With World Intellectual Property Day approaching, local software industry groups yesterday kicked off a signature drive to call on the government to take a tougher line on piracy.
"The development of the software industry is key to determining whether Taiwan can successfully transform into a knowledge-based economy," Sung Hong-ti (
BSA, a Washington-based international association representing the world's leading software publishers, yesterday launched a campaign to gather 10,000 signatures by Monday, World IPR Day.
Several local organizations including the Information Service Industry Association of ROC (
The groups want the government to raise the amount it spends on developing the information technology sector to 5 percent of its annual budget within three years, a similar level to other advanced countries such as the US.
They also asked the government to establish a task force to crack down on piracy manned by permanent staff, rather than personnel seconded from other agencies.
They also want the government and companies to introduce software property management systems.
Citing statistics from International Data Corp, David Chang (
However, Chang said, bringing the rate down to Japan's level of 35 percent should be the goal.
Taiwan is now fourth in the software anti-piracy ranking in the Asia-Pacific region, after New Zealand, Japan and Australia. The nation has jumped from No. 7 in 2001, passing South Korea, Singapore and Hong Kong.
Nevertheless, not everyone appreciates these efforts. An annual trade review released early this month by the US government said IPR protection continues to be a serious and contentious issue between the US and Taiwan, as the US International Intellectual Property Alliance estimates that Taiwan's weak IPR protection caused trade losses to the US of at least US$382 million last year, not including losses from business software piracy.
By the end of this month, the US Trade Representative is expected to announce its Special 301 Watch List of IPR violators, on which Taiwan has been placed several times since 1992.
Sung said her group's members sold less software last year, suggesting that the rate probably increased, although figures are not yet available. She suggested this was because the government was inconsistent in clamping down on pirated software, CDs and other products.
Another problem is the difficulty of catching corporate users of pirated software, which accounted for more than 80 percent of the 2,000 copyright violation reports the BSA received last year. Unlike roadside vendors, who are easy to spot, police need to obtain evidence of wrongdoing before investigating companies, Sung said.
As a result, BSA is planning more than 100 forums in the second half of the year to educate companies about piracy, Sung said.
As peer-to-peer file-sharing software, long a convenient way to swap audio and video files, may soon be used to share software, Jeffrey Huang (
Those who want to give their support to the campaign can go to NOVA Computer City's Taipei Main Station outlet to sign the petition, or they can sign up on tw.yahoo.com or www.yam.com.tw during the week.
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