Beijing Internet Court opened its first trial on Oct 30, 2018, with President Zhang Wen, as the presiding judge. 

Beijing Microvision Horizon Technology Co Ltd, the plaintiff and owner of short video app Douyin, or Tik Tok, sued Baidu Online Network Technology (Beijing) Co Ltd and Beijing Baidu Netcom Science and Technology Co Ltd for infringement of copyright. The defendants had published a short video made by a Douyin user on their own video app Huopai without permission, and allowed the users of Huopai to download it.

The plaintiff sought an order that the defendants should publish an apology at a prominent position on the homepage of Baidu.com and the homepage of Huopai Small Video for 24 hours to eliminate the impact, as well as pay compensation of 1 million yuan ($149,082) for its economic loss and 50,000 yuan for other reasonable expenses, plus costs.

The defendants argued that the video involved was not original and did not constitute a work under the Copyright Law, and so was not protected.

The judicial panel conducted a detailed investigation into relevant issues, including whether the video involved constituted a work, whether the parties as identified were competent to sue, and whether the circumstances of the case created an infringement.

The trial, which lasted for about 150 minutes, was well-controlled and progressed smoothly. The trial was conducted online, so the parties were spared attending a physical court. It attracted 16,000 online viewers.

The court has not yet given its verdict.