Apple Forced to Pay 1.03 Million Yuan / $165,000 to eBook Publishers [WSJ]

In a copyright dispute involving several Chinese writers Apple has been ordered to cough up over a million Yuan, or roughly $165,000 in settlement fees.

The suit had been ongoing for a while but it seems a Beijing court has ordered the Mac maker to compensate eight writers and two publishing companies for having violated their copyrights, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The exact sum paid to all parties was 1.03 million Yuan, or about $165,000, according to the paper.

The settlement was for selling unlicensed iBooks through iTunes, according to Xinhua, a Chinese news agency which reported Thursday that the Beijing No. 2 Intermediate People’s Court was behind the order.

Just to make one matter clear, Apple wasn’t ripping off any copyrighted works. It was the authors of several unlicensed titles that submitted their content through the iBookstore for sale. Since Apple is the intermediate, it got a slap on the wrist as well for not making sure the material was genuine.