Novel Bin Chapter 376 - Battle of the Young Masters (Part Eleven)
Chapter 376: Battle of the Young Masters (Part Eleven)
Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
Actually, initially, according to the usual procedures, it would take at least 15 days or more from the lodging of the complaint till the court trial. But the matter this time was exceptional.
Because this time, the amount of money involved was too huge.
Currently, Hong Dali’s smartphone reading app had earned a daily net profit of more than 6 million. The more this case was dragged on, the higher the amount involved in malfeasance. Thus, this time, Tianjing Supreme People’s Court totally gave the green light throughout, and it only took one day from the receipt of the complaint till the start of the trial.
The next day, at 9:00 AM, countless people woke up very early and hurriedly washed up. Large groups of people streamed towards Tianjing City’s People’s Court to join in the hearing of the case of the century.
Passerby One: “Have you heard of it? This court hearing today can be seen as the biggest copyright infringement case in recent years!”
Passerby Two: “Of course, yesterday night I saw the news. Am I not here now? Aiya, it’s really serious this time, it’s said that the amount of money involved in this copyright infringement case is so huge that every day it gets dragged on costs a few million!”
Passerby Three: “Of course, I heard that the number of installations of Zhong Dian website’s smartphone reading app has already reached close to 40 million! And then Feng Yun website got jealous and copied it. Sigh, it really doesn’t have any bottom line!”
While the passersby were engaged in discussions, the authors called over by Zhong Dian website’s five Supreme Gods had arrived.
Author One: “He must win today! Feng Yun website really doesn’t have any bottom line, poaching people over, selling the copyrights, and now they’ve even created a pirated app... They definitely can’t be easily pardoned!”
Author Two: “Yes, Young Master’s moral quality is awesome! We have to support him no matter what! We can’t let them continue having their way!”
Author Three: “Damn it, for this matter, I didn’t even update my book and came over here. He must win today!”
Author Four: “Yes yes, must win! Brothers, after the win, let’s go and have a drink!”
While the various people were engaged in discussions, on the other side, reporters from various websites had also come upon hearing news of the case. They carried all their equipment and represented the names of their various websites, gathered together and waited for the hearing to start.
Very soon, at 9:00 AM, when the main door of Tianjing City’s People’s Court opened, countless people madly rushed inside for fear of being unable to grab a seat. The security guards at the court were like rice straws being cut down by a scythe, and they were instantly hit by the people barging in till they stumbled here and there. After order had been maintained, the entire place could be said to be full of people even at the passageways, and the 20,000 seats were all filled.
Afterward, the joint regulatory board arrived. They were formed by eight judges with practicing qualifications in Tianjing City, and they were all respected people. Expressionless, their emotions couldn’t be perceived. Dressed neatly in judge’s robes, they walked to their respective seats and sat down.
The listeners below were engaged in discussions, “Quickly look, quickly look, it’s the regulatory board! There are eight judges! One... Two... Three... Oh god, I know six of them!” “I know five of them. What the heck, they’re all outstanding people, there’s a good show to watch today!” “I know all eight of them. Estimating conservatively, altogether, they’ve been the judges for close to 30,000 and more cases. They’re all extremely experienced! As expected, it’s the trial of the century, impressive!”
The eight judges took their seats. Then, the jurors arrived, and the lineup was super luxurious. Almost all the upper-class people in the entire Tianjing City had arrived, and there were plutocrats and influential people from all parts of the world.
Hong Weiguo, Mu Tie, and Liu Yihui were impressively in the list. The energy tycoons, smartphone communications, and other members of the family as well. Anyway, the juror team this time had more than 40 people and was sufficient to break the record of the past court trial cases!
After everyone had taken their positions, the presiding judge on the rostrum took the wooden mallet in his hand and used it to fiercely hit the table. “Silence!”
The entire room instantly became silent.
The case this time was really too impactful. Even the judge couldn’t help but act careful and prudent. Very soon, the trial started. “The plaintiff Zhong Dian website sues the accused Feng Yun website for piracy and copyright infringement. Now, may I invite both parties to speak. The plaintiff, please!”
“Your Honor!” The plaintiff, Zhong Dian website’s Zhang Wenyang, was sloppily dressed. Once he heard that the trial had started, tears instantly trickled down continuously as if he’d put eye drops. “Your Honor, you must serve justice for me!” He spoke like a peasant in ancient times crying out of injustice. “I was initially a small manager at Tianjing West Fourth Loop. It wasn’t easy that Young Master made an app, but alas, this group of despicable and mean people created a pirated version of our app, and it had a very deep impact on us, your Honor!” This fellow spoke as if he were reciting a poem...
After he’d said all these, the listeners below instantly started whispering and discussing.
“It’s Manager Zhang from Zhong Dian website, haha. This fellow is really like what others say him to be—sloppy like a beggar.”
“That’s only his outer appearance, this fellow is very capable. He has a huge credit for making Zhong Dian website get so far!”
“Mm, we can’t judge a book by its cover. This is very apt when it comes to him!”
After Zhang Wenyang finished speaking, the lawyer for Feng Yun website started to loudly retort!
“You’re lying, it’s a false accusation!” Feng Yun’s lawyer exclaimed, “We didn’t create a pirated version of your smartphone reading app! That’s all false accusations, Your Honor! They can’t say that just because they have an app and we have one too, ours is called the pirated one, right?! Our Feng Yun app only has a small portion of similarity with their smartphone app, but it’s a common source code that’s present in similar softwares. It’s not a knockoff at all!”
Speaking up to this point, the listeners below didn’t know which party to support.
After all, what both of them said was reasonable. It was indeed very common for source codes to have a similar portion.
“Actually, what he says makes sense. There are many similar softwares, so it really can’t be said that those with more or less of the same functions are pirated ones.”
“Makes sense, let’s see what Zhong Dian website’s side says!”
“Silence!” The judge pounded his gavel. “Plaintiff, what evidence do you have?”
“Your Honor, I have a complete document of comparison and analysis here.” Just then, the lawyer for Zhong Dian website spoke. “This is the final conclusion that our company has obtained through careful and prudent comparisons and obtaining of evidence, and reading the source codes of both parties. Your Honor, please take a look.”
As he spoke, he took out a document file and handed it to the judge.
After the eight experienced judges had taken a quick look at the document, they nodded in unison. One person said, “Mm, it’s indeed written very clearly on the document and marked very clearly as well. It can be handed over to the examiner.”
After hearing this, Feng Yun’s lawyer was very agitated, as he loudly shouted, “This is premeditated, you’re planning to tamper with the information!”
Zhong Dian’s lawyer let out a cough as he smiled and said, “Justice has long arms. You need to produce evidence to say that we’re doing something premeditated. Don’t forget that in order to prevent you from tampering with the program at the last minute, we’ve specially downloaded your app. They are all in the documents.”
Now that things had progressed to this stage, Feng Yun website was undoubtedly in a very passive position. Once this information was proven to be accurate, then their faces would undoubtedly be smacked very hard.
As expected, the faces of that Feng Yun’s lawyer and his team were as green and bitter as bitter gourd.
Alas, unexpectedly, when the examiner came back, his voice was very deep and low, as he whispered, “Your Honor, the examination results are out. The source code on this piece of information does have many similarities, but...” Speaking up to this point, the examiner slowly shook his head. “It hasn’t reached 60%. Because, a portion of the source code belongs to a public source code, which any similar program would contain, so it can’t be used as evidence.”
Once he said this, everyone burst into an uproar!
The similarity between Feng Yun website’s smartphone Feng Yun app and Zhong Dian website’s smartphone reading app hadn’t reached 60%. That meant that they couldn’t be charged for piracy!
“Hahahaha, like what I said, our Feng Yun app was completely developed by ourselves, it’s not pirated at all!” Once the results of the analysis were out, Feng Yun website’s lawyer instantly laughed heartily and loudly said, “According to Heavenly State’s ‘Internet piracy legislation law’ regulation number 183, as long as the level of similarity does not exceed 60%, it’s not counted as a pirated version! So we are not guilty!”
Once he said this, the listeners below started to engage in whispers. But this time, it wasn’t as one-sided as before. “Why is it like that? Could it be that they really didn’t do it?” “Impossible, if there’s no concrete evidence, why would Zhong Dian website sue them?” “I think this is hard to say for sure, it’s also possible that Zhong Dian’s side is jealous that Feng Yun is earning money?” “Yes, yes, don’t push all the problems to Feng Yun, it might be possible that Zhong Dian is jealous. There are many uncertain things in the business world!”
Hearing the discussions between the listeners around, Feng Yun’s lawyer secretly gave a thumbs-up to a person in the team.
That person was stony-faced. He was dressed in a gray suit and was about 55 to 56 years old. He was very skinny and small in size.
Ordinary people didn’t know what kind of person he was, but those who really knew him were all very aware of his impressive tricks!
This person was Toyoda Conglomerate’s chief barrister, Wada Nakamasa!
Since he’d arrived at Tianjing last night by taking the fastest personal jet, his first step was to contact Ko Gohon, and then search for every possible loophole! Eventually, he was sure that since Hong Dali’s side dared to file a complaint, they would definitely have acquired a special trick—altering a small portion of the source code of the smartphone reading app!
Though currently, there were already close to 30 to 40 million installations of the smartphone reading app, thus they couldn’t alter a large amount of the source code, but as long as they altered a small portion of it, that’d definitely do! There was even no need for them to install it once again, they only needed to slightly alter a small portion of the source code and make it 60% and above similar to Feng Yun app!
After all, Zhong Dian website was the first to register for the patent, and their Feng Yun app came out later. Thus, there was a difference in timing, and people would have first impressions and thus not suspect Zhong Dian website’s app. And indeed, their side had not been able to research on this situation in time, thus changed their tactic—Bribery!
It was bribery! Simple, yet very effective, as long as it was done secretly.
And in fact, since he was the chief lawyer for Toyoda Conglomerate, Wada Nakamasa was very familiar with this aspect. He directly invested 10 million and bribed the entire team of examiners. His request was very simple—they didn’t need to tamper with anything, they only needed to, after the trial had started, point out that a portion of the source code was public and thus couldn’t be used as evidence!