Apple ordered to pay $1.9 million to Chinese publisher over copyright case

AppleInsider

A Chinese publishing group has won a $1.9 million case against Apple for how the company fails to stop other publishers selling copyright content in the App Store.

App Store

The Tianjin Binhai People's Court has sided with a local subsidary of China's COL Digital Publishing Group in a case against Apple and the App Store. The online publisher claims that multiple rivals had released apps which included material, such as popular novels, whose rights belong to COL Digital.

According to the South China Morning Post, COL Digital claims that Apple should be responsible for the copyright infringement of these other apps. It accused Apple of failing to conduct due diligence.

Reportedly, the publisher has been embroiled in a total of four legal battles with Apple since 2012. While this latest ruling sees Apple ordered to pay 12 million yuan ($1.9 million), it appears to be only one part of an ongoing case.

South China Morning Post says that COL Digital's full lawsuit centers on 83 separate incidents of copyright infringement, and involves 460 cases of intellectual properties.

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Kuyangkoh

Apple….just raise the price of your devices.

OutdoorAppDeveloper

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

verne arase

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

That's a load of bull hockey.

How do you control what the apps do or will contain in the future.

This is a losing battle for Apple in a country which has no regard for intellectual property. That this is an IP case is particularly ironic.

This is simply a shot across the bow at Apple from the Chinese Communist Party - one of many, in fact. Apple will simply have to eat these judgements fighting as best as it can in Chinese courts until such time as it makes doing business in China impractical.

This is one reason why opening the Indian market is so important - the Chinese market is closing rapidly, and the CCP is becoming increasing hostile to foreigners in general, foreign manufacturing, and foreign products. The opening up of China under Deng Xiaoping is rapidly being reversed by Xi Jinping, and the populace is totally under CCP control now that Cisco has helped China isolate the local populace from world information and views with the great firewall.

waveparticle

verne arase said:

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

That's a load of bull hockey.

How do you control what the apps do or will contain in the future.

This is a losing battle for Apple in a country which has no regard for intellectual property. That this is an IP case is particularly ironic.

This is simply a shot across the bow at Apple from the Chinese Communist Party - one of many, in fact. Apple will simply have to eat these judgements fighting as best as it can in Chinese courts until such time as it makes doing business in China impractical.

This is one reason why opening the Indian market is so important - the Chinese market is closing rapidly, and the CCP is becoming increasing hostile to foreigners in general, foreign manufacturing, and foreign products. The opening up of China under Deng Xiaoping is rapidly being reversed by Xi Jinping, and the populace is totally under CCP control now that Cisco has helped China isolate the local populace from world information and views with the great firewall.

You are too political. 

tmay

waveparticle said:

verne arase said:

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

That's a load of bull hockey.

How do you control what the apps do or will contain in the future.

This is a losing battle for Apple in a country which has no regard for intellectual property. That this is an IP case is particularly ironic.

This is simply a shot across the bow at Apple from the Chinese Communist Party - one of many, in fact. Apple will simply have to eat these judgements fighting as best as it can in Chinese courts until such time as it makes doing business in China impractical.

This is one reason why opening the Indian market is so important - the Chinese market is closing rapidly, and the CCP is becoming increasing hostile to foreigners in general, foreign manufacturing, and foreign products. The opening up of China under Deng Xiaoping is rapidly being reversed by Xi Jinping, and the populace is totally under CCP control now that Cisco has helped China isolate the local populace from world information and views with the great firewall.

You are too political. 

Verne is correct though.

Interestingly enough, the Philippines President Dutarte, is turning his back on the PRC, and is again embracing the U.S. as a security partner, and that is driven by the public outrage against China's militarization of the South China Seas. 

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/philippines-protests-beijings-provocative-acts-south-china-sea-2021-10-20/

https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/us-philippines-defense-alliance

waveparticle

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

When you demand absolute control over what apps users can run, you must take absolute responsibility for anything those apps do. Notice that no one sues PC makers when users install apps that pirate video?

I agree. Apple enforces absolute control of what apps can run on iPhone through App Store. Then Apple should share responsibility of inappropriate apps. The question is how much. 

$1.9 million seem reasonable.

viclauyyc

waveparticle said:

You are too political. 

In China, nothing is not political. 

waveparticle

viclauyyc said:

waveparticle said:

You are too political. 

In China, nothing is not political. 

Politics is no good. There is no goodness in politics. 

leighr

China…. Copyright laws…. LOL. 

the1maximus

leighr said:

China…. Copyright laws…. LOL. 

I thought the exact same thing … 😂

beowulfschmidt

To be fair, if Apple knew about the infringement, then they should be liable for failing to do something about it.  But that should be the limit of the liability.  There is no moral justification for making Apple responsible for the content of the apps they host.  Unfortunately, Apple has taken responsibility for some content, which opens them up to criticism for not exercising that control over content others find objectionable.  Still not justified, IMO, but then, Chinese copyright law isn't exactly my strong suit.

GeorgeBMac

leighr said:

China…. Copyright laws…. LOL. 

Conversely, despite all the claims of ip theft by Chinese companies, how many American companies have sued Chinese companies -- much less won? 

Lawsuits between American companies for ip theft are exceedingly common but rare against Chinese companies.

It suggests that those claims against China are just more bullshit propaganda.

GeorgeBMac

beowulfschmidt said:

To be fair, if Apple knew about the infringement, then they should be liable for failing to do something about it.  But that should be the limit of the liability.  There is no moral justification for making Apple responsible for the content of the apps they host.  Unfortunately, Apple has taken responsibility for some content, which opens them up to criticism for not exercising that control over content others find objectionable.  Still not justified, IMO, but then, Chinese copyright law isn't exactly my strong suit.

If Apple holds no responsibility for the apps they host on their app store, then the app store serves no purpose other than to boost Apple's profits -- which means it will, at some point, be taken down under antitrust laws for restraint of trade.

Admittedly, that is a black and white argument over an area with a million shades of grey.

But, it has analogies to social media enabling & publishing disinformation that harms society and it raises questions of how it is policed and who does the policing.

And, another analogy is a pimp:  he doesn't actually sell the product, but he enables it to be sold.

Should he be fully or partially responsible for the sale of an illegal product?

waveparticle

GeorgeBMac said:

beowulfschmidt said:

To be fair, if Apple knew about the infringement, then they should be liable for failing to do something about it.  But that should be the limit of the liability.  There is no moral justification for making Apple responsible for the content of the apps they host.  Unfortunately, Apple has taken responsibility for some content, which opens them up to criticism for not exercising that control over content others find objectionable.  Still not justified, IMO, but then, Chinese copyright law isn't exactly my strong suit.

If Apple holds no responsibility for the apps they host on their app store, then the app store serves no purpose other than to boost Apple's profits -- which means it will, at some point, be taken down under antitrust laws for restraint of trade.

Admittedly, that is a black and white argument over an area with a million shades of grey.

But, it has analogies to social media enabling & publishing disinformation that harms society and it raises questions of how it is policed and who does the policing.

And, another analogy is a pimp:  he doesn't actually sell the product, but he enables it to be sold.

Should he be fully or partially responsible for the sale of an illegal product?

The real truth lies on the apps developers. They should be punished more for infringing copyrights. Unfortunately this news made no mention of what happened to the app developers. 

GeorgeBMac

waveparticle said:

GeorgeBMac said:

beowulfschmidt said:

To be fair, if Apple knew about the infringement, then they should be liable for failing to do something about it.  But that should be the limit of the liability.  There is no moral justification for making Apple responsible for the content of the apps they host.  Unfortunately, Apple has taken responsibility for some content, which opens them up to criticism for not exercising that control over content others find objectionable.  Still not justified, IMO, but then, Chinese copyright law isn't exactly my strong suit.

If Apple holds no responsibility for the apps they host on their app store, then the app store serves no purpose other than to boost Apple's profits -- which means it will, at some point, be taken down under antitrust laws for restraint of trade.

Admittedly, that is a black and white argument over an area with a million shades of grey.

But, it has analogies to social media enabling & publishing disinformation that harms society and it raises questions of how it is policed and who does the policing.

And, another analogy is a pimp:  he doesn't actually sell the product, but he enables it to be sold.

Should he be fully or partially responsible for the sale of an illegal product?

The real truth lies on the apps developers. They should be punished more for infringing copyrights. Unfortunately this news made no mention of what happened to the app developers. 

True.

But, is Apple an accomplice to their crime by letting them use their platform?

...  Technology is changing a lot of the paradigms that law and legal precedent were based on.

These are complex questions that often are made more complex with different situations.

Should Apple be held to the same standard as FaceBook for how it's platform is used?

I don't think there are any right or wrong answers -- just better or worse ones -- and even that depends a lot on which perspective one views it from.

By charging for use of their app store, then Apple could be accused of benefiting (indirectly) from the crime others committed by republishing copyrighted materials.

MplsP

This article doesn’t say whether Apple was informed of the infringements and/or took the apps down once they knew. If they did then there should be no issues. Of course, if the company was owned by a friend of the local Party Chair then it really doesn’t matter.

waveparticle

MplsP said:

This article doesn’t say whether Apple was informed of the infringements and/or took the apps down once they knew. If they did then there should be no issues. Of course, if the company was owned by a friend of the local Party Chair then it really doesn’t matter.

Not true. Many many corrupted CCPs have been prosecuted.