Copyright and journalistic ethics in the digital age

On January 28, the Center for Journalism Training, the Vietnam Journalists Association, in coordination with the US Consulate General in Ho Chi Minh City, organized a workshop with the theme "Press copyright issues in the digital age."

The workshop was attended by many journalists and representatives of central and local press agencies.

Delegates at the workshop exchanged and discussed issues surrounding journalism, professional ethics of journalists; the issue of plagiarism, copyright infringement in electronic newspapers; solutions to overcome the current situation of plagiarism in the press...

2014 Science and Technology Journalism Awards Ceremony. Illustrative photo: VNA)

At the conference, delegates shared that currently, any "hot" news that has just been published in a newspaper or website immediately appears on most websites in Vietnam with many forms of copying such as linking to their website to keep the original article and clearly state the source or changing the title and words to be more "click-bait" to attract more readers to visit the information page.

Some journalists even took the content of published articles to rewrite them into their own articles and implicitly "had the right" to change their pen names.

The consequence of this is that genuine journalists who work with their labor and intelligence are not recognized for their labor value, and society is acknowledging the presence of information thieves and copyright violators of journalistic works.

Pointing out the causes of the current rampant copyright infringement, Mr. Le Quoc Vinh, Chairman of Le Media JSC, said that due to the perception that newspapers are not truly considered a valuable high-class commodity, the blood and intelligence of people, many press agencies like to "exploit" the content of other newspapers.

The press management policy still has many loopholes that are allowing the copying of press products without paying for them.

Besides, education about copyright and respect for copyright has not been included in the general education program like ethics in civic education.

Currently, there are almost no sanctions for violations, or if there are, the penalties are not strong enough to deter violations...

According to many delegates, the cause of the current copyright infringement is due to the professional ethics of journalists.

Journalist Huynh Dung Nhan, Vice President of the Ho Chi Minh City Journalists Association, said that some newspaper management agencies have made concessions and been lenient in the editing process to increase traffic and income.

To achieve profit in the journalism economy, the news and article production process in newspapers has ignored the basic principle that journalism must investigate, and if it is not clear or correct, it should not be written.

At the workshop, many solutions were proposed to overcome the situation of copying and copyright infringement of press works, including promoting the awareness and ethics of journalists in the digital media environment; it is necessary to build electronic newspapers with modern, correct, authentic techniques, with high professional culture, which are truly important political and ideological weapons, effectively serving the cause of innovation, building and defending the Fatherland.

In addition, it is necessary to strengthen sanctions in the implementation of copyright of press works; supplement and tighten regulations on copyright issues, have strict sanctions... to push back copyright violations and limit the current information overlap.

According to Vietnam+