Government Participation in Digital Copyright Licensing in the Cloud Computing Environment - Challenges of Information Management Beyond the Cloud - page 80

Government Participation in Digital Copyright Licensing
in the Cloud Computing Environment

Jingzhu Wei and Shujin Cao

School of Information Management, Sun Yat-Sen University, No.132, East Outer Ring Rd,
510006 Guangzhou Higher Education Mega Center, China
{Weijzhu,Caosj}@mail.sysu.edu.cn

Abstract. Cloud computing represents a major development in the digital
environment and is of great influence on the digital copyright system, breaking
down the interests balancing mechanism between copyright creators, owners,
distributors and users. Governments of many countries actively intervene in their
copyright market. In the environment of cloud computing, how and to what
extent government should participate in the digital copyright market as a part of
commodities market deserves studying. This paper introduces some cases of
Chinese government participation in digital copyright solutions with several
projects (e.g., Copyright Cloud Project, and National Cultural Information
Resources Sharing Project (NCIRSP)) and discusses the role and means of
government participation in digital copyright licensing in the development of
copyright markets. With respect to the cloud computing environment, this paper
proposes how the government should take advantages of cloud computing
technology to promote the diffusion and usage of digital resources, to make the
market of digital copyright prosperous.

Keywords: Copyright, digital copyright licensing, government, cloud

computing.

1 Introduction

1.1 Digital Copyright in China

The Copyright Law of China was published in 1990 “in accordance with the
Constitution, for the purpose of protecting the copyright of authors in their literary,
artistic and scientific works and rights and interests related to copyright, encouraging
creation and dissemination of works”, with the aim to encourage beneficial socialist
spiritual civilization, the creation and dissemination of material civilization works to
promote the development and prosperity of socialist culture and science [1, Article 1].
The fast development and popularity of digital technology has caused digital copyright
problems in China and other countries all around the world. As a consequence, China
amended the Copyright Act in 2001. The Copyright Act expressly provides for the