The Chinese authorities’ have launched a 4.5 billion Yuan (around $350 million) complex aimed at mimicking the success of American animation powerhouses Dreamworks and Pixar. It’s been prompted by the success of Dreamworks’ Kung Fu Panda, the first animated film to take more than 100million yuan in China at the box office. The Chinese government’s response was to build this massive state sponsored complex outside of Beijing to churn out rival animated films. But it’s not easy for the state to effectively sponsor innovation, even in a liberal and open society. In China where the government is authoritarian and dicatorial (to put it lightly) creating innovation by diktat is not likely to out-do the free thinking creatives at Dreamworks, Pixar et al. in California. Quite how the Chinese expect to make money of their intellectual property in a country where the rights of content creators are routinely ignored and international copyright law doesn’t exist is another question altogether!

Perhaps the Chinese government/people will only care about enforcing copyright if they manage to create some intellectual property of their own worth protecting…