Doc Film 'Innovation Race' Exposing Communist China's Tech Threat Opens in Special Online Screening Event
Following its debut in select cities across the country, the documentary film “Innovation Race” premiered for special online screenings last week and will be viewable through Thursday.
Viewers worldwide can purchase a virtual ticket at watch.innovationracemovie.com and can stream the film on their computer, smartphone, tablet or even on their own TV, according to a news release from Tea Party Patriots Action, an executive producer of “Innovation Race.”
The film can be viewed beginning at either 2:00 p.m. or 7:00 p.m. local time. After purchasing their ticket, viewers have 24 hours to watch the documentary.
Tea Party Patriots Action described “Innovation Race,” saying it “boldly explores the imminent threat of China exploiting weaknesses in U.S. patent protection and presents solutions for restoring our dominance in innovation, technology, and invention.”
The documentary makes the case that communist China is now beating the U.S. at its own game by becoming the world’s repository of technology. And that has profound implications not only for the U.S., but for the world — both economically and militarily.
Watch the trailer below for “Innovation Race,” which won the Excellence in Filmmaking Award at the Anthem Film Festival in Las Vegas in June.
It’s another Sputnik moment for America, experts say in “Innovation Race,” with the CCP poised to leapfrog the U.S. in key areas of the technological realm, much as the Soviet Union did in the early years of the space race in the late 1950s and early ’60s.
“That moment shocked America. It shocked it to its core that America could be defeated in some area of technological prowess,” said Declan Ganley, an inventor and CEO of Rivada Networks, who appears in the film.
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“It was a wake-up call. It mobilized the spirit of a nation to realize we need to meet, match and exceed this moment, and we need to put a man on the moon,” which the U.S. did in July 1969.
The U.S. finds itself needing to rise to the occasion again or face a very different, less secure future.
Gordon Chang, author of “The Great U.S.-China Tech War,” said in the film, “Dominating technology means you dominate the economy of the world. Dominate the economy of the world, you dominate the world itself.”
“Clearly, this is a race that we cannot afford to lose, because we’re not going to have a country.”
The U.S. actually opened the door for China, the world’s second-largest economy, to make its move toward global dominance with the passage of the America Invents Act in 2011 during the Obama administration, according to “Innovation Race.”
The legislation had broad bipartisan support, but its impact, perhaps unintentionally, was to weaken the nation’s patent system, which had been the gold standard for the world.
Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution specifically grants Congress the authority to pass laws “to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.”
Multiple experts in “Innovation Race” contend that China has assimilated the best of how the U.S. patent system used to work.
Ganley believes Beijing reasoned, “What if we don’t just steal the technology? What if we steal the system that America actually operated successfully and we implement it in China? What if we out-America America?”
Democratic Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware and Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, who both appear in “Innovation Race,” have introduced legislation to restore key aspects of the U.S. patent system.
“[Chinese President] Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party in the last five years have made it abundantly clear that they intend to not just compete with the United States; they intend to surpass us and to be the world leader in innovative technology,” Coons said.
Massie argued, “If we change our laws and dilute our intellectual property incentives and China changes their laws and makes their intellectual property incentives even stronger, they won’t need to steal our intellectual property anymore. Their intellectual property’s gonna be better than ours because they will reward the people who develop it.”
“Innovation Race” director Luke Livingston said since he first conceived and began working on the film a few years ago, the situation has gotten worse.
“Sadly, the state of inventors and small business has continued to deteriorate, while China appears to be on even more of a fast track to copy and overtake our patent system, and thus overtake the US first in innovation,” Livingston said.
“We need to be reminded of the consequences, as there is no prize for second place.”
Jenny Beth Martin, an executive producer of “Innovation Race” and co-founder and president of Tea Party Patriots, noted, “Our founding fathers were very direct in their desire to both inspire and protect the innovations and ideas of American citizens.”
“We felt compelled to share the stories of not only how inventors are being impacted by these issues with patent protections,” she continued, “but the incredible threat our country faces if this course is not corrected.”
Watch the powerful documentary film “Innovation Race” here.
