligation to contribute not less than you take, and the second in thinking that somehow you're special and the only the rules you like apply to you. That is to say, it takes either balls or crazy (or both) to be Richard Stallman, it takes humanity to be the MPAA (and, that neither is terribly original).
This theory that Confucianism somehow doesn't allow for IP laws seems a little absurd right off the bat. The justification for IP regulations in the West is based on 2 things: First (the moral high ground option), that there is an overwhelming public good in the public having unrestricted access to new developments in any field, which needs to be balanced by some sort of incentive for people to actually create things (note that incentive doesn't have to be monetary, in at least some cases recognition is enough, same is true of tit for tat type of exchange like many of the free software licenses). Second, straight up greed. Someone has a thing other people want enough to pay money for it but is easily copied, so they lobby for laws to protect their right to be the sole provider of that thing (I would argue that is your organization ends in Of America, you're likely in this category, but that's another thread).
The first of those theories gives you the basic copyright and patent system that large portions of the West started with, and is consistent with what I know of Confucianism. The second gives you the crazier bits of IP law that we've started seeing over the last 30-50 years, and is pretty consistent with people being people.
edit: I suppose I should be clear here that since this bit of conversation really started more with trademark infringement than copying information that trademark enforcement is effectively an anti-fraud device (part of what a trademark implies is that you're getting the workmanship/warranty/internals of a certain entity). Trademark really needs to be separated from the rest of the IP issues because its a whole different can of worms.
The problem is that things like ipods just don't get developed without patent laws and copywrites. For the time being they're not something that you can make a cheap knockoff of effectively (really, chinese or American or Euro or whatever knockoffs of popular name brand electronics are never of the same quality), who knows how that will change
The idea that Chinese people don't care about IP laws because of their religious background is simple Orientalism, in my view.
I think Chinese people don't care about IP laws because that IP isn't owned by Chinese people. If China had a better level of technological innovation, I'm 100% sure that IP would start being respected, and given the state's attitude to law-breaking, enforcement would be even more draconian than in the US.
I don't think that many people anywhere respect IP law. It's enforced, and some people are principled about it, but companies still feel the need to put comedy warnings on our DVDs and so on. I suppose we are often proud of the famous inventors in our societies, and vaguely connect the idea of respect for innovation with modern property theft issues. So a historical or modern tendency towards technological innovation=good IP law.
A more interesting question might be - why don't Chinese people have that much invention? And if your answer is 'Chinese people are culturally not creative' then you should stop and read some books.
You don't need to go to Orientalism to explain this - I'm with Brother Occam and Dr Said on this.
I was under the impression that it was because chinese secondary education was focused on copying and memorizing works rather than creating works
I don't remember being asked to create very much in my (English) school either. The myth of a lack of Asian creativity is, well, a myth. China (and other parts of the Far East that get hit with that particular canard) have an astonishing wealth of creative output within the arts, but technological innovation has not been their focus. This might be because of governments that valued stability over progress, or any number of reasons, but I don't think some kind of innate lack of creativity, or recent high school policies, are the answer at all.
The problem is that things like ipods just don't get developed without patent laws and copywrites. For the time being they're not something that you can make a cheap knockoff of effectively (really, chinese or American or Euro or whatever knockoffs of popular name brand electronics are never of the same quality), who knows how that will change
There's a good point here - without good IP laws or culture, regardless of the reason for the lack, China will never attract international investment or talent for technological development. Innovate within China? Boom someone will nick it.
I don't remember being asked to create very much in my (English) school either.
Compared to the standard Chinese student you likely did. Chinese schools rely heavily on rota memorization and testing to teach students and very little on reports, presentations, projects, questioning students, etc.
Now, this isn't entirely bad either. When class sizes average around 50 students teachers can't really expect to be able to afford the time it takes to go through and examine every student's book report or whatever. And at the same time while students don't entirely understand everything it is they've memorized, it can provide for a phenomenal foundation of knowledge later in their academic careers should they move on to higher learning.
I don't remember being asked to create very much in my (English) school either.
Compared to the standard Chinese student you likely did. Chinese schools rely heavily on rota memorization and testing to teach students and very little on reports, presentations, projects, questioning students, etc.
I remember my grade school presentations. The way to get a good grade was to succinctly summarize whatever the teacher and the book had already said. Well, or if you slept through class like me then you did get to engage in some serious creative work. Questioning students was largely in the same bent. It may have gotten better in high school, or I may have just gotten better at sleeping through classes until I was called on.
The rest though, I quite agree with. Huge class sizes are sometimes the world you're stuck with and there are very few ways to handle that.
The problem is that things like ipods just don't get developed without patent laws and copywrites. For the time being they're not something that you can make a cheap knockoff of effectively (really, chinese or American or Euro or whatever knockoffs of popular name brand electronics are never of the same quality), who knows how that will change
There's a good point here - without good IP laws or culture, regardless of the reason for the lack, China will never attract international investment or talent for technological development. Innovate within China? Boom someone will nick it.
It's a little bit of a Catch 22.
A lot of foreign technology companies already have extensive RND in china. There are at least three reasons for this: 1) salaries are low. 2) the factories are most probably in china already and 3) it is much easier to sell products "made in china" to the chinese market, especially when dealing with government companies.
They import a lot of people since as a developing country (like China) it's far easier to import talent than to structure your education system to be more about students creating presentations and reports and whatnot.
I think Feynman wrote about that once, about how abroad in developing nations typically physics students would have absolutely memorized laws and formula, but when the question was rephrased in a way where a practical situation was given the law could not be named because rote memorization was prioritized above all else.
I may be totally wrong here but I seem to remember a great deal of people talking about it when a grad student was grading a Chinese girl's paper that was almost entirely plagiarized. I'd love to know more on this subject from someone who actually knows more about it if anyone has linkies.
They import a lot of people since as a developing country (like China) it's far easier to import talent than to structure your education system to be more about students creating presentations and reports and whatnot.
I think Feynman wrote about that once, about how abroad in developing nations typically physics students would have absolutely memorized laws and formula, but when the question was rephrased in a way where a practical situation was given the law could not be named because rote memorization was prioritized above all else.
I may be totally wrong here but I seem to remember a great deal of people talking about it when a grad student was grading a Chinese girl's paper that was almost entirely plagiarized. I'd love to know more on this subject from someone who actually knows more about it if anyone has linkies.
The trouble is that these are all anecdotes supporting a popular and prevalent idea. That's the most likely combination to be absolute rubbish. Some non-anecdotal data, or at least some anecdotes that don't support a cliche of Chinese commiebots, would be much more persuasive.
The idea that Chinese people don't care about IP laws because of their religious background is simple Orientalism, in my view.
I think Chinese people don't care about IP laws because that IP isn't owned by Chinese people. If China had a better level of technological innovation, I'm 100% sure that IP would start being respected, and given the state's attitude to law-breaking, enforcement would be even more draconian than in the US.
I don't think that many people anywhere respect IP law. It's enforced, and some people are principled about it, but companies still feel the need to put comedy warnings on our DVDs and so on. I suppose we are often proud of the famous inventors in our societies, and vaguely connect the idea of respect for innovation with modern property theft issues. So a historical or modern tendency towards technological innovation=good IP law.
A more interesting question might be - why don't Chinese people have that much invention? And if your answer is 'Chinese people are culturally not creative' then you should stop and read some books.
You don't need to go to Orientalism to explain this - I'm with Brother Occam and Dr Said on this.
If I had to guess, I would said it has more to do with the cost of our IP compared to what most Chinese earn. American cultural output is highly desired pretty much everywhere, but I can see how it would be an unwieldy expense to a lot of Chinese.
The problem is that things like ipods just don't get developed without patent laws and copywrites. For the time being they're not something that you can make a cheap knockoff of effectively (really, chinese or American or Euro or whatever knockoffs of popular name brand electronics are never of the same quality), who knows how that will change
There's a good point here - without good IP laws or culture, regardless of the reason for the lack, China will never attract international investment or talent for technological development. Innovate within China? Boom someone will nick it.
It's a little bit of a Catch 22.
A lot of foreign technology companies already have extensive RND in china. There are at least three reasons for this: 1) salaries are low. 2) the factories are most probably in china already and 3) it is much easier to sell products "made in china" to the chinese market, especially when dealing with government companies.
That's really interesting. Does their work end up being sold abroad? And I wonder if their IP is more respected than that of western companies.
The idea that Chinese people don't care about IP laws because of their religious background is simple Orientalism, in my view.
I think Chinese people don't care about IP laws because that IP isn't owned by Chinese people. If China had a better level of technological innovation, I'm 100% sure that IP would start being respected, and given the state's attitude to law-breaking, enforcement would be even more draconian than in the US.
I don't think that many people anywhere respect IP law. It's enforced, and some people are principled about it, but companies still feel the need to put comedy warnings on our DVDs and so on. I suppose we are often proud of the famous inventors in our societies, and vaguely connect the idea of respect for innovation with modern property theft issues. So a historical or modern tendency towards technological innovation=good IP law.
A more interesting question might be - why don't Chinese people have that much invention? And if your answer is 'Chinese people are culturally not creative' then you should stop and read some books.
You don't need to go to Orientalism to explain this - I'm with Brother Occam and Dr Said on this.
Speaking historically, poorer, developing countries tend to give zero fucks about copyright law. The U.S. didn't respect British copyrights for a long time either. Doesn't make it right, but it's generally what happens.
FPA20111 on
The paranoid man believes that everyone is out to get him. The intelligent man knows that everyone is out to get him.
The alternative is to suggest that they will do something entirely new in human history. This is not unreasonable, but needs a hell of a lot more evidence than has been presented in this thread.
No, the alternative is to suggest that they will do something which is entirely congruous with their history and cultural outlook, but incongruous with ours...except we don't understand theirs. Therefore people come out with hyperbolic statements like "something entirely new in human history", when actually what they mean is "something entirely new in what I know of human history", said "what I know" provision being somewhat more limited by a Western-centric education that we are willing to admit.
I'm hardly an anti-Western cultural apologist for colonialism, but even a small amount of travel and an open mind will teach you that we (Europe, US) are relentlessly West-centric in how we view the world, often without even realising it, and a lot more shit goes on out there than will be found in A Complete History of Europe and the Americas (And The People They Conquered For A Bit).
Many of the spurious arguments about "music should be free", "information wants to be free" and the popularity of open-source principles on the web are only a short hop and a skip away from the Chinese mentality.
The difference between the mentality that produces the statement that "information wants to be free" and the principles behind open source and that "music should be free" (or that someone should be allowed to "borrow" a trademark) are vast. The first is based in a social obligation to contribute not less than you take, and the second in thinking that somehow you're special and the only the rules you like apply to you. That is to say, it takes either balls or crazy (or both) to be Richard Stallman, it takes humanity to be the MPAA (and, that neither is terribly original).
The differences are only vast if you take a reductive view of the statements and only consider what was meant by the originator. But applying 60's (actually, earlier) hippy culture to "music should be free" or value of information arguments to "information wants to be free" isn't the story. Most teenagers today using the first sentiment mean "I want free stuff". Many public / private arguments using the second mean "information should be openly available to whoever wants it" rather than making a value point. They have been appropriated wholesale by a strain of internet culture which claims them as part of the whole open-source, WikiLeaks, freedom of information is a public good / right piece. The original quote or sentiment has evolved. Which is my point: what can be seen from one viewpoint as a self-serving movement to get stuff for free is creating its own cultural / moral framework for being something more. Equally, you will find some people (not me) who argue that the cultural / moral framework justifies people getting things for free, even though it be breaking the law.
Things don't fit quite so neatly into the boxes you want them to. Culture affects law, behaviour and rationalism as well as the reverse.
This theory that Confucianism somehow doesn't allow for IP laws seems a little absurd right off the bat. The justification for IP regulations in the West is based on 2 things: First (the moral high ground option),
...and there we go with relating this immediately to the West again. In the last page of this thread I scanned, I haven't seen one person argue from actual evidence, but simply saying "I don't think that's the reason". So here's the original piece I took it from as promised, you know, as evidence to support my point. Note that this person actually researches in this area! Note also that I published several links on the previous page which supported this idea, which nobody has actually tried to refute with any counter-evidence. In other words, show me the money, or accept that you are simply opining about something you can't back up.
In contrast to individualism in the West, collectivism – a traditional and socialist value – substantially influences the cultural, social and legal areas in China. Collectivism has a long tradition based on Confucianism, which prioritizes the needs of the group over the rights of individuals. Historically, there was little protection of individual rights, especially in the intellectual property field. Copying and sharing created works without any compensation was widely accepted in traditional China.
Judging from the last page, if it is honestly this hard for even the young, liberal, go-getter intellectual types to even consider that non-Western cultures may not ultimately behave like Western ones, then the lecturer in the original video was right - we really are fucked for the future.
Personally, I feel like China will go down that road. It may take a long time, but I feel like once the average Chinese citizen (read: more than <30% of the population) becomes self-sufficient and empowered, they'll want the full package of westernization -- economic and cultural, not just $200/mo menial labor jobs. You already see the Chinese falling into their own trap of meteoric growth; they haven't had to reform their institutions much because everything was "growing around them," as Zakaria puts it. Eventually, though, all this growth is going to catch up with them, and they're going to need to actually do some development.
The problem with this thinking is that it naively assumes they're thinking in Western terms. We made the same predictions about Russia following the collapse of the Soviet Union and what happened? Did they join the EU? Did they become a liberal democracy? Far from it, they're already back to embracing authoritarian leadership.
Even Japan which has long been celebrated as a successfully Westernized Asian nation still doesn't follow democracy as we understand it and the Chinese especially see their government as a patriarchal component of their society. They weren't socially or culturally conditioned over the generations to distrust their government or to critically challenge their own sense of nationalism or ethnic superiority.
Assuming we can just let the free market take the wheel and that it'll eventually steer China into being our Westernized pals is at best wishful thinking. You say it'll take a long time for them to come around but how long? And what happens until then? While you're waiting for them to play ball, the nature of the game may already be changing.
I was under the impression that it was because chinese secondary education was focused on copying and memorizing works rather than creating works
As already noted, western education, particularly in primary school, has a lot of emphasis on rote memorization rather than anything "creative"--more so than the much smaller education system of the United States, China's varies greatly from city to city.
My first exposure to American education, in Virginia in the early 1990s, in primary school consisted of reading books and memorizing the important parts of the content, and very little interpretation--that was left to the teachers. It was called "learning".
Which is not to say Chinese education doesn't greatly emphasize memorization in its techniques, it does, and the limitations faced by some schools further emphasize it. The fact that this also happens in the United States, to varying degrees, is something Americans don't like to admit--but they're fine with students having mountains of home work and studies which basically imitates rote memorization--read this, remember it long enough to copy it down, repeat--just as home. Then again, the quantity of busy home work American students have compared to other parts of the world has declined from its high about 20 years ago.
As for the iPod analogy--my mind inevitably thinks of all the Sandisk, D-Link, and Creative MP3 players and devices that preceeded the iPod for years (I owned one, probabyl why). You might not have an iPod without patent laws, as was said, but I think you'd still have MP3 players, closely ripping eachother off and forcing eachother to be cheaper and more pleasing to the consumer, instead of a single apparent juggernaut. Nevermind that a bunch of these were produced in China anyway.
I was under the impression that it was because chinese secondary education was focused on copying and memorizing works rather than creating works
As already noted, western education, particularly in primary school, has a lot of emphasis on rote memorization rather than anything "creative"--more so than the much smaller education system of the United States, China's varies greatly from city to city.
My first exposure to American education, in Virginia in the early 1990s, in primary school consisted of reading books and memorizing the important parts of the content, and very little interpretation--that was left to the teachers. It was called "learning".
Which is not to say Chinese education doesn't greatly emphasize memorization in its techniques, it does, and the limitations faced by some schools further emphasize it. The fact that this also happens in the United States, to varying degrees, is something Americans don't like to admit--but they're fine with students having mountains of home work and studies which basically imitates rote memorization--read this, remember it long enough to copy it down, repeat--just as home. Then again, the quantity of busy home work American students have compared to other parts of the world has declined from its high about 20 years ago.
As for the iPod analogy--my mind inevitably thinks of all the Sandisk, D-Link, and Creative MP3 players and devices that preceeded the iPod for years (I owned one, probabyl why). You might not have an iPod without patent laws, as was said, but I think you'd still have MP3 players, closely ripping eachother off and forcing eachother to be cheaper and more pleasing to the consumer, instead of a single apparent juggernaut. Nevermind that a bunch of these were produced in China anyway.
I know that Virginia is barely in the south, but still, the south.
I was under the impression that it was because chinese secondary education was focused on copying and memorizing works rather than creating works
As already noted, western education, particularly in primary school, has a lot of emphasis on rote memorization rather than anything "creative"--more so than the much smaller education system of the United States, China's varies greatly from city to city.
My first exposure to American education, in Virginia in the early 1990s, in primary school consisted of reading books and memorizing the important parts of the content, and very little interpretation--that was left to the teachers. It was called "learning".
Which is not to say Chinese education doesn't greatly emphasize memorization in its techniques, it does, and the limitations faced by some schools further emphasize it. The fact that this also happens in the United States, to varying degrees, is something Americans don't like to admit--but they're fine with students having mountains of home work and studies which basically imitates rote memorization--read this, remember it long enough to copy it down, repeat--just as home. Then again, the quantity of busy home work American students have compared to other parts of the world has declined from its high about 20 years ago.
As for the iPod analogy--my mind inevitably thinks of all the Sandisk, D-Link, and Creative MP3 players and devices that preceeded the iPod for years (I owned one, probabyl why). You might not have an iPod without patent laws, as was said, but I think you'd still have MP3 players, closely ripping eachother off and forcing eachother to be cheaper and more pleasing to the consumer, instead of a single apparent juggernaut. Nevermind that a bunch of these were produced in China anyway.
I know that Virginia is barely in the south, but still, the south.
Um yeah...this is true of primary education everywhere. Suzie Q isn't going to learn how to read or do math without a significant amount of teacher guidance and memorization.
As I've gotten into grad school, the difference between American and Chinese (as in they did their undergrad in China and are now here for grad school) students has become more apparent and the differences are in line with what people are saying here. That said, there is a significant amount of post-doc original research occuring in Chinese universities in my field (EE) - though everything that gets translated and published in American journals seems to be directly sponsored by US corporations.
I was under the impression that it was because chinese secondary education was focused on copying and memorizing works rather than creating works
As already noted, western education, particularly in primary school, has a lot of emphasis on rote memorization rather than anything "creative"--more so than the much smaller education system of the United States, China's varies greatly from city to city.
My first exposure to American education, in Virginia in the early 1990s, in primary school consisted of reading books and memorizing the important parts of the content, and very little interpretation--that was left to the teachers. It was called "learning".
Which is not to say Chinese education doesn't greatly emphasize memorization in its techniques, it does, and the limitations faced by some schools further emphasize it. The fact that this also happens in the United States, to varying degrees, is something Americans don't like to admit--but they're fine with students having mountains of home work and studies which basically imitates rote memorization--read this, remember it long enough to copy it down, repeat--just as home. Then again, the quantity of busy home work American students have compared to other parts of the world has declined from its high about 20 years ago.
As for the iPod analogy--my mind inevitably thinks of all the Sandisk, D-Link, and Creative MP3 players and devices that preceeded the iPod for years (I owned one, probabyl why). You might not have an iPod without patent laws, as was said, but I think you'd still have MP3 players, closely ripping eachother off and forcing eachother to be cheaper and more pleasing to the consumer, instead of a single apparent juggernaut. Nevermind that a bunch of these were produced in China anyway.
I know that Virginia is barely in the south, but still, the south.
Um yeah...this is true of primary education everywhere. Suzie Q isn't going to learn how to read or do math without a significant amount of teacher guidance and memorization.
As I've gotten into grad school, the difference between American and Chinese (as in they did their undergrad in China and are now here for grad school) students has become more apparent and the differences are in line with what people are saying here. That said, there is a significant amount of post-doc original research occuring in Chinese universities in my field (EE) - though everything that gets translated and published in American journals seems to be directly sponsored by US corporations.
A good friend of mine in the local grad department is Chinese, and got her BA there (Nanjing, maybe? I really need to pay better attention), and has the unfortunate stigma that professors automatically assume she's incapable of creativity...or more accurately, original analysis. She is (not necessarily well, but many of her American counterparts aren't good at it either). That stigma by itself can be pretty damning in academics, regardless of basis in reality, since a lot of importance is, unfortunately, placed on appearances.
Besides...."the South" is just an admission that a very large region, and its body of students, are facing this issue. Assuming it's limited to "the South", which I suspect it isn't in many respects.
The trouble is that these are all anecdotes supporting a popular and prevalent idea. That's the most likely combination to be absolute rubbish. Some non-anecdotal data, or at least some anecdotes that don't support a cliche of Chinese commiebots, would be much more persuasive.
No one's called them robots. And the Chinese themselves recognize the issue, hence why it's central to almost anything I read about education. Private schools are becoming more prominent but the fact of the matter is, kids spend most of their time doing nothing but taking notes, regurgitating them, and doing a few hours of homework exercises every night. This is not just something I totally heard from this one guy, this is an issue every Chinese teacher I've learned under has discussed and is discussed across their country.
Memorization is a key to primary education. It creates a framework that students can use as a reference point for what they learn later. Having a variety of information from a variety of fields helps students once they begin to think critically and independently. And whether or not you think it's important that you learned that the population of France was about 56 million people back in 1990 (something you most likely would not specifically remember), it helped you retain a general population level and helped anchor your geographical knowledge of France.
I would be incredibly suspect of an educational system that didn't focus on memorization as the first step in an education. That's not to say that constructivist teaching methods are bad (they breed creativity and help with connection building), but they generally take longer than more objectivist methods for simple facts. And elementary school includes a lot of simple facts by necessity.
But I have also heard from ESL teachers and anecdotally from exchange students that an overly heavy focus on memorization - even into secondary and tertiary education - is hurting the Chinese system. But I don't think this by itself is an excuse or cause for disregarding IP rights by itself.
I've met both very creative and very uncritical Chinese students and professors. I've had very creative professors (I would almost argue creative to a fault for one of them). I had a very by-the-book professor who refused to alter his scheduling or assignments, even when they conflict with standards in the field (or maybe that's being creative for adopting an "out-dated, old, crotchety professor only kept on because of tenure" personality?). I also had to work with a very apathetic exchange student who wouldn't (or maybe couldn't) contribute anything unless given clear, concrete goals. But I also ate lunch with a guy intent on designing a program to receive and store a graduate research project's data (...which is not a very exciting lunch conversation topic over multiple days, but was creative).
But I could also pull examples of the same sort for Germans, Italians, Koreans, Americans, Canadians and many other countries if we start just counting students. I guess I am saying applying a broad generalization to an entire nation is probably not a good idea (particularly since educational standards and quality in the US alone fluctuate wildly between states and even within states, and that seems to be the main avenue of comparison).
The alternative is to suggest that they will do something entirely new in human history. This is not unreasonable, but needs a hell of a lot more evidence than has been presented in this thread.
No, the alternative is to suggest that they will do something which is entirely congruous with their history and cultural outlook, but incongruous with ours...except we don't understand theirs. Therefore people come out with hyperbolic statements like "something entirely new in human history", when actually what they mean is "something entirely new in what I know of human history", said "what I know" provision being somewhat more limited by a Western-centric education that we are willing to admit.
No, I really do mean within human history. First world nations all have this interesting trend of ignoring IP laws while they were developing, and then gradually switching to enforcing them as they neared parity with the rest of the first world nations. China is quite clearly on that path, going by the very paper that you linked, although they are using their IP laws to help with censorship as well which makes the issue a little harder to seperate.
Many of the spurious arguments about "music should be free", "information wants to be free" and the popularity of open-source principles on the web are only a short hop and a skip away from the Chinese mentality.
The difference between the mentality that produces the statement that "information wants to be free" and the principles behind open source and that "music should be free" (or that someone should be allowed to "borrow" a trademark) are vast. The first is based in a social obligation to contribute not less than you take, and the second in thinking that somehow you're special and the only the rules you like apply to you. That is to say, it takes either balls or crazy (or both) to be Richard Stallman, it takes humanity to be the MPAA (and, that neither is terribly original).
The differences are only vast if you take a reductive view of the statements and only consider what was meant by the originator. But applying 60's (actually, earlier) hippy culture to "music should be free" or value of information arguments to "information wants to be free" isn't the story. Most teenagers today using the first sentiment mean "I want free stuff". Many public / private arguments using the second mean "information should be openly available to whoever wants it" rather than making a value point. They have been appropriated wholesale by a strain of internet culture which claims them as part of the whole open-source, WikiLeaks, freedom of information is a public good / right piece. The original quote or sentiment has evolved.
Curiously enough, what I was talking about was also the open source/hacker/wikileaks versions. Thus the Stallman reference. You are in fact familiar enough with what you're discussing to recognize his name right?
Which is my point: what can be seen from one viewpoint as a self-serving movement to get stuff for free is creating its own cultural / moral framework for being something more. Equally, you will find some people (not me) who argue that the cultural / moral framework justifies people getting things for free, even though it be breaking the law.
Had you paid my post any degree of attention as you replied to it, you would have found relatively substantial mention of just such a theory of when and why work should be shared. I've boled one such bit above, and quoted another below
If instead you meant the argument that IP theft isn't theft when the party you're copying from has already broken the social contract where society lets them have a temporary monopoly on something trivial to reproduce so that they'll keep doing that then you're just talking about the other side of IP law
This theory that Confucianism somehow doesn't allow for IP laws seems a little absurd right off the bat. The justification for IP regulations in the West is based on 2 things: First (the moral high ground option),
...and there we go with relating this immediately to the West again.
You're ignoring the meat of the argument in favor of beating your favorite dead horse (that the cultural differences are so vast that no similarities are possible), still without providing evidence that your claim is true. You're making the extraordinary claim, burden of proof lies on you.
Here's the original piece I took it from as promised, you know, as evidence to support my point. Note that this person actually researches in this area!
Appeals to authority, no matter where it is derived from, are not valid arguments. We'll get to the text of the paper momentarily.
Note also that I published several links on the previous page which supported this idea, which nobody has actually tried to refute with any counter-evidence. In other words, show me the money, or accept that you are simply opining about something you can't back up. Also, other than the one video, I can't seem to find these links that you spoke of. Perhaps you could direct me to a specific post?
I'm first going to cover at least some of my objections to this article, and then I'll move on to commentary on it.
Copying and sharing created works without any compensation was widely accepted in traditional China. Moreover, intellectuals, much esteemed in Chinese society, wanted their work to be copied because the highest form of admiration is in the imitation and recreation of writings, art, or other works.
The author does an ok job of citing his sources ... except here. He also doesn't even discuss that, if they are working in a patronage system, that once the artist hands the work over, he has already made all of his profit from its exclusivity and any further copying is free advertising for him.
With the establishment of Socialist China in 1949, the Chinese government set up a political and legal system based on the Soviet model, which deemed individual property rights to be the antitheses of socialist principles. As China Expert Dr. Robert Weatherley has pointed out, for the sake of maintaining a stable and harmonious community, Chinese citizens are strongly promoted to abandon any rights in favor of the society.[14] IPR, as a form of individual right, is often sacrificed in favor of collective interests. Thus collectivist ideology is bound to erode the foundation of IPR protection. In a word, communal property is a part of Chinese culture that dates from the teaching of Confucianism through the birth of Communism. Questioning the idea of public property and recognizing the importance of private property takes great resources and social will.
Moving from saying (effectively) "the state has a right to take your stuff and redistribute it as we see fit" to "individual people have a right to take your stuff and redistribute it as we see fit" is a hell of leap to make without any intervening steps. That is to say, just because your government has certain powers, doesn't mean your neighbors do.
From the analysis above it is evident that the problematic IPR enforcement in China results from its cultural and political uniqueness.
This statement is based on a bunch of stuff that I agree with (and have more or less already said!) and the two bits that I quoted here as being unsubstantiated hogwash. Not that the problems of enforcing IP regs in China are hardly unique to it (see also: symptomatic of a developing nation).
Judging from the last page, if it is honestly this hard for even the young, liberal, go-getter intellectual types to even consider that non-Western cultures may not ultimately behave like Western ones, then the lecturer in the original video was right - we really are fucked for the future.
In only a quarter century, China has evolved from a country with no IP protection to one with a broad system of IP laws. In only a quarter century, China has evolved from a country with no IP protection to one with a broad system of IP laws
Chinese IP laws (including copyright, trademark and patent law) only provide that the damage awards are based on the losses suffered by the right holders or the profit obtained by the infringers.[7]
Effective on May 30, 2005, the MAPIC provides that an ISP will be liable for administrative penalties if it clearly knows an Internet content provider’s copyright-infringing act through its network or if it fails to remove copyright infringed material upon the request of a copyright holder. [3]
I could find more examples in that text, but those seem sufficient to indicate that China's IP laws strongly resemble a mix of the original American copyright regs and the DMCA.
If you skip the section titled "A. Culture Uniqueness" then mostly what this guy ends up arguing is that China is in a state similar to most Western countries were as they developed. Ignoring IP regs until there is substantial internal benefit to strongly enforcing them (and it even indicates that they are moving towards doing that!)
Or, to quote the article:
As scholars John R. Allison and Lianlian Lin observed, “China has followed the typical pattern of a developing nation by depending heavily on foreign investment and imported technology before being able to generate substantial internal growth and technological advancement on its own.”[19] Due to the lack of technological innovation in China, strict IPR enforcement cannot bring great benefit to current Chinese companies. In contrast, it means many Chinese companies have to pay a large sum of royalties to foreign proprietors, thereby resulting in increasing production costs. Correspondingly, the Chinese government finds neither political will nor domestic pressure to substantially enforce IPR.
If that and the video are what you have for evidence, you need to try harder, and it needs to start with being willing to abandon your claim that China will not follow a general trend already established by other developing nations (assuming that you actually have an interest in having any predictions you make turn out to be correct. If your goal is simply to say something that makes you feel good, then feel free to carry on). I'm more than willing to accept the claim that they won't, if someone will actually provide solid evidence that there is some truth to it. I think its unreasonable to assume that they will be identical to any other country on the face of the planet, because that would also be unprecedented (but, again, if the evidence says otherwise, who am I to argue with reality).
psuedo-edit: Section B Innovation Insufficiency of that paper is more or less the basis for the bit about breaking social contracts that I mention above.
But I could also pull examples of the same sort for Germans, Italians, Koreans, Americans, Canadians and many other countries if we start just counting students. I guess I am saying applying a broad generalization to an entire nation is probably not a good idea (particularly since educational standards and quality in the US alone fluctuate wildly between states and even within states, and that seems to be the main avenue of comparison).
At least where I'm at, the worst folks for doing incredibly boring work (that is, uncreative in the extreme), not to mention the more than occasional cases of one person doing the work for several people, are Americans. I'm not sure I could make an estimate as to which nationality would be next, but I'm willing to bet its a roughly even spread percentage wise, and that the only reason Americans seem to be ahead is because there's a lot more of them here. I can say that if I run into problems when I'm trying to do something, the two guys I go to for some insight are Russia and Taiwan because they have consistently novel approaches (well, as compared to mine anyway), both had their graduate and undergrad time in the US though.
As far as grade school goes, you can safely add New Jersey to the list of places that are heavy on the memorization. Montana as well. Early classes have to be memorization heavy in some respects, and I don't think many schools anywhere have the money to employ people who are good enough to consistently and effectively help students learn through asking questions (no, really, try using the Socratic method to teach a friend something that they don't already know. Its not nearly as straightforward as it might seem).
I was under the impression that it was because chinese secondary education was focused on copying and memorizing works rather than creating works
As already noted, western education, particularly in primary school, has a lot of emphasis on rote memorization rather than anything "creative"--more so than the much smaller education system of the United States, China's varies greatly from city to city.
My first exposure to American education, in Virginia in the early 1990s, in primary school consisted of reading books and memorizing the important parts of the content, and very little interpretation--that was left to the teachers. It was called "learning".
Which is not to say Chinese education doesn't greatly emphasize memorization in its techniques, it does, and the limitations faced by some schools further emphasize it. The fact that this also happens in the United States, to varying degrees, is something Americans don't like to admit--but they're fine with students having mountains of home work and studies which basically imitates rote memorization--read this, remember it long enough to copy it down, repeat--just as home. Then again, the quantity of busy home work American students have compared to other parts of the world has declined from its high about 20 years ago.
As for the iPod analogy--my mind inevitably thinks of all the Sandisk, D-Link, and Creative MP3 players and devices that preceeded the iPod for years (I owned one, probabyl why). You might not have an iPod without patent laws, as was said, but I think you'd still have MP3 players, closely ripping eachother off and forcing eachother to be cheaper and more pleasing to the consumer, instead of a single apparent juggernaut. Nevermind that a bunch of these were produced in China anyway.
I know that Virginia is barely in the south, but still, the south.
Is this a jab at students in the south, or the schools? Because while living in Tennessee I've seen a lot of very intelligent kids being taken up by very upscale colleges/ academies.
No, I really do mean within human history. First world nations all have this interesting trend of ignoring IP laws while they were developing, and then gradually switching to enforcing them as they neared parity with the rest of the first world nations. China is quite clearly on that path, going by the very paper that you linked, although they are using their IP laws to help with censorship as well which makes the issue a little harder to seperate.
What a load of meaningless wank. IP law has only existed in any meaningful form since the late 18th - early 19th century. At that time, with the exception of possibly Japan and South Korea, all the first world nations were either exactly the same first world nations as today (Europe), or were colonial owners of the other modern first world nations (US, Australasia). In other words, of course first world nations displayed a trend of ignoring IP law while they were developing, because it didn't exist while they were developing.
As for those two exceptions:
Japan didn't start on the kind of development path you're talking about until the Meiji Restoration in the mid-19th century, and 20 years later they introduced their first IP laws. In other words, becoming a developing nation and IP were almost simultaneous in historical terms, contrary to your claim.
South Korea looks more amenable to your claim on the surface, as serious IP laws and protection are only a few decades old, but that has been based more on pressure from the United States to protect US IP, rather than internal pressure from South Korea to protect their own now that they are a developed nation. Indeed, piracy is still a massive issue in S Korea, despite strong laws.
Some facts, please, to back up your increasingly thin argument.
The differences are only vast if you take a reductive view of the statements and only consider what was meant by the originator. But applying 60's (actually, earlier) hippy culture to "music should be free" or value of information arguments to "information wants to be free" isn't the story. Most teenagers today using the first sentiment mean "I want free stuff". Many public / private arguments using the second mean "information should be openly available to whoever wants it" rather than making a value point. They have been appropriated wholesale by a strain of internet culture which claims them as part of the whole open-source, WikiLeaks, freedom of information is a public good / right piece. The original quote or sentiment has evolved.
Curiously enough, what I was talking about was also the open source/hacker/wikileaks versions. Thus the Stallman reference. You are in fact familiar enough with what you're discussing to recognize his name right?
Curiously enough, if you read what I said in reply to your Stallman reference (I've highlighted it for you as well, for good measure) you might realise that I said it doesn't always matter what the original author meant, because ideas are appropriated and change meaning. For the purposes of my argument it doesn't matter that the original Stewart Brand / Richard Stallman / [whichever chemically altered hippy first came up with "music should be free"] quote meanings are miles apart, because I'm talking about people who use them today as analogous ideas.
This theory that Confucianism somehow doesn't allow for IP laws seems a little absurd right off the bat. The justification for IP regulations in the West is based on 2 things: First (the moral high ground option),
...and there we go with relating this immediately to the West again.
You're ignoring the meat of the argument in favor of beating your favorite dead horse (that the cultural differences are so vast that no similarities are possible), still without providing evidence that your claim is true. You're making the extraordinary claim, burden of proof lies on you.
1. Er, evidence and link was provided just below that line...
2. ...unlike your first un-evidenced claim in this post, by the way. Awesome.
Here's the original piece I took it from as promised, you know, as evidence to support my point. Note that this person actually researches in this area!
Appeals to authority, no matter where it is derived from, are not valid arguments. We'll get to the text of the paper momentarily.
3. Note ignoring where I provided aformentioned evidence. Also, appeals to authority are not a valid argument, but using facts or evidence drawn from credible sources to support an argument is a-okay. If you really think this is an appeal to authority, then I suggest you go patrol the rest of this forum and complain at anyone who posts a link as part of a discussion.
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As for the rest of it, I can't be bothered to sort it out because you seem to using quotations from the stuff I posted which contradict what you are saying, but claiming they support it, such as:
As scholars John R. Allison and Lianlian Lin observed, “China has followed the typical pattern of a developing nation by depending heavily on foreign investment and imported technology before being able to generate substantial internal growth and technological advancement on its own.”[19] Due to the lack of technological innovation in China, strict IPR enforcement cannot bring great benefit to current Chinese companies. In contrast, it means many Chinese companies have to pay a large sum of royalties to foreign proprietors, thereby resulting in increasing production costs. Correspondingly, the Chinese government finds neither political will nor domestic pressure to substantially enforce IPR.
Despite having the words "developing country" in, that doesn't remotely support your argument. Yes, they may be updating IP law. But it explicitly states that there is weak demand for it, weak takeup, and the pressure is coming from foreign investment sources, not internally. In other words: the West is pressuring China to adopt Western IP law to protect Western IP, not that it is coming from a natural culture change.
If that and the video are what you have for evidence, you need to try harder
Not really. Looking back over the past two pages, I count 7 linked documentsorarticles I've given to support my arguments. You, on the other hand, have...0. Which suggests you need to try harder.
But, you are saying what is commonly accepted wisdom, so that's okay then! Wait - is that an appeal to authority? Help!
TL;DR part 2: The question "what standard of proof will be sufficient for demonstrating to you that your argument is incorrect?" is a useful one to consider before entering a discussion because it informs if the discussion is possible in that arena (for example, if the discussion is around the existence of God, then asking that question of a religious person will likely tell you that the standard of proof is not possible (that is, faith exists outside of proof by definition)).
If that and the video are what you have for evidence, you need to try harder
Not really. Looking back over the past two pages, I count 7 linked documentsorarticles I've given to support my arguments. You, on the other hand, have...0. Which suggests you need to try harder.
Now, now, lets be fair and counts ones that I haven't cited and weren't in the post I'm replying to. That brings us to 4. Lets also take a look at each of them, and see what we see shall we? http://www.mac.doc.gov/China/Docs/BusinessGuides/IntellectualPropertyRights.htm - document produced by a US government agency outlining what protections IP has in china and how they're implemented. Indicates protection is not up to current US standards, but is likely on par or ahead of those from when the film industry decided to move to California to avoid licensing several patents. http://www.cio.com/article/24969/Understanding_Chinese_Attitudes_Towards_Intellectual_Property_IP_Rights - On the upside, it actually does support your point. On the downside, it is entirely based on claims supported by data that is not provided (ie: same issue I had with the one section from the previous paper I quoted). It doesn't matter how much you agree with the claim, if the data to back it up is not present, the claim is worthless (before you start in on that, do recall that so far 2 out of 3 of your links are supporting a side other than yours, particularly if you remove the bits that have no foundation in presented data or at least citiations). Assuming that we believe it to be true though, the previous source had IP enforcement in China starting not later than 1984, and this source has the US trying to get China to implement them starting w/ Bush Sr (basically, 5 or so years later). http://ipdragon.blogspot.com/ - First, you're using a blogsplot url as a source? Really? Ok, I'll play along. At least some of the posts on the blog are actually quite good at citing sources and quoting from them to back up the argument, but since you linked the entire blog and not a particular post I'm having to guess that you meant the 3 part series on Chinese IP (as opposed to the current thing on how Australian/Chinese trademark treaties interact with Australian law), because it most closely relates. That 3 parter covers sound strategies that would apply anywhere in the world (namely, if you're giving someone a license to use a patent/trademark/other information, make sure to specify what exact uses are allowed). http://www.ia-centre.org.uk/news_and_events/blog/viewer.cfm?intBlogID=12 - I haven't found a source for any of their claims which really do need data to back them up, but I did find this gem
The FT (Thursday 3rd July) reports that more companies are filing for patents in China and suing to enforce rights there than anywhere else in the world. The FT believes that this highlights a new Chinese attitude to Intellectual Property. SIPO the Chinese State Intellectual Property Office received nearly 700,000 patent applications last year which outs it way ahead of the US and Japan which received under 500,000 domestic filings each. With 4,000 patent law suits a year Chinese patent holders are more litigious than Americans who have been filing fewer than 3,000 patent law suits a year.
I honestly do not understand why you would link this, as it appears to be directly counter to your claim.
After the Meiji Restoration of 1868, imperial rule returned to Japan and the modernization of the country began. In 1871 an experimental patent system was implemented that only lasted a few years, but was a promising beginning.
Finally, on April 18, 1885, The Patent Monopoly Act was adapted from French Patent Law – April 18 continues to be known as “Invention Day” in Japan. The Patent Act was replaced by the Patent Law of 1899, which was revised in 1909, 1921 and 1959.
It would appear that their first patent system didn't last all that long, and that from the Meiji Restoration to the Patent Monopoly Act was nearly 20 years. That's not nearly simultaneous. http://internationalbusiness.wikia.com/wiki/Intellectual_Property_Rights_in_South_KoreaA wiki? Really? I mean, the blog was bad but honestly, this is just impressive. While we're on the subject though, you may want to take a look at how Wikipedia handles citations in its more technical articles as an example of what you should really be looking for. http://www.entrepreneur.com/tradejournals/article/55721901.html - Mentioned as 1 of 2 sources for the preceeding link, seems to be the most likely to be relevant. This limits its coverage specifically to software piracy, where in it is completely correct that the US forced South Korea to implement some changes to its IP laws. It does not make any statements outside of that realm, nor does it appear to discuss anything that may have lead to South Korea having less strong standards than the rest of the world. Reading beyond the first paragraph you will come to this (unsupported) gem
Recently, however, through the development of a domestic software industry, Korea has begun to appreciate the negative effects of piracy. Moreover, the structural economic reforms, resulting from the 1997 financial crisis, will sever the past economic policy that promoted economic development over everything else, including property rights. Although external pressure may lead to some improvement in protecting intellectual property rights, significant long-term change will occur only when the Korean government understands the impact of piracy on its own economy.
That is from what passes for closing notes on the articles coverage of South Korean IP regs, and is exactly my claim. IP enforcement will happen when the country sees a benefit to itself.
Piracy may have assisted Korea in its modernization by gaining access to cheap technology, but, in order to join the ranks of the advanced countries, and to be a creator and producer of high-tech products, Korea must abide by international intellectual property laws. Korea's technological capacity will grow as its economy develops.(245) Eventually, Korea will reach a threshold where "protecting ideas yields a greater benefit than infringing upon others,"(246) and pirating will no longer be beneficial but could potentially weaken Korea's domestic technological capability.(247)
Same claim, but now he's citing something unknown because the paper seems to be chopped off in the mid 80s of the bibliography. Given the rigor going into the paper, I'm willing to take it on faith for now.
So, there we go. Of the links you had posted before I asked you to point them out to me, you have 2 in support (one of which with no data to back up its claims, the other of which doesn't actually attempt to address your claim as to the reason), a couple that are neutral and the rest are claiming that they are strengthening IP laws and that they are being used by their citizens (which is a round about way of saying: my expectations and claims).
Before I even consider answering the rest of your post, let me pose a different question to you Altalicious: what standard of proof will be sufficient for demonstrating to you that your argument is incorrect?
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I think there's a lot of truth behind this--of course, it assumes that China, as it continues to devope, continues to grow economically, continues to industrialize will emulate the United States capitalist rules-of-engagement, which is certainly possible (but by no means guaranteed). Should China continue in this route, then yes, both the citizenry and the government will change their view of things like patent law over time.
It's probably hard to apply, but if anything, Confucianism rather jealously guards things that would be construed as intellectual property (though back then, it'd only be applicable to books, and authors were paid by very different methods in Confucius' time). COnfucianism is far less concerned with compassion and egalitarianism than Buddhism, and far more on obeying the obligations and rules of your station within society. Not really something that would promote ignoring the perceptions of intellectual property, particularly in a society that recognized them.
Er, which is basically the same argument as the original video aimed to debunk, namely "they'll become more like us as they develop". To which I say: not necessarily.
I would also suggest that your parallel of the similarities of IP problems around the world misses the point that cultural trends elsewhere ((i.e. with upper middle class American teenagers) also are based on a version of "IP theft isn't theft". Many of the spurious arguments about "music should be free", "information wants to be free" and the popularity of open-source principles on the web are only a short hop and a skip away from the Chinese mentality. Sure, plenty in the West use them as self-justification for going against what cultural norms tell us to do (i.e. do not steal), but there is a definite and growing subset of people who genuinely believe in this stuff...they are creating their own cultural norms which justify it. In the West, however, as you point out they may not fully realise the consequences, and may well be normalised into "do not steal" later on when they see it as affecting them more.
What happens if that particular cultural bias doesn't exist? There is nothing for them to normalise into. Apparently they will all become social democrats by Pacific osmosis...
PS
As so often with these things, five seconds of Google produces some answers: Yes, there is a historical / cultural bias against IP, and Chinese IP law is still in total infancy, in some cases being less than 20 years old, but there are also extensive efforts to change this from both the Chinese government and Chinese companies, so Syrdon may well be proven right in the long run. Guess we'll have to wait and see!
This theory that Confucianism somehow doesn't allow for IP laws seems a little absurd right off the bat. The justification for IP regulations in the West is based on 2 things: First (the moral high ground option), that there is an overwhelming public good in the public having unrestricted access to new developments in any field, which needs to be balanced by some sort of incentive for people to actually create things (note that incentive doesn't have to be monetary, in at least some cases recognition is enough, same is true of tit for tat type of exchange like many of the free software licenses). Second, straight up greed. Someone has a thing other people want enough to pay money for it but is easily copied, so they lobby for laws to protect their right to be the sole provider of that thing (I would argue that is your organization ends in Of America, you're likely in this category, but that's another thread).
The first of those theories gives you the basic copyright and patent system that large portions of the West started with, and is consistent with what I know of Confucianism. The second gives you the crazier bits of IP law that we've started seeing over the last 30-50 years, and is pretty consistent with people being people.
edit: I suppose I should be clear here that since this bit of conversation really started more with trademark infringement than copying information that trademark enforcement is effectively an anti-fraud device (part of what a trademark implies is that you're getting the workmanship/warranty/internals of a certain entity). Trademark really needs to be separated from the rest of the IP issues because its a whole different can of worms.
I think Chinese people don't care about IP laws because that IP isn't owned by Chinese people. If China had a better level of technological innovation, I'm 100% sure that IP would start being respected, and given the state's attitude to law-breaking, enforcement would be even more draconian than in the US.
I don't think that many people anywhere respect IP law. It's enforced, and some people are principled about it, but companies still feel the need to put comedy warnings on our DVDs and so on. I suppose we are often proud of the famous inventors in our societies, and vaguely connect the idea of respect for innovation with modern property theft issues. So a historical or modern tendency towards technological innovation=good IP law.
A more interesting question might be - why don't Chinese people have that much invention? And if your answer is 'Chinese people are culturally not creative' then you should stop and read some books.
You don't need to go to Orientalism to explain this - I'm with Brother Occam and Dr Said on this.
I don't remember being asked to create very much in my (English) school either. The myth of a lack of Asian creativity is, well, a myth. China (and other parts of the Far East that get hit with that particular canard) have an astonishing wealth of creative output within the arts, but technological innovation has not been their focus. This might be because of governments that valued stability over progress, or any number of reasons, but I don't think some kind of innate lack of creativity, or recent high school policies, are the answer at all.
There's a good point here - without good IP laws or culture, regardless of the reason for the lack, China will never attract international investment or talent for technological development. Innovate within China? Boom someone will nick it.
It's a little bit of a Catch 22.
Compared to the standard Chinese student you likely did. Chinese schools rely heavily on rota memorization and testing to teach students and very little on reports, presentations, projects, questioning students, etc.
Now, this isn't entirely bad either. When class sizes average around 50 students teachers can't really expect to be able to afford the time it takes to go through and examine every student's book report or whatever. And at the same time while students don't entirely understand everything it is they've memorized, it can provide for a phenomenal foundation of knowledge later in their academic careers should they move on to higher learning.
The rest though, I quite agree with. Huge class sizes are sometimes the world you're stuck with and there are very few ways to handle that.
A lot of foreign technology companies already have extensive RND in china. There are at least three reasons for this: 1) salaries are low. 2) the factories are most probably in china already and 3) it is much easier to sell products "made in china" to the chinese market, especially when dealing with government companies.
I think Feynman wrote about that once, about how abroad in developing nations typically physics students would have absolutely memorized laws and formula, but when the question was rephrased in a way where a practical situation was given the law could not be named because rote memorization was prioritized above all else.
I may be totally wrong here but I seem to remember a great deal of people talking about it when a grad student was grading a Chinese girl's paper that was almost entirely plagiarized. I'd love to know more on this subject from someone who actually knows more about it if anyone has linkies.
The trouble is that these are all anecdotes supporting a popular and prevalent idea. That's the most likely combination to be absolute rubbish. Some non-anecdotal data, or at least some anecdotes that don't support a cliche of Chinese commiebots, would be much more persuasive.
If I had to guess, I would said it has more to do with the cost of our IP compared to what most Chinese earn. American cultural output is highly desired pretty much everywhere, but I can see how it would be an unwieldy expense to a lot of Chinese.
That's really interesting. Does their work end up being sold abroad? And I wonder if their IP is more respected than that of western companies.
Speaking historically, poorer, developing countries tend to give zero fucks about copyright law. The U.S. didn't respect British copyrights for a long time either. Doesn't make it right, but it's generally what happens.
No, the alternative is to suggest that they will do something which is entirely congruous with their history and cultural outlook, but incongruous with ours...except we don't understand theirs. Therefore people come out with hyperbolic statements like "something entirely new in human history", when actually what they mean is "something entirely new in what I know of human history", said "what I know" provision being somewhat more limited by a Western-centric education that we are willing to admit.
I'm hardly an anti-Western cultural apologist for colonialism, but even a small amount of travel and an open mind will teach you that we (Europe, US) are relentlessly West-centric in how we view the world, often without even realising it, and a lot more shit goes on out there than will be found in A Complete History of Europe and the Americas (And The People They Conquered For A Bit).
The differences are only vast if you take a reductive view of the statements and only consider what was meant by the originator. But applying 60's (actually, earlier) hippy culture to "music should be free" or value of information arguments to "information wants to be free" isn't the story. Most teenagers today using the first sentiment mean "I want free stuff". Many public / private arguments using the second mean "information should be openly available to whoever wants it" rather than making a value point. They have been appropriated wholesale by a strain of internet culture which claims them as part of the whole open-source, WikiLeaks, freedom of information is a public good / right piece. The original quote or sentiment has evolved. Which is my point: what can be seen from one viewpoint as a self-serving movement to get stuff for free is creating its own cultural / moral framework for being something more. Equally, you will find some people (not me) who argue that the cultural / moral framework justifies people getting things for free, even though it be breaking the law.
Things don't fit quite so neatly into the boxes you want them to. Culture affects law, behaviour and rationalism as well as the reverse.
...and there we go with relating this immediately to the West again. In the last page of this thread I scanned, I haven't seen one person argue from actual evidence, but simply saying "I don't think that's the reason". So here's the original piece I took it from as promised, you know, as evidence to support my point. Note that this person actually researches in this area! Note also that I published several links on the previous page which supported this idea, which nobody has actually tried to refute with any counter-evidence. In other words, show me the money, or accept that you are simply opining about something you can't back up.
From The Impact of ACTA on China’s Intellectual Property Enforcement by Yicun Chen
Judging from the last page, if it is honestly this hard for even the young, liberal, go-getter intellectual types to even consider that non-Western cultures may not ultimately behave like Western ones, then the lecturer in the original video was right - we really are fucked for the future.
The problem with this thinking is that it naively assumes they're thinking in Western terms. We made the same predictions about Russia following the collapse of the Soviet Union and what happened? Did they join the EU? Did they become a liberal democracy? Far from it, they're already back to embracing authoritarian leadership.
Even Japan which has long been celebrated as a successfully Westernized Asian nation still doesn't follow democracy as we understand it and the Chinese especially see their government as a patriarchal component of their society. They weren't socially or culturally conditioned over the generations to distrust their government or to critically challenge their own sense of nationalism or ethnic superiority.
Assuming we can just let the free market take the wheel and that it'll eventually steer China into being our Westernized pals is at best wishful thinking. You say it'll take a long time for them to come around but how long? And what happens until then? While you're waiting for them to play ball, the nature of the game may already be changing.
As already noted, western education, particularly in primary school, has a lot of emphasis on rote memorization rather than anything "creative"--more so than the much smaller education system of the United States, China's varies greatly from city to city.
My first exposure to American education, in Virginia in the early 1990s, in primary school consisted of reading books and memorizing the important parts of the content, and very little interpretation--that was left to the teachers. It was called "learning".
Which is not to say Chinese education doesn't greatly emphasize memorization in its techniques, it does, and the limitations faced by some schools further emphasize it. The fact that this also happens in the United States, to varying degrees, is something Americans don't like to admit--but they're fine with students having mountains of home work and studies which basically imitates rote memorization--read this, remember it long enough to copy it down, repeat--just as home. Then again, the quantity of busy home work American students have compared to other parts of the world has declined from its high about 20 years ago.
As for the iPod analogy--my mind inevitably thinks of all the Sandisk, D-Link, and Creative MP3 players and devices that preceeded the iPod for years (I owned one, probabyl why). You might not have an iPod without patent laws, as was said, but I think you'd still have MP3 players, closely ripping eachother off and forcing eachother to be cheaper and more pleasing to the consumer, instead of a single apparent juggernaut. Nevermind that a bunch of these were produced in China anyway.
I know that Virginia is barely in the south, but still, the south.
Um yeah...this is true of primary education everywhere. Suzie Q isn't going to learn how to read or do math without a significant amount of teacher guidance and memorization.
As I've gotten into grad school, the difference between American and Chinese (as in they did their undergrad in China and are now here for grad school) students has become more apparent and the differences are in line with what people are saying here. That said, there is a significant amount of post-doc original research occuring in Chinese universities in my field (EE) - though everything that gets translated and published in American journals seems to be directly sponsored by US corporations.
A good friend of mine in the local grad department is Chinese, and got her BA there (Nanjing, maybe? I really need to pay better attention), and has the unfortunate stigma that professors automatically assume she's incapable of creativity...or more accurately, original analysis. She is (not necessarily well, but many of her American counterparts aren't good at it either). That stigma by itself can be pretty damning in academics, regardless of basis in reality, since a lot of importance is, unfortunately, placed on appearances.
Besides...."the South" is just an admission that a very large region, and its body of students, are facing this issue. Assuming it's limited to "the South", which I suspect it isn't in many respects.
No one's called them robots. And the Chinese themselves recognize the issue, hence why it's central to almost anything I read about education. Private schools are becoming more prominent but the fact of the matter is, kids spend most of their time doing nothing but taking notes, regurgitating them, and doing a few hours of homework exercises every night. This is not just something I totally heard from this one guy, this is an issue every Chinese teacher I've learned under has discussed and is discussed across their country.
I would be incredibly suspect of an educational system that didn't focus on memorization as the first step in an education. That's not to say that constructivist teaching methods are bad (they breed creativity and help with connection building), but they generally take longer than more objectivist methods for simple facts. And elementary school includes a lot of simple facts by necessity.
But I have also heard from ESL teachers and anecdotally from exchange students that an overly heavy focus on memorization - even into secondary and tertiary education - is hurting the Chinese system. But I don't think this by itself is an excuse or cause for disregarding IP rights by itself.
I've met both very creative and very uncritical Chinese students and professors. I've had very creative professors (I would almost argue creative to a fault for one of them). I had a very by-the-book professor who refused to alter his scheduling or assignments, even when they conflict with standards in the field (or maybe that's being creative for adopting an "out-dated, old, crotchety professor only kept on because of tenure" personality?). I also had to work with a very apathetic exchange student who wouldn't (or maybe couldn't) contribute anything unless given clear, concrete goals. But I also ate lunch with a guy intent on designing a program to receive and store a graduate research project's data (...which is not a very exciting lunch conversation topic over multiple days, but was creative).
But I could also pull examples of the same sort for Germans, Italians, Koreans, Americans, Canadians and many other countries if we start just counting students. I guess I am saying applying a broad generalization to an entire nation is probably not a good idea (particularly since educational standards and quality in the US alone fluctuate wildly between states and even within states, and that seems to be the main avenue of comparison).
As far as grade school goes, you can safely add New Jersey to the list of places that are heavy on the memorization. Montana as well. Early classes have to be memorization heavy in some respects, and I don't think many schools anywhere have the money to employ people who are good enough to consistently and effectively help students learn through asking questions (no, really, try using the Socratic method to teach a friend something that they don't already know. Its not nearly as straightforward as it might seem).
Is this a jab at students in the south, or the schools? Because while living in Tennessee I've seen a lot of very intelligent kids being taken up by very upscale colleges/ academies.
GM: Rusty Chains (DH Ongoing)
What a load of meaningless wank. IP law has only existed in any meaningful form since the late 18th - early 19th century. At that time, with the exception of possibly Japan and South Korea, all the first world nations were either exactly the same first world nations as today (Europe), or were colonial owners of the other modern first world nations (US, Australasia). In other words, of course first world nations displayed a trend of ignoring IP law while they were developing, because it didn't exist while they were developing.
As for those two exceptions:
Japan didn't start on the kind of development path you're talking about until the Meiji Restoration in the mid-19th century, and 20 years later they introduced their first IP laws. In other words, becoming a developing nation and IP were almost simultaneous in historical terms, contrary to your claim.
South Korea looks more amenable to your claim on the surface, as serious IP laws and protection are only a few decades old, but that has been based more on pressure from the United States to protect US IP, rather than internal pressure from South Korea to protect their own now that they are a developed nation. Indeed, piracy is still a massive issue in S Korea, despite strong laws.
Some facts, please, to back up your increasingly thin argument.
Curiously enough, if you read what I said in reply to your Stallman reference (I've highlighted it for you as well, for good measure) you might realise that I said it doesn't always matter what the original author meant, because ideas are appropriated and change meaning. For the purposes of my argument it doesn't matter that the original Stewart Brand / Richard Stallman / [whichever chemically altered hippy first came up with "music should be free"] quote meanings are miles apart, because I'm talking about people who use them today as analogous ideas.
1. Er, evidence and link was provided just below that line...
2. ...unlike your first un-evidenced claim in this post, by the way. Awesome.
3. Note ignoring where I provided aformentioned evidence. Also, appeals to authority are not a valid argument, but using facts or evidence drawn from credible sources to support an argument is a-okay. If you really think this is an appeal to authority, then I suggest you go patrol the rest of this forum and complain at anyone who posts a link as part of a discussion.
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As for the rest of it, I can't be bothered to sort it out because you seem to using quotations from the stuff I posted which contradict what you are saying, but claiming they support it, such as:
Despite having the words "developing country" in, that doesn't remotely support your argument. Yes, they may be updating IP law. But it explicitly states that there is weak demand for it, weak takeup, and the pressure is coming from foreign investment sources, not internally. In other words: the West is pressuring China to adopt Western IP law to protect Western IP, not that it is coming from a natural culture change.
Not really. Looking back over the past two pages, I count 7 linked documents or articles I've given to support my arguments. You, on the other hand, have...0. Which suggests you need to try harder.
But, you are saying what is commonly accepted wisdom, so that's okay then! Wait - is that an appeal to authority? Help!
TL;DR part 2: The question "what standard of proof will be sufficient for demonstrating to you that your argument is incorrect?" is a useful one to consider before entering a discussion because it informs if the discussion is possible in that arena (for example, if the discussion is around the existence of God, then asking that question of a religious person will likely tell you that the standard of proof is not possible (that is, faith exists outside of proof by definition)).
Now, now, lets be fair and counts ones that I haven't cited and weren't in the post I'm replying to. That brings us to 4. Lets also take a look at each of them, and see what we see shall we?
http://www.mac.doc.gov/China/Docs/BusinessGuides/IntellectualPropertyRights.htm - document produced by a US government agency outlining what protections IP has in china and how they're implemented. Indicates protection is not up to current US standards, but is likely on par or ahead of those from when the film industry decided to move to California to avoid licensing several patents.
http://www.cio.com/article/24969/Understanding_Chinese_Attitudes_Towards_Intellectual_Property_IP_Rights - On the upside, it actually does support your point. On the downside, it is entirely based on claims supported by data that is not provided (ie: same issue I had with the one section from the previous paper I quoted). It doesn't matter how much you agree with the claim, if the data to back it up is not present, the claim is worthless (before you start in on that, do recall that so far 2 out of 3 of your links are supporting a side other than yours, particularly if you remove the bits that have no foundation in presented data or at least citiations). Assuming that we believe it to be true though, the previous source had IP enforcement in China starting not later than 1984, and this source has the US trying to get China to implement them starting w/ Bush Sr (basically, 5 or so years later).
http://ipdragon.blogspot.com/ - First, you're using a blogsplot url as a source? Really? Ok, I'll play along. At least some of the posts on the blog are actually quite good at citing sources and quoting from them to back up the argument, but since you linked the entire blog and not a particular post I'm having to guess that you meant the 3 part series on Chinese IP (as opposed to the current thing on how Australian/Chinese trademark treaties interact with Australian law), because it most closely relates. That 3 parter covers sound strategies that would apply anywhere in the world (namely, if you're giving someone a license to use a patent/trademark/other information, make sure to specify what exact uses are allowed).
http://www.ia-centre.org.uk/news_and_events/blog/viewer.cfm?intBlogID=12 - I haven't found a source for any of their claims which really do need data to back them up, but I did find this gem I honestly do not understand why you would link this, as it appears to be directly counter to your claim.
That should cover it for the older links, now the ones from your most recent post:
http://info.articleonepartners.com/blog/bid/56798/International-Patent-History-and-Laws-JapanAgain, data given without citation. But, if we assume it is correct then we do find the following It would appear that their first patent system didn't last all that long, and that from the Meiji Restoration to the Patent Monopoly Act was nearly 20 years. That's not nearly simultaneous.
http://internationalbusiness.wikia.com/wiki/Intellectual_Property_Rights_in_South_KoreaA wiki? Really? I mean, the blog was bad but honestly, this is just impressive. While we're on the subject though, you may want to take a look at how Wikipedia handles citations in its more technical articles as an example of what you should really be looking for.
http://www.entrepreneur.com/tradejournals/article/55721901.html - Mentioned as 1 of 2 sources for the preceeding link, seems to be the most likely to be relevant. This limits its coverage specifically to software piracy, where in it is completely correct that the US forced South Korea to implement some changes to its IP laws. It does not make any statements outside of that realm, nor does it appear to discuss anything that may have lead to South Korea having less strong standards than the rest of the world. Reading beyond the first paragraph you will come to this (unsupported) gem That is from what passes for closing notes on the articles coverage of South Korean IP regs, and is exactly my claim. IP enforcement will happen when the country sees a benefit to itself. Same claim, but now he's citing something unknown because the paper seems to be chopped off in the mid 80s of the bibliography. Given the rigor going into the paper, I'm willing to take it on faith for now.
So, there we go. Of the links you had posted before I asked you to point them out to me, you have 2 in support (one of which with no data to back up its claims, the other of which doesn't actually attempt to address your claim as to the reason), a couple that are neutral and the rest are claiming that they are strengthening IP laws and that they are being used by their citizens (which is a round about way of saying: my expectations and claims).
Before I even consider answering the rest of your post, let me pose a different question to you Altalicious: what standard of proof will be sufficient for demonstrating to you that your argument is incorrect?
edit: added tl;dr