According to Changjiang Daily, in view of the rights protection of Zhou xiuluan, the wife of Zhao Dexin, a retired professor of Zhongnan University of economics and law, the court ruled that the compensation for a single article of HowNet ranged from 2100 yuan to 2400 yuan. HowNet appealed against the excessive amount of compensation. Recently, the Beijing Intellectual Property Court rejected HowNet's appeal in the second instance and made a final judgment upholding the original judgment.
After retired professor Zhao Dexin sued HowNet to protect his rights, his wife Zhou xiuluan also chose to protect his rights. The court decided to compensate Zhou xiuluan for a single article of HowNet ranging from 2100 yuan to 2400 yuan. HowNet appealed against the excessive amount of compensation.
Previously, according to media reports, because more than 100 articles were included in China HowNet unknowingly, readers need to pay for downloading, but they have never received royalties. In August 2020, Zhao Dexin chose to sue for rights protection.
Zhao Dexin revealed that he has prosecuted more than 160 cases in total, starting from 2016 at the earliest. All cases have won, with a total compensation of more than 700000. At present, the compensation has been fully paid.
It is worth mentioning that HowNet once said that if the compensation is based on the standard of 200 yuan / 1000 words of Professor Zhao Dexin of Zhongnan University of economics and law, HowNet's works in the library will be compensated by about 120 billion yuan.
There are four main controversial issues in these 10 cases: whether the network reading and downloading services provided by HowNet constitute infringement; Whether the sued use of HowNet constitutes a legal license; Whether zhouxiuluan obtained evidence from different communication ports and prosecuted them separately constituted repeated litigation; Whether the judgment of the court of first instance on the amount of economic losses and reasonable expenses that HowNet should compensate is reasonable.
For the above disputes, the court held that: HowNet infringed Zhou xiuluan's right to information network communication of the works involved, and should bear the liability for tort compensation; The act that HowNet uploads the works involved and allows network users to download does not constitute a legal license for the reprint of periodicals; The scope of transmission of different terminals is different, and the damage caused and the scope of compensation that can be claimed are also different. It is not improper for Zhou xiuluan to notarize and obtain evidence and file lawsuits respectively; The court of first instance supported reasonable expenses such as lawyer's fees and notarization fees after equal sharing, with sufficient basis and appropriate amount.
In the second instance, the Beijing Intellectual Property Court held that the facts in the first instance judgment were clear and the application of law was correct, which should be maintained; The appeal of HowNet cannot be established and shall be rejected. According to item (1) of paragraph 1, article 177 of the Civil Procedure Law of the people's Republic of China, the Beijing Intellectual Property Court made the final judgment of "rejecting the appeal and upholding the original judgment"
Some netizens roast that "if you can take it in, you can't take it out" and "when we write papers and check literature, HowNet didn't cry for poverty".
Some netizens also said that HowNet is "unjust and lack of help".