China’s unauthorized Disney Land!

Does the above photo look like Disneyland? Well its not, and this is no joke.

It emerged today that the Internet-filtering, democracy-hating government of The People’s Republic of China own a Disneyland-like theme park called The Shijingshan Amusement Park. That would be fine if it was Disney endorsed (which its not) or even if they actually admitted it to be a rip off of the real Disneyland (which they don’t). They have renamed versions of Shrek, MickeyMouse, SnowWhite, and other famous copyrights of The Walt Disney Company.

Extract from The Standard…

With its slogan “Disneyland is too far,” Beijing’s Shijingshan Amusement Park features a replica of Cinderella’s Castle, with staff dressed like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and other Disney characters.

None of this is authorized by Disney - but that has not stopped the state-owned park from creating its own counterfeit version of the Magic Kingdom in a brazen example of the sort of open and widespread copyright piracy that has Washington fuming.

The United States announced Monday it would file a case at the World Trade Organization over rampant copyright piracy in China, a practice which US companies say deprives them of billions of dollars each year.

But 31-year-old housewife Zhang Li betrays a typical Chinese attitude on the issue while chasing her young son around the park.

“I don’t understand why that is such a big problem. Shouldn’t others be able to use those characters besides [Disney]?” she asks.

Sigh… what next China!