Baidu copyright negotiations break down

Negotiations between Chinese search engine Baidu and Chinese writers over a copyright dispute broke down on March 24, according to a micro-blog posted by Lu Jinbo, the general manager of Wanrong Books.

"Negotiation with Baidu didn't make any progress and totally broke down" Lu said on his micro blog.

The so-called anti-copyright-infringement alliance organized by 50 Chinese writers held a negotiation with Baidu on March 24. And Baidu was asked to make public apologies for "copyright infringement," compensate the losses of publishers and writers and stop any acts of infringement in addition to setting up an operation model so any online publication receives the author's approval prior to being published online.

However, it seems like that the negotiation did not come to a happy ending.

Baidu, China's search engine giant, was blamed on March 15 by Chinese writers for participating in copyright violations since the website offers free online excerpts of unauthorized stories and books. On March 15, which is World Consumer Rights Day, more than 40 writers charged, in an open letter, that Baidu stole their work and infringed on their copyrights.

The letter was published on the personal blog of Shen Haobo, a publisher, and called for an end to the piracy. Launched in November 2009, Baidu's online library offers an open platform for online resource sharing. Users can read or download information for free and all accumulated resources come from user uploads.

By Wang Hanlu, People's Daily Online

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