Five big newspapers, Lao Động, Sài Gòn Giải Phóng, Thanh Niên, Tiền Phong, Tuổi Trẻ, have got together and signed a long-awaited MOU on newspaper copyright, with a special focus on digital media.

Two important points:

- The five participating newspapers are granted the right to republish each other’s articles on their digital properties or English version without having to seek permission or pay fees.

- Other digital newspapers (like DanTri or VnExpress) or news websites (like TimNhanh) which are not part of this MOU can republish articles of the five signees only with explicit permission of the concerned newspaper.

The MOU will be effective on January 1, 2008.

For the background of the current copyright crisis with Vietnamese online media,  Sonny performed an extensive analysis: Part 1 & Part 2.

While this MOU may not be legally enforceable, it certainly presents a huge step forward for Vietnam’s online media turf – we just got to give them the credit! With the deadline of roughly three months, the five traditional newspapers do seem to take this serious. Three months is also a decent time for other players to adjust the strategy. I hope that at least the online newspapers will “quietly” agree to this MOU and gradually beef up their reporting staff,. Well, unless they risk losing their reputation and face value, which are 10x more critical than any forms of punishment, especially in media and especially in Vietnam.

My two questions:

- how do the five newspapers track and enforce this “Code of Respect”?

- how does this MOU, and future rules, affect non-newspaper, commercial websites like Baomoi.com or Cyvee or portals like TimNhanh that publish the news from mainstream players? Obviously these sites are not pure search engine, but they do (or will) make money off the traffic and interest generated from the news paid by the brick-and-mortar newspaper companies.

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