Music industry sues Yahoo! China – (not) a repeat of Baidu?

The music industry has filed a much anticipated, or at least expected, law suit against Alibaba which runs Yahoo! China. The Shanghai Daily mentions eleven plaintiffs in a suit led by the IFPI. The suit relates to copyright infringements on music, lyrics and ringtones and requests approximately $700,000 in damages, which seems low, but relates to a couple of hundred songs.

So won’t this just be another Baidu? Well the original Baidu case was filed in 2005, prior to The Protection of the Right of Communication Through a Network legislation which came into force on July 1st 2006. The legislation effectively outlaws deep-linking to infringing content. So the Alibaba/Yahoo! case will be argued on a different legislative footing against the backdrop of an appeal by the IFPI on the Baidu ruling. Incidentally the IFPI had been sure to win Baidu last year given a decision in 2005 against Baidu in a similar case brought by Push Music (an EMI subsidiary). This shortly before Google ditched it’s share-holding in Baidu.  Just to show how fast the business world moves you may recall that EMI pulled out of the IFPI action against Baidu to forge a partnership. 

Funnily enough back in 2005 Yahoo! China was suing Baidu over unfair competition.

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