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In recent years, there have been many voices in Korea arguing that a few commercially successful films take up the opportunities for the exhibition of other films and thus limit the selection of titles available for moviegoers, a trend dubbed the "screen monopoly". In seeking a solution, a number of scholars have looked to the anti-screen monopoly "regulations" in France, but without providing rigorous or persuasive evidence. By comparing the appropriate variables of Korea and France, this paper argues that the Korean film market is less monopolised than France despite the non-existence of these regulations. Furthermore, it demonstrates that Korea has more diversity than France. As a result, this paper concludes that introducing the French anti-screen monopoly regulations in Korea does not seem a beneficial option. The findings in this paper suggest a strong need to re-examine the effectiveness of government policies in the cultural industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A common perception is that a strong copyright regime protects cultural diversity and creativity; thus, it should be well developed, implemented, and respected. However, this belief may be different for certain industries or countries. In other words, strong copyright may not bring about a positive impact as expected whereas weak copyright can bring about positive impacts contrary to one’s expectations, which is different from the conventional belief on copyright. This paper explores this issue with the Korea music industry. Although this industry has recently enjoyed global popularity with K-pop, it was lesser-developed as it endured many difficulties over several decades. By comparing and analyzing these two contrasting periods, the case of the Korean music industry demonstrates that both weak and strong copyright has helped with its development. This interesting case can provide meaningful implications regarding the practice and development of copyright and its impact on the growth of the music industry, particularly in the era of digitization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In comparison to Korea’s other cultural industries, manhwa 만화 has shown a lagged development. As a result, the Korean government has recently shown interest in this industry and begun to support it. However, the fundamental reasons for the lagged development of manhwa should be carefully scrutinized in order to make promotion policies and support more effective and thus to achieve further development and advancement of the manhwa industry. This article seeks to address this issue and argues that the core problem is derived from a negative view toward manhwa as it has been considered to be harmful to Korean society and, hence, not acknowledged as a part of culture. Therefore, this paper takes a historical approach to track down how this negative view formed and why it has prevailed in Korea. To this end, political and economic changes related to the manhwa industry are analyzed with a focus on production and consumption. The paper reveals that it was not only coercive public policies but also a lack of production capacity that induced a distorted view toward manhwa and caused the development of the industry to lag. Where business strategies have been adopted in an improved business environment, this has helped to enhance production to achieve better outcomes and change the view of consumers toward manhwa, resulting in an increase in consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]