Wuxiaworld's Formal Response (With Screenshots)

Also another thing to note that makes Qidian's claims to be able to rehost Wuxiaworld content is that they are trying to go directly to translators and offering to buy their work outright and with a threat to boot (like hey you WW isn't in a good place we will offer to buy do it now and don't regret when we try to take it by force). The Email to OMA shows this kind of stuff. Soooo...

It puts Qidian's claim that they have a right to host what WW has through their agreement.. The problem is they are telling Translators they will buy their stuff. This second step would not be needed at all if they actually had the rights or an agreement to do so.. They don't so, Qidian will get screwed on this issue.

 

This has probably already been responded to, but I've also seen Qidian International also respond saying that it owns all translations of its work. This is factually incorrect. China has agreed to the same International Copyright laws as the rest of the world and has signed the Berne Convention. Unless the rights to the translations were explicitly signed over to QI in the contract, QI has no rights to the actual translations. QI has the right to demand the translator take down the translation as well as to take them to court for any monetary damages from publishing the unauthorized translations, but they cannot claim any ownership of the translations unless it is explicitly granted.

This would especially be the case for the 11 novels under dispute even if the rights to translate were given in the contract for the original 20 novels, because QI is contesting that those 11 did not fall under the Umbrella Agreement and thus, WW wouldn't have any rights to them. So then QI also wouldn't have any rights to dual-host them on their website and they can only demand WW to take down the unauthorized translations and pay monetary damages. WW is declining to do so because of the written & oral agreements and that's what the court will cover.

But right now, QI has made several statements about copyright that are factually incorrect and if that's what QI thinks then they will lose. And secondly, dual-hosting WW novels is illegal unless explicit copyright was granted and it seems silly for WW to pay for the right to translate something they give up the copyright to, and lastly, the extra 11 novels on QI that are under dispute is illegal in any scenario as either it is allowed thru the contract or it doesn't and in neither case would QI have the rights to the translations.

 

"D. Good General Practices for Notice Senders 2
1. Good faith submission of all information required by Section 512(c).
2. Submitting take down requests presented as Section 512 notices only for copyright infringement (i.e., not to address issues such as trademark, defamation, privacy, etc.).
3. Before submitting a take down notice, it is a good practice to take measures that are reasonable under the circumstances (e.g. taking into account the information visible to the notifier and the apparent volume of infringement at the location, etc.) to determine the online location at which the material or a link to the material resides and to appropriately consider whether use of the material identified in the notice in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent or the law. Using automated tools of various types to search for and send notices is a common practice to improve efficiency by notice senders who must search for numerous works across a wide variety of sites and services and send large volumes of notices. Use of such tools has evolved and will evolve over time. When using these sorts of automated tools, examples of current good practices include some combination of the following: - Particularly where automated takedown notices will be sent to a site based on metadata (e.g. keywords, titles, file size, etc.), conducting, in a manner reasonable under the circumstances, a human review of the site to which notices will be directed to ascertain whether the site is particularly likely or unlikely to be hosting or linking to infringing material. - Establishing search parameters the copyright owner or its agent believe will efficiently identify the unauthorized material while minimizing the inadvertent inclusion of authorized material; for example, in addition to searching on the title of the copyrighted work, using additional metadata (e.g. the type and size of file, etc.) where appropriate to help indicate whether material actually constitutes an unauthorized use of the copyrighted work; - Periodically conducting spot checks to evaluate whether the search parameters are returning the expected results, and adjusting the search parameters if needed are not as expected; and/or - If given sufficient information by the service provider to show that the notice sender’s systems for generating notices are resulting in significant numbers of notices being sent to the service provider that do not accurately identify the online location at which the infringing material or a link to the infringing material resides or that do not accurately identify the use of the material as unauthorized, making good-faith efforts to correct the issue, with assistance from the service provider as needed, when sending further notices to the service provider.
4. Guidelines for sending DMCA notices on behalf of other parties should be developed in accordance with these best practices."
https://www.uspto.gov/sites/default..._and_Situational_Practices_Document-FINAL.pdf


"(3)Elements of notification.—
(A)To be effective under this subsection, a notification of claimed infringement must be a written communication provided to the designated agent of a service provider that includes substantially the following:
(i)
A physical or electronic signature of a person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
(ii)
Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed, or, if multiple copyrighted works at a single online site are covered by a single notification, a representative list of such works at that site.
(iii)
Identification of the material that is claimed to be infringing or to be the subject of infringing activity and that is to be removed or access to which is to be disabled, and information reasonably sufficient to permit the service provider to locate the material.
(iv)
Information reasonably sufficient to permit the service provider to contact the complaining party, such as an address, telephone number, and, if available, an electronic mail address at which the complaining party may be contacted.
(v)
A statement that the complaining party has a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law.
(vi)
A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
(B)
(i)
Subject to clause (ii), a notification from a copyright owner or from a person authorized to act on behalf of the copyright owner that fails to comply substantially with the provisions of subparagraph (A) shall not be considered under paragraph (1)(A) in determining whether a service provider has actual knowledge or is aware of facts or circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent.
(ii)
In a case in which the notification that is provided to the service provider’s designated agent fails to comply substantially with all the provisions of subparagraph (A) but substantially complies with clauses (ii), (iii), and (iv) of subparagraph (A), clause (i) of this subparagraph applies only if the service provider promptly attempts to contact the person making the notification or takes other reasonable steps to assist in the receipt of notification that substantially complies with all the provisions of subparagraph (A)."
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/512

Bringing what the law says to you all.

 

First of all, the rights of the novels don't belong to the authors. Yep, they don't - not in this case, as they have signed a contract with Qidian and handed over the rights to them. Of course they will be remunerated, but that point of yours is already wrong. To continue, I would like to highlight that Qidian copied the translation of 20 novels from WW - 20 novels that was licensed by WW! They have paid huge amounts to Qidian to be able to publish those translations on their site. Whether or not that money is enough doesn't even matter, because Qidian agreed to sell it - they were not forced, they negotiated a price, they agreed. Not enough? Well, in that case they were stupid enough to sign a bad deal. As to how much of that licensing money ends up with the authors themselves, again, you have to ask Qidian, as it depends on the agreement between them and has nothing to do with the translators or WW.

But yeah, sure, Qidian is playing nice - they only want to take what WW have paid for and worked on for ages, discredit/defame Ren and WW, and possibly destroy WW in the process. If that doesn't give anyone the impression of being "nice"... then those people probably know what that word means.

 

There is something i don't clearly understand. I thought we were talking about "co-hosting". Since the contract is about "co-hosting", QI shouldn't have higher rights than WW right? QI asked to co-host 20 novel, and even if WW agreed, why do they have to delete the dixit novel from their website?

>w< Bruh I'm lost in this shit.

 

According to the sample contract from WW, they don't have the rights to the translations, the translators retain them. As such Qidian can't take those rights even if WW breached the contract. The only rights WW hold are the distribution/hosting rights. Qidian has the rights to the original Chinese works, but not the translations. They do have the rights to allow translations, but they cannot take the translated products and host them on their website without permission of both the translators and WW, since WW owns the hosting rights, and the translators own the IP rights to the translations themselves.

 

Exactly what this man here stated, it seems like people are stuck on the idea that WW actually agreed with QI to allow dual hosting and can not reveal why due to a NDA. However the point which everyone looks over is this right here.

 

QI said that WW agreed to the contract. So, let's pretend WW agreed.
The contract stipulated that QI could "co-host" 20 novels. So, if it's co-hosting, WW should be able to still host the 20 novels on their site.

Since they could still host them, QI don't have any logical explication for all this stuff.

 

I assume a company worth $1b won't make sh* up to lose a mill in damages, they have the best lawyers out there. They not liable to take down co-hosted novels as its up to the translators that would have to ask Qi to take down the novel due to WW not owning translation rights. However, by hiding behind WW they all get burned.

Qi poaching translators offering $50,000 yr 1st place reward.. is our community still going to be fan based or turn to translators who become corporate whores

 

They are still hosting 20 novels which are totally legal, DMCA was issued for 11 other illegal novel hosted By WW, WW sent email to Qi for them to show contract evidence stating they own this 11 illegal novels which is weird, as WW has direct email contact with Qi. Now WW just need to show no breach of contract and proof to being in process of acquiring legal contract of rights for new 11 novels(still illegal to publish). Thus avoiding damage and counter by taking Qi to courts for any breach of contract

 

That's some crazy stuff

 

Here's the thing.. Qidian stole all of the works as all of the rights to those translations are with the translators themselves. If Qidian wants to make themselves legit they would have to retranslate everything.

Well you would be wrong on that account as the parent company, Tencent, who owns Qidian was caught forging documents to smear a competitor.
By hiding behind WW they would get burned? No you don't seem to understand contracts and agreements here.. WW has exclusive license to the 20 novels and Ren claims that they also have in writing to have framework layout with an oral agreement to take on more projects to add later. When talks fell through those agreements are still binding no matter what Qidian thinks about it. Which is why when it goes to court it will be in court for a long long time.

 

Companies do illegal acts all the time, especially when it comes to contract disputes. Double so when they are large and can effectively play a bigstack bully, and try to get the other party to fold when they can't afford the litigation. Qi just needs grounds for their position, and then can argue it out in court. It doesn't need to be good grounds.

Aslo, er, the translators 100% can ask to have QI take down the novel, as long as QI is unlawfully using their translation. Authorized or not, the translation is owned by the translator. Also WW Does have the translating rights, or more specifically the rights to publish a translation, for the 20 novels that QI is stealing the translations from.

 

What I remember is that WW agreed with the initial contract, but then QI inserted shaddy clauses in the contract that WW disagreed to. (basically making QI the boss and WW a slave)

 

No, WW got the licensing agreement already done.. The shady clauses that are being talked about was the investment into WW that Qidian wanted.. Ren said no and Qidian broke off all contact.

 

I don't know how if this works in other countries, but in the UK a copyright holder can get a court order that states a ISP can ban people from accessing websites that host illegally shared items (usually movies/ tv shows).

But if the copyright holders can get something similar in the US, QI would more likely be forced to remove the stolen novels, rather than deal with 40% of their traffic being banned from accessing their website.

 

ohh

At least I got the shady clauses right

 

DMCA's can be issued, but those can be worked around. WW is moving servers to avoid this, and Webnovel is hosted by tencent.

Otherwise, they need to get a court order, and they don't want to do that yet. WW has arbitration options to go through first, and wants to build up a 125k plus warchest before going to court. It's not a cheap process.

 

Sigh this reminds me of the battle between Arpen (ww) and Haven (qidian) kingdoms. Haven is trying to take over the continent (qidian the novel market) using hostile methods while Arpen is for the users (readers). There is a clear good and bad but just because haven is dropping the tax (qidian allowing us the read without a paywall) doesn't mean they won't raise it like a motherf*ck*r if they win (huge paywall). Don't be fooled once they have control of the market our opinions/voice will no longer have weight.

 

Hello community of fellow consumers, new member joined this site just to let people know some of my opinions( Because they are really importan)

I started out with reading korean novel LMS really good book i was hooked on novels after that, i basically dropped all the manga i was reading at that point in time. I was later enlightened about Chinese novels which are really good and addictive ;P the one that got me into this drug was MGA at Flowerbridgebatoto if i remember correctly(for the most part i don't). Which later got transfered to WXW and it was there my CN novel journey of binge reading late nights and missing some school days just to get up to date with the translation, which by the way was splendid by my standards.

Couple years go by and this new site called Qidian gets promo from WXW if i remember correctly, i didn't know what it was at the time. Basically Ren announced something about copyrights and partnering up possibly with this Chinese novel site which he recommended.
So i clicked in to the site and it was all basically in Chinese. I dismissed the thing about Qidian from my mind until some weeks or month ago when i read on WXW about Qidian trying to fuck them over royally. At first i was scared the site was gonna get shut down, and all the translations would stop so i tried to be in the loop about this Qidian thing whenever i had the time. It wasn't until yesterday that i found this forum(Amazing thing by the way). So i started readin all the posts by both sides and got pretty worked up about this.

And then one thing in particular annoyed me to the point i had to make this account and say my piece.
One of the mods on this website called Brasca something something, started out with a comment about being neutral(which i thought was fair play by said person). But then i see that said person doesn't understand neutrality, if you are neutral u do not keep commenting(Plural) on the said subject. I believe this person should choose to support whichever side she thinks is right or wrong or just keep from commenting because that is not being neutral at all.

Example: WHO THE FOOK IS THIS GUY!!!

" I am gone with the wind, Just like a Fart"

PS: Ren good luck my friend i sincerely hope you get the better outcome out of this situation.
And you should think about starting a website and other stuff aimed at Europe and America and other civilized countries where lawsuits scare people. You can ban all Ips from China like some websites that show television shows, you can't watch because you are not included in the sites programed country list. <<<Doing this may prevent them from stealing your translated works, i don't actually know if this is feasible.