GIO’s Scrutiny on P2P Platforms to Punish Unauthorized Downloading.

　Taiwan music industry’s failure in the charge against the local P2P provider, ezPeer for its copyright infringement has caused GIO’s deep concern (the Government Information Office, Taiwan). The minister of GIO, Mr. Wen-chih Yao, indicated on July 1, 2005 that he would invite IPO, IFPI, and P2P providers to confer with them on resolution and consider punishment on P2P providers by administrative procedures or legislation and law amendment.

 

　Mr. Wen-chih Yao pointed out a threat brought to Taiwan’s music industry by P2P music files swapping and MP3, etc., and that has caused the output value to head into a serious slide. Local music industry suffers the most significant decrease in its output value to one-third only. Therefore, P2P issue demands immediate resolution.

 

　GIO has conducted negotiation between the record industry and P2P providers for 5 times in the past two years in the hope of building up a legal music swapping mechanism. However, this attempt failed due to the different opinions about interest distribution between the record industry and P2P providers.

 

　GIO invited people from relevant fields for a conference, attempting to establish a reasonable transaction mechanism and create a platform for legal downloading by general consumers on condition that a fixed amount of fee must be paid. Nevertheless, GIO considers penalty to be imposed on P2P providers by means of administration or law amendment and legislation on illegal downloading permitted by P2P providers.

 

　Vice Chief of Copyright Department of IPO, He Yu-tsen held that administrative department should respect the decision made by the judiciary authority, and the verdict of not guilty made by Shilin District Court, however, has made Taiwan the first state that rules such similar cases not guilty. He Ye-tsen predicted that such a verdict would lead to deep concerns by copyright holders and the international community. IPO is now watching the subsequent influence. (2005.7)

CYJ/CCS