News Licensing Issues of Wuxiaworld

Discussion in 'Novel General' started by Qidian, May 22, 2017.

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  1. DocB

    DocB "I see you, little mouse! Run along"

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  2. asriu

    asriu fu~ fu~ fu~

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    Wuxiaworld Formal Response to Qidian Licensing Issues Post
    May 22, 2017 at 10:24 am


    Dear readers, this might be the most important post I’ve made since the creation of Wuxiaworld, so I encourage you to read it closely, as it involves the very existence and longevity of this creation. As of May 22, 2017 the Yuewen Group, the parent group of Qidian International, send a formal letter in Chinese making several copyright-related requests of us, and also posted on a libelous statement on NovelUpdates Forum. This is our formal response to that statement (we’ll be responding privately to the private email), because all of you who have been with us for so long deserve to know what is happening.

    It is extremely unfortunate that Qidian chose to make our disagreements public, as well as quite unprofessional. Unfortunately, over the course of my past half year of engagement with them it has become apparent to me that Western standards of professionalism are perhaps different from the standards which monopolistic Chinese companies might have.

    For some months now, Wuxiaworld and Qidian were actually in intensive talks for an investment partnership, and we opened up all of our books and data to them. While I cannot disclose any details due to a non-disclosure agreement, what I can say is that the talks were extremely serious but in the end, due to Qidian imposing many clauses on both the translators and the company which I found unacceptable, our talks fell through roughly a week or two ago. Note the term, ‘a week or two ago‘. In other words, they know everything about what we have been doing, so their claims of not receiving ‘notification’ or ‘permission’ are completely bogus. But more on that later.

    There have been many cases during the past six months when I have been forced to ‘bite my tongue’ as I’ve watched Qidian’s English representatives publicly proclaim how much they wish to support fan translators when in private they have taken a mix of threats and warnings to try and force translators to join their own platform. I won’t name them and will let them stand out if they so choose, but there have been many times that I have wished to speak out and publicize some of this, but since I had to look out for our own translators and our own working relationship with Qidian, I was forced to bite my tongue. That is no longer the case.

    When we first negotiated with Qidian and reached an agreement of twenty novels, it was agreed that this would serve as the framework for future authorizations as well. It was made extremely clear to Qidian that Wuxiaworld does not select novels, it selects translators, which means that they bring the novels they are working on over to Wuxiaworld. In addition to the formal authorizations agreement, we had an oral commitment from Qidian stating that we can bring new novels onto the site, then bring them under the authorizations umbrella once every quarter. This was the reason why Wuxiaworld has brought in new Qidian novels over the past few months, and for Qidian to suddenly renege on its oral commitments to Wuxiaworld is not only dishonest, it causes serious damages to us and our reputation and we will be seeking appropriate compensation from them if we are indeed forced to halt translation of the new projects.

    Many of you might be wondering why Qidian is doing this. In short, in China Qidian holds a near-monopolistic stranglehold on the online reading market, and they are very used to having control over all things they work on. In any market, monopolies are a bad thing. In my negotiations with Qidian, it became increasingly clear to me that they were more interested in having Wuxiaworld as a stepping-stone for their own Qidian International website, which they intend to paywall in a few months. Now that I have declined their onerous and inequitable terms (again, cannot discuss due to NDA), they wish to put the screws to us and take by force what they were unable to do through contractual negotiations. There are also talks of them potentially wishing to buy Gravity, now that the deal with Wuxiaworld has fallen through. If that is the case, then it adds a new dimension to the reasons behind their actions, but I am not privy to those conversations and can only speculate.

    Qidian’s post in the NovelUpdates Forum is not only insulting and unprofessional, it is flat-out libelous in many areas and we will pursue them for that in a court of law. Their claim that we ‘privately approached the translators of Gravity‘ is a defamatory claim, designed to use Gravity’s reputation as their cat’s paw against Wuxiaworld in the public sphere; every single person who moved over from Gravity would tell you that we did not actively recruit any previous Gravity translators, and that they made a request of their own free will to join Wuxiaworld. You can ask them for yourselves.

    Similarly, the claim that Wuxiaworld did not get ‘permission’ or give ‘notification’ to Qidian is also a defamatory statement, since Qidian has been aware of every single action we have taken. In fact, Qidian actually encouraged us to try and obtain more of Gravity’s novels when they believed we would sign with them, which we declined because it was never our intention to ‘go after’ Gravity, nor have we ever tried to poach Gravity’s translators. For them to publicly claim there was ‘no notification’ and then call our actions ‘unacceptable’ and ‘out of business ethic’ is libelous, and we will take appropriate legal action as necessary.

    Their claims that we will ‘send the twenty novels to them’ veer uncomfortably in the area covered by NDA, and so I won’t address that here and instead will respond privately. However, I believe there’s a significant difference in how we are interpreting the contract vs how they are interpreting it, and unless we are specifically ordered by an arbitrator or a court of law to hand those translations over, we will not be doing so. They picked the wrong arena and the wrong person to fight. As for their request for us to take down the eleven ‘unauthorized’ translations, we will also fight them in any court of law on the grounds that we started these projects after they had given oral agreements for us to start them, and will demand compensation and damages from them if they wish for us to cease the translations.

    The next few months might be a bit rocky, but I am comforted by knowing that we have not only an outstanding group of translators at Wuxiaworld, but also an outstanding group of fans that are so supportive, it attracted the attention of China’s biggest publishers, for better or worse. I won’t ask that you boycott their website (although that would be appreciated); this is our fight, not yours. But I do ask for your support as we carry through and deal with the issues raised today.

    Thank you all, and may God bless [​IMG]

    Ren
    see that big smile~ muahahahaha!
     
  3. Panzaro

    Panzaro It's just mayonnaise~

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    And when they win and with no competition, they might(I really hope not) just build a (pay)wall and have the readers pay for it. Not realizing that they pissed off the minority of the reader base that actually spend money on donations.
     
  4. elRouge

    elRouge Well-Known Member

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    what's this?
    do anyone sell popcorn,it's look interesting
    ------------------------------------------
    anyway i vote WW.fuck u QI
     
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  5. Accidentally

    Accidentally Random Member

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    Rip qidian.
     
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  6. Guan Zhong

    Guan Zhong Well-Known Member

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    good lord, that smiley
     
  7. Lovely

    Lovely 『Valentines Terror!』『Cherished Kitty』『Rika's Twin』

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    time to make some epubs \o/
     
  8. Accidentally

    Accidentally Random Member

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    Give me too ;3
     
  9. Udeze

    Udeze Well-Known Member

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    @Qidian, life is like a waterfall, it cannot be reverted once again after the fall, you're swimming to the void as the higher you climb, the harder you will fall
     
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  10. Alexander Valdimir

    Alexander Valdimir Well-Known Member

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    How unprofessional
     
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  11. Ogami-kun

    Ogami-kun 『Blue Shadow ensnaring demons』『FA sect disciple』

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    Considering that now the notion on translation and Wuxiaworld spread already to some press, what would happen if the word of Qidian going back on his words is heard from them?
     
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  12. TheZephyrStorm

    TheZephyrStorm Rock God

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    So we boycotting qidian? I'll miss library of heavens path but hey, I do like it when companies keep their word more
     
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  13. gokrad

    gokrad Well-Known Member

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    @Qidian Who the fk goes to some random forum on the internet to publish your private business when you should have done this privately with the person in question, the owner of that said site ? On a scale from 1 to 10 how much of a retard are you people? Whats next, going to publish something on tumblr as well ?

    What did you expect to happen if you told us this , some few readers of different novels here(jp/kr/en not only CN ) ?
    Someone lend me a hand to facepalm myself , 2 hands are not enough.
     
  14. Zhen

    Zhen ~[Badass Butler from hell]~

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    Sorry to say but... I never liked qidian ever since it started that mess and step into this arena of translating and also because of WW really do have capable translators where as the translators of qidian barely can compare. The fact that they are power balling their way into top just because of rights are making me dislike them more. these translators are doing this out of their own reason (hobby etc.) and qidian is doing this.

    Get off the platform Qidian.
     
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  15. Accidentally

    Accidentally Random Member

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    We demand some payback.

    Some law stated about damage to one identity or name or so.
     
  16. BluerBluest

    BluerBluest Active Member

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    "As known to all, Qidian and WuxiaWorld (hereinafter referred to as WW) came to an agreement several months ago to authorize WW to translate 20 novels for Qidian, which means the ownership of the translations will still belong to Qidian."
    Correct me if i'm wrong because this is bs. Permission for translation is not equal to rights for translated contend. Translation is still work of others and they can't claim it even it was done without autor permission. Especially when it was done without any monetization. You cant break the law even though someone else broke it. I'm wrong?
     
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  17. Lokumi

    Lokumi 『The second greatest trash of society』

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    I will not miss it, while I don't support aggregator site, well I will probably use them now
     
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  18. iamgboy08

    iamgboy08 Well-Known Member

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    the moment qidian steps in is like when the mc being sorrounded by a bunch of 2nd generations of the renowned families in the capital, they just showed up when everythings been going fine and suddenly says some shit that seems justifiable to prove that they are right.
     
  19. pepeoo

    pepeoo high lord of the seven seas

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    see I was a pessimist about this from the start. I know there were here for money if they weren't why the fuck would this come here? Translations were doing fine without em. Tells me to be optimistic and now u show up with this and I really would not be surprised if you can tomorrow with a fucking pay wall. This is about to go to shit really quick as the entire community is now against @Qidian. At the start it was around 50-50 but now everyone sees you for the shitheads you are when the pay wall comes out even those blindly loyal to you will turn against you. This market only exist because of the community, you the the community against you and force everyone to leave. Sooner or later you won't have a market. Good luck asshats
     
  20. SoulZer0

    SoulZer0 Heaven Refining

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    Why would you quote me then? You're stupid man. You started quoting me and then you ask you don't ask my opinion. That's some retardation.
    Who says WW told the truth? Qi said they don't know, WW said Qi knew. You choose to believe WW because you're attached to them. It's only neutral but that's not gonna work in court
    Eh, I donated but I don't care at all. I give translators money because I want to be able to say "I owe you nothing".
     
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