A revised judiciary rule from the Supreme People's Court, which came into effect on Friday, bans reprinting Internet material without obtaining preliminary approval from the copyright holder.

Under the previous judiciary rule implemented in 2003, websites that copied and re-posted Internet material did not infringe upon intellectual property right (IPR) laws so long as they identified the source of the material and paid IPR fees afterwards.

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"The revision is in line with international norms in the field. It is also compatible with a new Internet information communication regulation issued by the State Council and implemented this July," said Jiang Zhipei, president of the IPR Court at the Supreme People's Court. He added that the new regulation would likely lead to more IPR legal disputes.

Now, anyone uploading text, sound and video recordings to the Internet for downloading, copying or other use, must acquire the permission of the copyright owner and pay the required fee.

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