Posted on Tuesday 2 August 2005
I read an interesting article in IEEE Spectrum about the problem of software piracy in China. According to the article, 92% of software loaded on Chinese PCs is pirated (yea, I know, it’s kind of dubious how they could come up with such a statistic). For Europe and the US, the figure is 36% and 22%, respectively.
According to the author of China, Inc., there’s a widespread, though seldom spoken, view that the government is to some extent intentionally lax about cracking down on piracy since it is essentially “one of the greatest industrial subsidies in the world.”
However, the article also points out how the piracy hurts the native Chinese software industry. Companies like Microsoft and Adobe can afford the piracy hit of China since they reap so many profits elsewhere in the world. However, a Chinese company will generally have to make profits in China to be successful, but the widespread piracy makes it difficult for such companies to be profitable in their native country.
Tags: China, piracy, Science and Technology