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Media
Information > Media DVD Coverage 
Archive
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DVD NEWS DIGEST
1 -
You Got Served (Special Edition) Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment Last year was a record one for the sale of DVD players, according to the Consumer Electronics Association, with nearly 22 million sold in the United States alone -- a 28% leap over the previous year. And this year is on a pace to break that record. One product that is boosting growth is the portable DVD player. Traveling players come in a variety of screen sizes. Most common are the five-inch models, but over the past few months, more and more seven- and eight-inch players have begun to appear, and there also are 9-12-inch units.
Many vendors of pirated DVDs are illegal immigrants or asylum-seekers who were smuggled into the UK by Chinese gangs, and are forced to sell the counterfeits to repay their debts to the smugglers. The number of pirated DVDs being sold at street markets and online auction sites is rocketing, despite efforts to clamp down on the sources and on ports of arrival. Last year, the number seized grew by nearly four times compared to 2002 - but that is believed to be only a fraction of the number sold. British Customs seized one million pirated DVDs in the past financial year, but analysts believe that between 20 and 100 million such disks were sold in the UK.
China has unveiled a national strategy aimed at beefing up intellectual property rights (IPR) protections even as pirated versions of latest Hollywood blockbusters like 'Troy' and 'Shrek 2' were available in Beijing stores. It normally only takes days for Chinese pirates to get versions of the latest Hollywood releases into the shops despite the repeatedly stated determination of the government to crackdown on the practice. Zhang Qin, deputy commissioner of the State Intellectual Property Office, told the China Daily: "The national IPR strategy will include an educational programme to deepen IPR knowledge among officials of ministerial and provincial levels." The US estimates the value of counterfeit goods in China at $19-24 billion, with losses to US companies exceeding $1.8 billion a year.
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