Chinese Web search giant, Baidu, has been ordered by Beijing’s Haidian district court to pay a total of 145,000 yuan (US$22,939) in compensation to three local writers for failing to protect copyrights of their work.
However, a petition by one of the three authors, prolific writer and blogger Han Han, to shut down Baidu’s online library, Wenku, was rejected by the court, Xinhua reported Monday. The writer accused the Internet titan of stealing three of his titles by offering them on Wenku to free downloads, the report said.
Last July, Han sued Baidu for copyright violation demanding a compensation of 760,000 yuan (US$119,387) and that Baidu post an apology on its home page for seven days.
The Chinese writer has yet to decide whether he will appeal the court’s ruling, the report added, citing Han’s lawyer.
A separate report by The Global Times quotes a court officer as saying since no legal basis was provided to explain why Baidu Wenku should shut down and make an apology to Han, the court could not uphold these requests.
Views: 0