America Provides Thailand High Tech Gear To Combat Disc Piracy

[sriracha john]

A street vendor, hawking pirated software, holds up his wares on the streets. (AP)

Microscope Will Aid Fight Against Piracy of CDs, DVDs in Thailand

Machine can detect unique defects in discs made during manufacturing process

Washington -- A package of optical-disc forensics equipment -- including a microscope, camera and specialized software -- will aid efforts to combat intellectual property piracy in Thailand by enabling authorities to identify compact discs and digital video discs manufactured by specific machines, the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok says.

"It has been all too easy to find pirated discs for sale on the streets of Thailand. With evidence obtained using this microscope, the Royal Thai Police will be able to expand and improve their anti-piracy efforts by targeting the problem at its source -- the pirate disc factories themselves," U.S. Charge d'Affaires Alexander A. Arvizu said in a press release issued by the embassy August 7.

The microscope, manufactured by the U.S. company Technical Instruments, can detect defects on optical discs such as CDs or DVDs made during the manufacturing process. Such defects -- like fingerprints or grooves on a bullet that has been fired -- are unique to each manufacturing machine. As a result, a pirated CD or DVD can be traced back to its original source.

The equipment also includes a high-resolution camera custom-built to enable the examination of optical discs and state-of-the-art imaging software, according to a press release from the International Federation of Phonographic Industries (IFPI), which provided training on use of the equipment. The U.S. Embassy in Bangkok financed the procurement of the package, which is valued at $52,000 ( 2,000,000 Baht ).

The new forensic program "will benefit all industries using optical disc formats in Thailand, including software and gaming companies," IFPI said. "Such developments will also promote and protect the future of Thailand's own legitimate disc manufacturing industry with all the employment and revenue opportunities such a growing sector provides."

According to estimates from the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA), the recording, movie and software industries lost $278 million (10.4 Billion Baht ) in sales in Thailand alone in 2005 due to piracy. Losses have risen over the past few years as CD and DVD use has become more widespread and replication technology has become more advanced. Pirated CDs manufactured in Thailand have been discovered and seized in ports around the world, according to the embassy press release.

IFPI and the Motion Picture Association (MPA) have used forensic technology to detect copyright-infringing disc production in 17 countries since 2000, according to IFPI. Malaysia is the only other country in Asia to have such a capability modeled on the IFPI/MPA process, and use of the technology there has resulted in the filing of criminal cases and license revocations across the country.

- U.S. Department of State press release

Edited August 13, 2006 by sriracha john

[Tippaporn]

Looks like we're ripe for another debate, SJ.

[Sing_Sling]

The real issue here is a matter of sustaining all the values and practices we hold dear in Thailand!

Huh?

No graft in procuring the machine??

USD$52k stays USD$52k???

Don't they know where they are????

Time to pack . . . Thailand is going to the dogs.

[sriracha john]

Looks like we're ripe for another debate, SJ.

happy to be of service...

[TRIPxCORE]

What a crock! Stopping piracy is the top priority? There is nothing else more important than making sure rich companies retain even more money???? The world is controlled by big business folks.

Edited August 13, 2006 by TRIPxCORE

[egeefay]

I don't think the Thai government is that concerned about software piracy....especially if its American companies that are getting the shaft.

A visit to Pantip Plaza should convince any doubters. You can buy almost any pirated PC program (and some for the Mac addict) or the latest DVD movie. I don't think there are many people in Thailand who are buying legitimate copies of movies or programs.

"There are literally dozens of different vendors selling hacked versions of software programs, and even the most up-to-date software is available amazingly quickly. Microsoft Windows XP, for instance, had been available in Panthip some weeks prior even to it's official launch in the USA, let alone in Thailand.

As well as software, pirated versions of all of the top Hollywood movies are also available on DVD or VCD, as are compilation MP3 CD's with around 12 albums on each (right). Each CD/VCD/CDROM costs only around 100-150B, as the intense competition helps to keep the prices low. The DVDs cost around 300B or so, and may or may not have had the regional coding removed.

The Thai government, under pressure from the USA, has periodic crackdowns on Panthip Plaza, but they never seem to last very long. The only lasting effect of the crackdowns seems to be that all the pirated material is no longer kept with the vendor, but is instead in a building down the street and is retrieved when someone makes a purchase."

The new piracy detecting equipment donated by the American Embassy will look nice. But don't ever expect the Thai police to get much use out of it. (Oh, and it probably comes with a nice all expense paid trip to the States so that a Thai official can learn how to use it)

[tourleadersi]

What I love are the posters up in Panthip that say 'The owners of this building do not encourage the sale of pirated goods. If you see this occuring then please call....'! Talk about a token gesture. To say that the Thai Gov is even remotely interested in fighting piracy at this time would be a mile off. Sure there may be soem symbolic arrests and drives, but at the end of the day its all back out there within a couple of days.

[Chang_paarp]

OK they have this new toy.

So who is going to train them to use it?

Are the handbooks in Thai? Yes I know many can read English, but this will vastly reduce the pool of people who can use the equipment.

I suppose if they need another one they can take it to Pantip or Zeer and get another one made for a special price.

[Tippaporn]

What a crock! Stopping piracy is the top priority? There is nothing else more important than making sure rich companies retain even more money???? The world is controlled by big business folks.

Agreed, Trip. Although big business has a right to claim their profits IMHO they deserve what they get in response to their overwhelming greed. <deleted> 'em, I say.

[Donz]

I love piracy, who bloody pays $190 AUD for windows XP? Its a rip, i rather pay my 100 baht

I will be a supporter of piraters till the end

[Valjean]

What a crock! Stopping piracy is the top priority? There is nothing else more important than making sure rich companies retain even more money???? The world is controlled by big business folks.

Agreed, Trip. Although big business has a right to claim their profits IMHO they deserve what they get in response to their overwhelming greed. <deleted> 'em, I say.

I won’t bother to debate the justification that it’s OK to take Intellectual Property for free because the people or companies who own it have too much money already.

What I will argue is the contention that the only companies that profit from Intellectual Property are large and not Thai. Entrepreneurs take risks, act on their dreams, invest their time and money because there is a possible large upside reward in doing this. This is the well spring of most innovation; the belief that the market will reward great ideas and hard work. If you have a market that in fact enjoys and embraces these new innovations but does not reward the very people who made it possible then you won’t have individuals and start-ups making it happen – there isn’t an incentive for risk when the outcome is people steal the result of your inspiration and perspiration.

Now the large multi-national IP-based companies; software or pharmaceuticals for instance, of course want to maximize their profits (that is what their shareholders expect and there is a free market system that punishes severely those that don’t) however, the fact is they can afford the levels of piracy in emerging markets such as Thailand because they have the advantage of healthy markets elsewhere.

What lack of respect for IP really hurts is the local Thai economy in developing into a modern information-based economy (this is not unique to Thailand by any means). When the Thai’s realized that lack of enforcement for IP is a critical local issue hurting the Thai economy you’ll see more enforcement. When countries want to foster investment in economic development in knowledge and IP-based industries they start with IP protection because it’s the first step in getting local entrepreneurs and investors to invest in the sector – otherwise the reward to risk equation is out of whack.

Meanwhile the very large multi-nationals you so joyfully deride will have a great business here.

[ovenman]

Washington -- A package of optical-disc forensics equipment -- including a microscope, camera and specialized software -- will aid efforts to combat intellectual property piracy in Thailand by enabling authorities to identify compact discs and digital video discs manufactured by specific machines, the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok says.

...

The microscope, manufactured by the U.S. company Technical Instruments, can detect defects on optical discs such as CDs or DVDs made during the manufacturing process. Such defects -- like fingerprints or grooves on a bullet that has been fired -- are unique to each manufacturing machine. As a result, a pirated CD or DVD can be traced back to its original source.

And then what...? Without knowing where the duplicating machine in question is located, I'm not sure where this information really gets the powers-that-be, although it sure is a nifty way to spend a bunch of baht on nifty overpriced hardware. Plenty of opportunity for all the right pockets to get lined here.

[Donz]

My heart bleeds for the companies making 6 billion a year instead of 10 billion.

[Neeranam]

I suppose if they need another one they can take it to Pantip or Zeer and get another one made for a special price.

Waste of money - they'll never stop piracy.

I don't understand why those nerds at Microsoft can't develop software that can't be copied.

Actually I believe they canm but aren't doing so, YET.

[Donz]

nothing can be piracy proof

[Tippaporn]

I won’t bother to debate the justification that it’s OK to take Intellectual Property for free because the people or companies who own it have too much money already.

What I will argue is the contention that the only companies that profit from Intellectual Property are large and not Thai. Entrepreneurs take risks, act on their dreams, invest their time and money because there is a possible large upside reward in doing this. This is the well spring of most innovation; the belief that the market will reward great ideas and hard work. If you have a market that in fact enjoys and embraces these new innovations but does not reward the very people who made it possible then you won’t have individuals and start-ups making it happen – there isn’t an incentive for risk when the outcome is people steal the result of your inspiration and perspiration.

Now the large multi-national IP-based companies; software or pharmaceuticals for instance, of course want to maximize their profits (that is what their shareholders expect and there is a free market system that punishes severely those that don’t) however, the fact is they can afford the levels of piracy in emerging markets such as Thailand because they have the advantage of healthy markets elsewhere.

What lack of respect for IP really hurts is the local Thai economy in developing into a modern information-based economy (this is not unique to Thailand by any means). When the Thai’s realized that lack of enforcement for IP is a critical local issue hurting the Thai economy you’ll see more enforcement. When countries want to foster investment in economic development in knowledge and IP-based industries they start with IP protection because it’s the first step in getting local entrepreneurs and investors to invest in the sector – otherwise the reward to risk equation is out of whack.

Meanwhile the very large multi-nationals you so joyfully deride will have a great business here.

Yes, yes, all well and good, Valjean. You haven't touched upon the aspect of greed yet, though. Do you support that concept, also?

[Sing_Sling]

valjean, if this were a valid criteria on overseas and corporate investment, how do you then explain the billions flowing into China, the capitol of IP piracy.

As for saying it's a good thing that companies earn 6 billion instead of 10, I guess the re-investment of 4 billion is not at issue here. Copy ahead.

[Donz]

everyone copies stuff off the tv on to video tape once in there lives, thats called piracy too, they make vcr's have a record button so people will copy movies etc.

I recently got a Dvd recorder vcr combo and it tells you in the manual how to record your tapes on to dvd's.

So there bitching about a problem the big companies created.

[Valjean]

I won’t bother to debate the justification that it’s OK to take Intellectual Property for free because the people or companies who own it have too much money already.

What I will argue is the contention that the only companies that profit from Intellectual Property are large and not Thai. Entrepreneurs take risks, act on their dreams, invest their time and money because there is a possible large upside reward in doing this. This is the well spring of most innovation; the belief that the market will reward great ideas and hard work. If you have a market that in fact enjoys and embraces these new innovations but does not reward the very people who made it possible then you won’t have individuals and start-ups making it happen – there isn’t an incentive for risk when the outcome is people steal the result of your inspiration and perspiration.

Now the large multi-national IP-based companies; software or pharmaceuticals for instance, of course want to maximize their profits (that is what their shareholders expect and there is a free market system that punishes severely those that don’t) however, the fact is they can afford the levels of piracy in emerging markets such as Thailand because they have the advantage of healthy markets elsewhere.

What lack of respect for IP really hurts is the local Thai economy in developing into a modern information-based economy (this is not unique to Thailand by any means). When the Thai’s realized that lack of enforcement for IP is a critical local issue hurting the Thai economy you’ll see more enforcement. When countries want to foster investment in economic development in knowledge and IP-based industries they start with IP protection because it’s the first step in getting local entrepreneurs and investors to invest in the sector – otherwise the reward to risk equation is out of whack.

Meanwhile the very large multi-nationals you so joyfully deride will have a great business here.

Yes, yes, all well and good, Valjean. You haven't touched upon the aspect of greed yet, though. Do you support that concept, also?

Sorry to bring a thread back from the dead on Page 3 but got busy and didn’t have time to questions asked of me…

Greed?

Tell me how do you envision this working? If you are worldwide Czar of Greed Mitigation how does the process to identify greed work? Or is this supposed to be self-regulating? Is Julia Roberts getting $15M per movie greed? Should she work for less even if the profits from the IP of her movies makes big profits? Should JK Rollings not ask for movie and book royalties for the next Harry Potter book because she is already a billionaire? How do you measure greed?

I can imagine some scenarios. Let’s say greed = profit above a percent of sales. Say there are two pharmaceutical companies.

Company A has a very innovative research & development process as a result of billions in software and technical development to find new drugs and they are the industry standard for efficient management; production, supply chain, marketing and distribution. Company B has a very labor intensive, outdated research & development process and their management and profitability are poor.

Now let’s say they have similar drugs in the market and Company A is able to sell at 10% less than Company B and make 5 times the profit. Is this greed? Is there a point where you want to punish Company A for their innovation, for their risk and for being good at what they do? And inversely reward Company B? Is this what we want?

There were economic systems intended to regulate greed and have production be for the good of all. They were in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, China and elsewhere and in every case they are a complete and total failure. A free market (with reasonable measures to ensure free and fair; anti-trust, insider training, etc) allows some companies to make huge profits. That’s a good thing and we all by in large benefit from this system.

Perhaps you should reflect a little on the amazing thing the PC and Internet that allow you to post your message and communicate in ways we couldn’t imagine 20 years ago. For the most part this incredible capability has been brought to you by the force of “greed”. By people hoping to get rich – and countless thousands have, by doing something new or something better. And most of this value creation was in intellectual property. Perhaps some is easier to steal some IP more than others but the value IP has brought to your everyday life is huge. And the creators and owners of that IP deserve whatever the market will give them. That “greed” is what fuels innovation.

Do I support the concept of greed? I don’t know I guess that depends on what you’re talking about. Do I support the concept of the profit motive and that companies and individuals should make as much profit within legal and ethical bounds as they can based on their brains and hard work? You bet I do. More power to them.

[Valjean]

valjean, if this were a valid criteria on overseas and corporate investment, how do you then explain the billions flowing into China, the capitol of IP piracy.

As for saying it's a good thing that companies earn 6 billion instead of 10, I guess the re-investment of 4 billion is not at issue here. Copy ahead.

There are a couple factors in this. People write books on this subject and the related ones. But in a few words…

One as I mentioned is that for some companies the R&D and other overhead cost in IP are covered by their developed markets. This enables a situation where high piracy markets can be profitable. The cost to make a movie, a CD or some software is a sunk cost. The cost to “manufacture” copies of that IP is low so the economics can work. So yes your statement is right; some profit is better than none especially when the incremental profits don't bear the full cost of production.

Also companies do think 5-10 years ahead. In 10 years China will be very different in the protection and enforcement of IP. Why? Because they have some very smart leadership who know that their future is IP not cheap manufacturing and at the point in time where their economy is dependent on protecting this home grown IP you can bet they will protect it. You can follow the maturity of economies and the protection of IP and they go hand and hand. Any smart businessman knows you can bet on this trend and if you can sustain a market position in the near team you will be there to profit in the long term.

For many IP based innovations and industry there are network effects that are critical also. Things work together and ecosystems around platforms (a kind of IP) develop. If you wait until the IP situation is right you may very well miss the entire game and new entrants to platforms have a tough time.

There are many other strategies that companies employ to determine what to do in emerging markets and what to do about their IP. For some these strategies play out well and for others they don’t. That’s the game.

[britmaveric]

All show, we all know Thai Govt isnt serious about piracy, so in the end its just a joke.

[Valjean]

everyone copies stuff off the tv on to video tape once in there lives, thats called piracy too, they make vcr's have a record button so people will copy movies etc.

I recently got a Dvd recorder vcr combo and it tells you in the manual how to record your tapes on to dvd's.

So there bitching about a problem the big companies created.

I'm not an expert on this but I do believe there are copyright provisions for copies for personal use. Such as backup or archive. Music I’ve bought online allows making multiple CD. I buy CDs and copy to my PC for either listening from there or making my own mixes on other CDs. Maybe some of this is piracy. Not 100% sure. One thing I think about is that if I can only listen to one instance at a time and no one else is listening to the same music via a different instance at the same time then it seems I haven’t duplicated or copied to get some extra use – I’m just listening to something I bought in different media and situations. I’m not trying to split hair s on this and I’m sure the music industry attorneys and IP experts spend countless hours trying to figure out what is both right for their protection and reasonable expectations from customers given the technology and choices they have. But really I think we all know what is out right theft of IP and what is a reasonably flexible personal use of something we bought.

I would agree in the case of music the industry helped create the problem by not having reasonable and workable legal alternatives. They ignored this until it was out of control.

[Tippaporn]

Sorry to bring a thread back from the dead on Page 3 but got busy and didn’t have time to questions asked of me…

Greed?

Yeah, I guess there is no such thing.

[Donz]

everyone copies stuff off the tv on to video tape once in there lives, thats called piracy too, they make vcr's have a record button so people will copy movies etc.

I recently got a Dvd recorder vcr combo and it tells you in the manual how to record your tapes on to dvd's.

So there bitching about a problem the big companies created.

I'm not an expert on this but I do believe there are copyright provisions for copies for personal use. Such as backup or archive. Music I’ve bought online allows making multiple CD. I buy CDs and copy to my PC for either listening from there or making my own mixes on other CDs. Maybe some of this is piracy. Not 100% sure. One thing I think about is that if I can only listen to one instance at a time and no one else is listening to the same music via a different instance at the same time then it seems I haven’t duplicated or copied to get some extra use – I’m just listening to something I bought in different media and situations. I’m not trying to split hair s on this and I’m sure the music industry attorneys and IP experts spend countless hours trying to figure out what is both right for their protection and reasonable expectations from customers given the technology and choices they have. But really I think we all know what is out right theft of IP and what is a reasonably flexible personal use of something we bought.

I would agree in the case of music the industry helped create the problem by not having reasonable and workable legal alternatives. They ignored this until it was out of control.

Making backups are now against the law also.

[Valjean]

everyone copies stuff off the tv on to video tape once in there lives, thats called piracy too, they make vcr's have a record button so people will copy movies etc.

I recently got a Dvd recorder vcr combo and it tells you in the manual how to record your tapes on to dvd's.

So there bitching about a problem the big companies created.

I'm not an expert on this but I do believe there are copyright provisions for copies for personal use. Such as backup or archive. Music I’ve bought online allows making multiple CD. I buy CDs and copy to my PC for either listening from there or making my own mixes on other CDs. Maybe some of this is piracy. Not 100% sure. One thing I think about is that if I can only listen to one instance at a time and no one else is listening to the same music via a different instance at the same time then it seems I haven’t duplicated or copied to get some extra use – I’m just listening to something I bought in different media and situations. I’m not trying to split hair s on this and I’m sure the music industry attorneys and IP experts spend countless hours trying to figure out what is both right for their protection and reasonable expectations from customers given the technology and choices they have. But really I think we all know what is out right theft of IP and what is a reasonably flexible personal use of something we bought.

I would agree in the case of music the industry helped create the problem by not having reasonable and workable legal alternatives. They ignored this until it was out of control.

Making backups are now against the law also.

I doubt this is true. The IP and copyright laws provide a framework and protection for the license agreements that the owner of the IP allows use of the product. It may be true that in the case of software the user license agreements don't allow back-up but I suspect the law doesn't get this specific. If the owner of the IP wanted to allow back-up within their license agreement they could. Of course country by country there must be so many different laws I wouldn't be surprise if what you say is true somewhere or maybe in Thailand. But in general, particualry in the case of software, you look to the license agreemnt for the terms and that agreement has a force of law.

[Donz]

everyone copies stuff off the tv on to video tape once in there lives, thats called piracy too, they make vcr's have a record button so people will copy movies etc.

I recently got a Dvd recorder vcr combo and it tells you in the manual how to record your tapes on to dvd's.

So there bitching about a problem the big companies created.

I'm not an expert on this but I do believe there are copyright provisions for copies for personal use. Such as backup or archive. Music I’ve bought online allows making multiple CD. I buy CDs and copy to my PC for either listening from there or making my own mixes on other CDs. Maybe some of this is piracy. Not 100% sure. One thing I think about is that if I can only listen to one instance at a time and no one else is listening to the same music via a different instance at the same time then it seems I haven’t duplicated or copied to get some extra use – I’m just listening to something I bought in different media and situations. I’m not trying to split hair s on this and I’m sure the music industry attorneys and IP experts spend countless hours trying to figure out what is both right for their protection and reasonable expectations from customers given the technology and choices they have. But really I think we all know what is out right theft of IP and what is a reasonably flexible personal use of something we bought.

I would agree in the case of music the industry helped create the problem by not having reasonable and workable legal alternatives. They ignored this until it was out of control.

Making backups are now against the law also.

I doubt this is true. The IP and copyright laws provide a framework and protection for the license agreements that the owner of the IP allows use of the product. It may be true that in the case of software the user license agreements don't allow back-up but I suspect the law doesn't get this specific. If the owner of the IP wanted to allow back-up within their license agreement they could. Of course country by country there must be so many different laws I wouldn't be surprise if what you say is true somewhere or maybe in Thailand. But in general, particualry in the case of software, you look to the license agreemnt for the terms and that agreement has a force of law.

Well in australia making backups are against the law now, im sure other coutries laws may differ.

[Valjean]

Sorry to bring a thread back from the dead on Page 3 but got busy and didn’t have time to questions asked of me…

Greed?

Yeah, I guess there is no such thing.

Of course there is something such as greed. Defined in my dictionary as “an overwhelming desire to have more of something such as money than is actually needed”. Greed to me seems to be in the eye of the beholder.

Greed as in the desire to have a lot of money has been a great motivator for people to innovate. People want to get rich which by definition you might say is having more than you need. And we benefit but that. So maybe I’d agree with the quote from the movie Wall Street “greed is good”. At least as a fuel for innovation. If it’s running your life – that’s a personal decision.

What I see here is that someone’s opinion of what greed is gives them the right to steal. If you think the BMW dealer is greedy is it OK to steal his cars?

There are lots of complex issues in the licensing of IP. In my experience, (I make my living in this) the companies in this area are very aware of the problems they have made for themselves, are working on alternatives for developing markets and new technology (such as in music). I don’t want to say there aren’t problems. I don’t expect these problems to go away soon. Many IP products are not priced right for emerging markets, or don’t cover new use scenarios, etc. etc. But fostering a personal opinion of greed as a justification for theft is bs. Just call a spade a spade and say that for now stealing music and software is an easy crime to commit and you don’t feel like paying at this time giveb that the risk are so low. That’s fair. Just don’t wrap this in some veneer of legitimate justification.

[Donz]

Its definately not stealing, as im still paying for the product

[Sing_Sling]

Its definately not stealing, as im still paying for the product

How?

[Donz]

Its definately not stealing, as im still paying for the product

How?

ever heard of the thing called money?