it looks like the u.s. is trying to strongarm the taiwan government into doing what it wants on the isssue of intellectual property rights again. at the same time the person in charge of ipr in taiwan doesn't seem that concerned, conisdering that the statistics on what taiwan is doing come from last year, and the copyright law here has since been changed some. but once again an article states statistics that i would like to know how they got:

Since 1997, the nation's music industry has seen its income drop by two thirds. Last year, 16.6 million legal CDs were sold, compared with 41.5 million in 1997, IFPI figures show. Almost one in every two music discs bought in the country is a fake.

how do they know one in every two discs are fake? what if a disc is independantly produced and not part of the ipr? would they still be considered in these statistics? they may suspect one in every two discs are fake, but i don't see how they can say a blanket statement like that and have anyone with half a brain believe it.

surprisingly, there are voices of reason out there:

Instead of pointing the finger at the government, one IPR expert said, the music industry needs to start paying attention to its customers.

"This is a wake-up call for the music industry to start selling music in the format that people want," said John Eastwood, a lawyer at Winkler Partners and co-chairman of the Intellectual Property Committee of the European Chamber of Commerce Taipei.

Consumers are tired of paying NT$400 to NT$600 for one good song on a 12-track disc, he said.

cd prices here have increased, and you are getting less and less for that money. instead of treating their customers like criminals, the labels should work on ways to make their releases more special. finally re-issuing a lot of what is in their vaults at a decent price would be a step in the right direction.