Two Encouraging Surveys: On Public Awareness and Business Attitudes of Intellectual Property Rights in Hong Kong

Selene Ng of Wilkinson and Grist wrote an article on the site of IAM Magazine about an encouraging outcome of a survey on public awareness of intellectual property protection by the Hong Kong population. The Survey on Public Awareness of Intellectual Property Right Protection 香港市民保護知識產權意識調查 2008 conducted by Mercador Solutions Associates Ltd., commissioned by the IP Department of Hong Kong. It showed that 96.3 percent of the surveyed group (1,003 repondents, response rate of 51.5 percent) considered that it was very/quite necessary to protect the IP rights in Hong Kong.

However, awareness does not necessarily convert into online behaviour that is respectful towards intellectual property rights. 78.6 percent stated that they probably/definitely would not pay to download songs, movies, games or ebooks. Why? The main reason for this was that purchasing legitimate content is “considered troublesome in purchasing online” (47.0%). When this group is downloading chances are that they access pirated content. So it is safe to assume that there is enough work to do for the intellectual property department of firms, such as Wilkinson and Grist, to enforce IPRs in Hong Kong. Read Ms Ng's article here.

Then there was another rather encouraging survey: Survey on Business Attitudes to Intellectual Property 香港商業機構知識產權意識調查 2008 conducted by Mercador Solutions Associates Ltd. , commissioned by the IP Department of Hong Kong (1,001 business establishments surveyed, response rate 30.3 percent) which showed that: 

• 98.3% of business establishments considered intellectual properties (e.g. patents for invented products / technology, design, logo or brand name) of the surveyed group in Hong Kong valuable assets of a company;
• 93.7% of the business establishments considered that it was very/quite necessary to protect IP rights in the business environment of Hong Kong.