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The Unauthorized State-Owned Chinese Disneyland
rmnoon writes "Apparently Japanese TV and bloggers have just discovered Disney's theme park in China, where young children can be part of the Magic Kingdom and interact with their favorite characters (like Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and the Seven Dwarfs). The park's slogan is 'Because Disneyland is Too Far,' and there's even an Epcot-like dome. The only problem? Disney didn't build it, and they didn't authorize it. What's more? It's state-owned!"
Take that Eisner!
Today, Disney. Tomorrow, GM. Get used to it.
Here's a picture from 10 April. Look at #2.
I've heard the Tiananmen Square Tank-Dodgems are really popular, although I think most children go to see the big cuddly cat, Chairman Meow.
Last time I checked, Snow White and the Seven Dwarves was in Grimm's Fairy Tales, a compilation of European folk stories that existed long before Walt Disney or copyright/trademark laws. As the dad of three, it bugs me more than a little when Disney Inc attempts to own childhood fantasy and retroactively copyright/trademark/turn-into-disney-IP all kinds of things that were part of the childhood psyche-scape long before Uncle Walt was even born.
never ask a question you don't want to know the answer to
In America, Disney owns the government. In Soviet China, the government owns Disney!!!
Or something like that.
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
We do all of the research and development, and they sell it at cost with no reimbursement, thus destroying our system of innovation,
Don't worry, the US did exactly the same thing in its infancy, ignoring European patents & copyrights at the govt level.
As soon as it became in the elite's interests to protect patents, copyright, etc, they were protected - the protections have become stronger & stronger over the years.
The same thing will happen in China. Get over it.
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
Why is Disney now part of the United States? There are more disneylands around the world than here. They sell more worldwide than in the US. They're an international conglomerate that profits people in many, many countries and many areas.
It's like Ikea. Ikea may have started in Finland, but they employ and enrich a heck of a lot of Americans. Toyota might have started in japan, but the US would take quite a hit if they suddenly wholesale pulled out of here.
The world is not a bunch of governments ruling over these little corporations who spread their tentrils forth for the motherland. Companies superceed governments. Sony exists as much in England and Europe as Japan, and does as much R&D around the world as in their original country. Sega was started by an American in Japan, and whose japanese-sounding name is actually an abbreviation for SErvice and GAmes. We think of Burger King as an amercan company because it started here. In Thailand, they think of Burger King as a Thai company, because the people who work there are Thai, the people who eat there are Thai, the people who make the Thai commercials for Burger King are Thai. Any given piece of electronics is likely to have bits designed in the US, EU, China, India, and many other places.
Companies are not part of a government. They are their own entities in a parallel system.
The ______ Agenda
So, I've heard of bootleg DVDs, bootleg CDs, bootleg Rolex watches... but I think this has to be the world's first bootleg amusement park!
OBL has openly written that they are out to destroy our economy. He wants us in the same boat that Russia was. So far, W. is helping him out.
As to China, they are trying to position themselves to own the world economy and then control countries in manners that they see fit(a MUCH larger USA with a nastier attitude). It is not the stealing of ideas that is doing this. It is the fact that they have tied their money to our money at a fixed rate. If it was allowed to float, then it would have increased in a big way by now. Others have dredged up the typical neo-con argument that this helps the economy. And for a short-term, they are correct. But it destroys the manufacturing (read tax) base. Another argument is that China holds a huge amount of our cash. And they will laugh if it falls, so long as they are in control. In the past, America had large natural resources to fall in during those times. Not anymore. What this means is that when China wants to pull the rug on us, they will be in control. And that is going to happen in about another 15 years (or less).
W.'s going to argue about the copyright and patents is almost akin to chargin Charlie Manson with litter AND making a big deal of it. It totally ignores the real problems.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I presume you're talking about "them" calling "us" and saying "we've decided not to buy your government-issued debt anymore." Problem is, what would they invest their 1 trillion in government funds in then? It's not like there are that many - if any - safer alternatives? Euro bonds? Uhhh ... what was that long-term growth rate again? Yen? yeah right, the Chinese? Swiss Francs? Uhh ... sure it's a hard currency, but how much of it can you liquidate when you need to? Dollars are still the best place to park savings.
Also, China exports vast quantities to the US - they'd never cause our economy to "crash" if they could help it. It would create massive social unrest over there (and they can barely keep a cap on what they've got happening even right now). China's going to have many, many significant, huge, social problems in the mid-term. Their "one country, two systems" thing is inherently unstable and will fail. If China ever copies the fine pre-handover Hong Kong example which the British left the world, then move over U.S., because we're going to get trounced. In the meantime, China will simply remain a cheap place to manufacture lower-technology goods. I include computers and HDTVs in the "lower-technology goods" category. They've got far to much to lose to damage us that way.
But one of the above posters is totally correct: The real threat - the one thing that could bring us down - is ourselves. FDR was right about fear. If the US goes down, it'll be because we did it to ourselves.
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for more on this topic, check yesterday's post.
-- Step Up Nihongo (learnjapanese.poddedcell.net)
I don't know what to do when standard anti-socialism and anti-IP /. dogma clash. Who's side are we supposed to be on on this one.
My feeling is that any economy built upon intellectual property is a house of cards. Sooner or later, someone just decides not to play. They simply declare themselves as rich as you are. It's like a bubble market: it only has value as long as everyone buys into the delusion that it has value ... then it goes "pop!".
If a country with all the manufacturing infrastructure and a country with all the legal IP rights to that tech have a conflict, is there really any doubt who wins?
There is nothing legally wrong with the Chinese government doing this; they're a sovereign country, they get to decide how much copyright and trademark law they want to have. Now, the US government can say "poor ol' Disney is suffering, we'd like you to stop this, so let's make a deal". But arguments like "it's not right" aren't going to be very convincing.
They're particularly unconvincing given that, by all rights, Mickey Mouse ought to be in the public domain by now. Other nations can have completely reasonable copyright terms and Mickey Mouse would still be in the public domain. It's the US that's unusual and unreasonable by having protected Mickey Mouse for another couple of decades through the Sonny Bono copyright extension act.
The public domain and limited copyright terms, two basic American rights, have been under attack in the US for the past century, and they have been replaced, effectively, with unlimited ownership of intellectual property. That's the real problem we need to address because that's what's really un-American.
Oh no, we mustn't get over it. Sackcloth and ashes everyone!
It's very important that we complain and moan about China, because we need someone to blame for the coming fall in living standards in the US. We also need to be painfully aware and forever complaining about other people's social problems so that we can be in continual denial about the ones that exist at our own doorstep.
It's in our local elitist's interests that we are unaware of the problems that they cause.
Do it yourself, because no one else will do it yourself. [beta blockade 10-17 Feb]
The Shijinshan Amusement Park was built more than 20 years ago. Not sure if the PRC has established diplomatic ties with USA yet, yet alone intellectual property treaties. Also, twenty years ago there was practically not such thing as "intellectual property" in China (ah, the good old days). There was a very famous brand of candy from Shanghai named "Mickymouse", with Disney's Mickymouse as its logo. Later, when China opened its market to the West, Disney realized that in China, the "Mickymouse" trademark was legally owned by the candy factory, so it paid big money and brought it back. It was reported in the newspaper that many Chinese children cried that day as their beloved "Mickymouse" candy was no more (oh, the evil Americans)...
When I was living in Taiwan, which isn't China but it's close enough, I encountered this sort of thing constantly. It permeates Chinese culture in ways few can imagine. Hell, I think it's just a fact of life all throughout Asia, it's almost the same in Korea, and common Japan, although it's a little more subtle there. It really is just a way of life.
Some shop opens up somewhere selling a particular kind of desert and becomes successful. Within 6 months there are maybe a dozen to be found within that city. Someone designs a particularly striking advertisement and it's only a matter of time because imitators appear. A news agency updates their look and almost over night everyone else does to.
You see it in small things too. My wife corresponds with an online community of Taiwanese living in the States. She has a blog, as many do. She has a fairly distinctive writing style which suits her personality. Inevitably someone came along and started copying her writing style. It got to a point where this particular girl started writing about the very same things my wife had written about previously.
China adds yet another dimension to this absurdity. Most people there are poor. We hear all this talk about the booming economy, the burgeoning middle class and all that. But the fact is that most Chinese are poor. And I mean living in poverty to a point that the so-called poor in the US haven't experienced. What does this mean? They can't afford all the shiny, impressive and absurdly expensive products made by foreign companies. So what have some enterprising Chinese done? They've made cheap, inexpensive knockoffs. Most are pure garbage, but they cost next to nothing and provide some level of the functionality found in the expensive foreign product. Some people may even be fooled into thinking they've purchased the real thing.
This sort of thing used to really frustrate me. Especially when it affect my work directly. At the time I'd think about how great it was that no one could get away with this sort of thing in the US.
But then I realized two things. First, it does happen in the US. Companies here just happen to be more careful about how they go about it. Look at Hollywood, and worse, look at the game industry. It's only logical that when people see something that has led to success they try to emulate it. The easiest way to enjoy some of that success is to resort to copying.
This leads me to the second thing I realized. I've come to think this is a good thing, within limits of course. There's a point at which a company or an individual has just gone too far and measures need to be taken.
Nevertheless, this sort of thing keeps innovators on their toes. It forces them to be competitive. Like I mentioned earlier, copying is a way of life in Asia. It means that people aren't sitting trying to figure out how to go about suing the offending party. They aren't whining to the government that someone has just ripped them off. Instead, their moving on to something else. In some cases, as it was with us, the frame of mind is one of trying to raise the bar further, to stand out from the imitators.
The other advantage here is that the imitators are slowly improving their own skill sets. They're being exposed to new ideas and learning from them, even if they don't realize it at the time. But it's something, over a long period of time that I believe leads to real progress.
The reality is that in most cases the imitations will never be anywhere near as good as the originals. So the ones actually producing something unique will always have the advantage. So as long as they don't get lazy they should be fine. If their in a situation where they're being seriously threatened by those copying it's almost certain they're doing something wrong.
I'm not suggesting a free-for-all where people can copy with impunity. Patents and copyrights are reasonable to a certain extent. I just feel that in some cases things have gotten out of hand. A real free market shouldn't have the absurd level of protectionism some companies seem to expect.
Top Ten Changes At China's "Disneyland":
10: Every conceivable surface is painted red.
9: Skeletons, vampires, and other scary images replaced with pictures of famous American capitalists.
8: The "Mickey Mouseketeer Club" replaced with "Children Of The Chinese Communist Party"
7: Replaced the cars in "Autopia" with T-72 tanks
6: "Rocketship" ride has been replaced with "Nuclear Missile" ride.
5: Replaced the pirates in "Pirates Of The Caribbean" with American Capitalists.
4: Replaced mechanical puppets in "It's A Small World" with brainwashed dissidents singing at bayonet point.
3: Inserted subliminal propaganda messages into the "Tiki Hut" song.
2: Renamed Disnyland restaurant "Mickey Mao's"
1: Doubled the MSG content of the corndogs.
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Knowing Google's lust for data collection, the Soviet Union is still alive and well inside the psyche of Sergey Brin....
What the hell is futuristic about this? We have been there for a long time!!
Who the hell do you think conquered India? The British? Well, yes, I grant you they were British, but they sure as hell weren't the British Government. It was the British East India Company (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Plassey), who were big enough at the time to make Ford, Coca Cola and Microsoft look like a crocked hat.
Note in the battle mentioned above, John Company fought against the Indian Princes and the French East India Company.
The equivalent today would be Halliburton fighting in Iraq against the Iraquis and Shell.
Modding this up would introduce Americans to a bit of history!!
The reason for their extemely low prices is simple supply and demand. Labor is dead-cheap because there is so much of it. I got a beautiful painting about an hour outside of Guangzhou for about a buck twenty five. The painting is a very large, rougly seven-feet wide one. For the record, the painter was not a slave. It's just that that's the price he can charge, since there were literally thousands of others I could have gone to.
Now, I'm not saying that there isn't any slave labor in China. I have no idea; there probably are some instances of it, just like there probably are instances of it here in the US. But it is simply not what drives their economy. It's not even remotely related to their success as an economy.
Pollution is another matter. I've never been to a traditionally smoggy city in the US (say, Houston or LA) but Guangzhou had a blanket of smog a couple hundred feet above the surface at all times... I can actually remember the air being "heavy." It was a releif to get out to countryside, so we could see the sun again.
groupthink: It's good for self-esteem.