The Shanghaiist asks:

“Does anyone else find it odd that Shanghai’s most famous/notorious bootleg DVD shop is advertising in Shanghai’s most famous/notorious state-run English-language newspaper? What does it say about Shanghai’s “war on piracy” when Ka De Club, routinely raided by police, has the balls to take out an ad — and that Shanghai Daily, which reports on those raids, runs the ad?”

The Ka Dae Club was last raided ahead of an intellectual property conference. A pure coincidence we assure you. The Shanghai government is very serious about cracking down on piracy.

Still, as for the Shanghaiist’s question, AsiaPundit is hardly shocked that state-owned Shanghai Daily is accepting ads for the illegal DVD shop coffee shop that doesn’t sell coffee. The paper regularly runs ads for prostitutes escort and massage services. It has even been skirting rules prohibiting foreign investment through a deal with Australia’s Seven Network. The latter deal has remarkably improved the readability of the paper over the past year.
Rule-breaking is a good thing for the paper. And given that its expatriate target audience are the biggest patrons of Ka De, AP would have recommended running the ad as a public service.

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