Is Beijing Law Firm Violating Copyright Laws?
My blog assistant (everyone should have one) just e-mailed me to ask if I had seen the relatively new Blawg of China. I had not, so I followed the link he gave me and was instantly shocked. This blog's design appears to be a direct rip-off of my law firm's website, which our Russian design team Fokadan/3dots.ru had copyrighted.
Compare my firm's website, here with the Blawg of China, here. What do you think? Seems awfully close to me. Is this a counterfeit? A fake? Why would one law firm do this to another?
Looks to me like there is a big problem here and I am going to be contacting our friends at Fokadan to advise them of this situation.
Copyright violation or not, I would have expected better.
Comments (11)
Read through and enter the discussion by using the form at the endSteven - April 26, 2006 12:25 AM
If your design was copyrighted, I think you can sue that firm.
Its web says it has more than 100 layers in its firm.
http://www.lehmanlaw.com/
This is its web.
China Law Blog - April 26, 2006 12:32 AM
Steven -- The rights to the design actually belong to the web design firm that did our site back in 2004, not to us. We own the rights to the content.
I am just hoping the publicity on this will cause them to change their design.
Dan
IP Dragon - April 26, 2006 2:06 AM
It depends, in some jurisdictions such as that of the PRC, the licensee can exercise rights if the copyright owner gave him permission or if they have already agreed upon it by contract.
See the amended copyright of the PRC, 2001,
article 26:
"The other party shall not, without permission from the copyright owner, exercise any right that the copyright owner has not expressly licensed or assigned in the licensing and assignment contract."
Cheers,
IP Dragon
panasianbiz - April 26, 2006 8:49 AM
It looks like thievery to me. I would expect more from a company whose business it is to understand the law rather than violate it.
Keep us posted, China Law.
Steven - April 27, 2006 5:32 AM
Have they shut down the blawg?
Interesting!
Lohr - April 27, 2006 9:58 AM
Looks like Lehman Lee & Xu launched a new site. This was the right thing to do.
China Law Blog - April 27, 2006 10:07 AM
Jason/Steven -- Lehman Lee redsigned their blog and, frankly, I think it looks better than before. The old (Harris & Moure/Fokadan) design was too stodgy for a blog anyway. Go to Nick's (n) Line Life to see Lehman's old blog design as compared with my firm's website: http://www.n-line.co.uk/2006/04/26/china_lawyers_unsure_of_copyright_laws/
Kevin Fisher - April 27, 2006 7:39 PM
I think it fair for you to have expected better. I'm Kevin Fisher, one of the people that post on LLX's blogs, and I'm very, very sorry about what has happened--as is our entire firm.
As you may know, when we found out about the fact that our sites were so similar, we immediately changed our blog's design. We had asked our web designers to update our blog and did not know that they had copied your web page.
Again, we sincerely apologize. And, believe me, we will double and triple check our new web pages for originality.
China Law Blog - April 28, 2006 12:47 AM
Kevin -- No hard feelings. None. I initially figured that was the case, but when nobody responded to my e-mail I went on the offensive. I do think your blog looks better now anyway (nice job changing it so quickly) and I am sure I will be linking to it from time to time in the future.
Josh Hallett - May 1, 2006 6:39 PM
Glad to see things got worked out.
China Law Blog - May 2, 2006 10:45 AM
Thanks Josh.
Josh designed this blog so nobody better copy this either!