DVD shops reopen after shutdown
- Source: Global Times
- [11:09 June 07 2010]
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By Jonathan DeHart and Shen Weihuang
DVD shops downtown are reshuffling and giving themselves a secret face-lift to keep loyal customers returning as stores maneuver to get around the recent crackdown on the sale of pirated films.
Up until about a month ago, expatriates used to frequent Dagu Road in Jing'an district to scour store shelves with the hopes of finding fake copies of their favorite foreign movies and television shows - or to get their fix of Gossip Girl.
But after a series of police raids shut down the illegal operations due to stricter regulations being imposed on the city for the World Expo 2010 in Shanghai, these shops have had to get more creative - resuming business with a modified set-up and in a different location.
A couple of the Dagu Road outfits have reopened just blocks north of their old street, where business Sunday appeared as thriving as ever.
"We have the best selection of DVDs anywhere," said a sales employee at Oscar's Club on Fengyang Road. The man working at the store, which used to be on Dagu Road, called Le Ka De Club, spoke with the Global Times under the assumption that these reporters were ordinary customers.
With the help of hidden back-chambers, the store has reopened to serve the demands of customers, who are ushered past a display of authentic-looking Chinese films to a back door leading up to the second floor, where bootlegged Chinese discs are scattered - another door leading to a stairwell brings customers to the third floor, which carries hundreds of pirated foreign discs.
According to another employee at Oscar's Club, the need to move and construct makeshift store subdivisions was triggered a few weeks into the Expo, and after The New York Times published an article on where to find the best pirated discs in the city, listing Dagu Road shops.
"After the article was printed, the police came and forced all the DVD stores on Dagu Road to close right away," he told the Global Times. "So, we're trying to get around the law by running our shop at a different location," he said.
"We plan to use our old shop space to open a beer store since we still pay the rent there," he added.
While operating stores with secret rooms storing pirated discs for sale is illegal, the problem with the fake goods on the street has been an ongoing issue for several years.
In 2006, six American film production companies, including Paramount Pictures, Disney, 20th Century Fox and Universal Pictures, jointly sued the DVD store Di Kai on Dagu Road for violating intellectual property rights, asking for over 158,000 yuan ($23,167) in compensation.
