Apple is facing legal troubles for “promoting” the iPhone as an eBook reader.

Ever since the Kindle launched people have been saying the iPhone does the job just as well, if not better, for one reason or another. There’s more than one application available for iPhones that lets you read electronic books on the phone (one of the more popular being Stanza as well as an official Kindle application) and it seems a foreign communications company sees Apple’s decision to allow this kind of application in the App Store as endorsement that the phone can double as an eBook reader.

AppleInsider today reports that an overseas communications company is suing Apple for promoting the iPhone as a touchscreen book reader. MONEC claims that over seven years ago it patented the concept of a lightweight electronic device with an LCD touchscreen and dimensions that allow for approximately one page of a book to be illustrated at normal size.

To us, this sounds like your run of the mill, money grabbing lawsuit and this company is more than likely chancing its arm. We’re also confused as to how MONEC thinks the iPhone can illustrate the page of a book at “normal size.” We also think it's silly to say by allowing the applications into the App Store catalog that Apple was promoting it. We'll keep you posted but we don't think this case is going to go anywhere.