French News Agency Sues Google News

n1ywb writes "CNN and others are reporting that 'News agency Agence France Presse has sued Google Inc., alleging the Web search leader includes AFP's photos, news headlines and stories on its news site without permission. The French news service is seeking damages of at least $17.5 million and an order barring Google News from displaying AFP photographs, news headlines or story leads, according to the suit filed Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.' This means they're suing in America this time, not France, which means Google might actually care if they lose."

Comments

AFP will be the ones to lose

[Tet]

Even if they're successful, AFP will be the losers here. Why can't people see that far from stealing their customers, Google drives visitors to their sites? By removing themselves from Google, all AFP will do is reduce their number of visitors, and hence the overall value of their site. This is particularly strange as AFP sells subscription based premium content, which isn't available to the masses anyway. Thus the only parts of the site that Google will be able to index are the loss leaders that they use to try and entice people to subscribe. As a business, I'd have thought you'd want that content to be made available to a wider audience at no extra cost to you...

Re:AFP will be the ones to lose

[Surazal]

Fair use allows Google to do Google News in the first place. Sure, some people may *want* that control. That doesn't mean they automatically get it. Also, Google News does not have ads, check for yourself: yourself

It's that kind of thinking that got SCO in its current position. I honestly don't think AFP has a chance on this one. That's my personal opinion. :^)

Disclaimer: I am not a blah blah blah...

Re:AFP will be the ones to lose

[Stonehand]

I'm not at all positive that fair use applies.

It's not personal use; it's being redistributed to the whole world.

It's not editorial use, because Google isn't writing -about- the articles.

It's not educational use, because there's no broader educational context in which Google can claim to be using this for teaching or research purposes.

And it's commercial, because they're using this to get viewers to access their other services which DO have advertising, as eyeballs are their business model.

Re:AFP will be the ones to lose

[jacksonj04]

robots.txt?

Re:AFP will be the ones to lose

[Surazal]

I'm not at all positive that fair use applies.
It's not personal use; it's being redistributed to the whole world.
It's not editorial use, because Google isn't writing -about- the articles.
It's not educational use, because there's no broader educational context in which Google can claim to be using this for teaching or research purposes.
And it's commercial, because they're using this to get viewers to access their other services which DO have advertising, as eyeballs are their business model.

If the facts are as simple as you say then this will be one very short court case. ;^)

Re:AFP will be the ones to lose

[sjames]

Shouldn't you have a right to tell them to remove the ad?

They have every right to declere their wishes using robots.txt. Why they don't do that is an open question.

Way too many suits like this are nothing more than companies refusing to follow the conventions of the web. It's analogous to the conventions for entering a business. That is, if the door isn't locked, the lights are on, and no sign saying closed is on the door, we presume we may enter freely. It's not reasonable to sue someone for not knocking first under those conditions.

Security! Security!

[Faust7]

AFP sells subscriptions to its content and does not provide it free. Google News gathers photos and news stories from around the Web and posts them on its news site, which is free to users.

If Agence France Presse didn't want people to view their content for free... ...why didn't they properly lock it down?

It's not like Google's impersonating a paid user account to get the information!

Re:Security! Security!

[ccady]

One word: Copyright. It doesn't matter that I let people see it: it's the right to make a copy that's being enforced here.

Re:Security! Security!

[Keruo]

from AFP website:

Copyright:
©AFP 2005 . All rights reserved. Users may download and print extracts of contents from this website for personal and non-commercial use only, provided they do not remove any copyright, trademarks or other proprietary notices. Except as provided above, users may not reproduce, publish, sell, distribute or in any way commercially exploit contents from this website without the prior written consent of AFP. AFP and its logo are registered trademarks.

I think that locks it down properly. Google just violated their copyright by reproducing and publishing their content without consent.

Re:Security! Security!

[InsaneGeek]

Linux is free but it has restrictions as to redistribution rights, etc. Microsoft cannot take the free linux kernel and incorporate that into their product while ignoring the GPL restrictions that were put on the free download.

Just because you put it up on a website without a password, doesn't mean that there are not restrictions on it's use.

Re:Security! Security!

[srleffler]

I disagree. If google puts a tag on its page which loads an image from AFP's publicly accessible server they have neither reproduced nor distributed the content. They have simply provided a reference to AFP's image, which the consumer's browser loads and displays in the middle of google's page. Google has done nothing but point to a location where the image can be found. It is the consumer who has actually downloaded the image from AFP. If AFP doesn't like this, they need to adjust their server not to provide images to people who aren't viewing an AFP page, or take other technical measures to prevent google from indexing news on their site.

Re:Security! Security!

[srleffler]

That isn't actually true. As the copyright owner, they are free to put their work in a place where the public can see it. They still have the right to deny people the right to copy it and do whatever they want with it. The lack of a technical measure to prevent you from doing something does NOT automatically mean that you have the right to do it, anymore than an unlocked door entitles you to enter and take whatever you want.

It's not clear to me, though that Google has actually done anything that infringes on AFP's copyright. It's not an infringement to make a reference to a copyrighted work, only to copy it.

AFP's prime business isn't their web site

[no parity]

They're a press agency, selling content to newspapers, and -- tada -- web sites. Of course they're not happy about google taking what they sell, for free.

Re:AFP's prime business isn't their web site

[The Cisco Kid]

How is Google able to access the paid portions of AFP's site without paying?

Simple answer - they cant, and arent. Google only has access to the information that AFP is providing to the public *FOR FREE*. If AFP does not want to provide that information free, they can arrange that by making the proper adjustments to their site.

Heck, if they even want to be snippy, and not provide it *just* to Google, it would take 10 minutes with a robots.txt, or a user-agent check, to block Google from accessing their site. It sounds to me they are more interested in suing than in preventing Google from using them. Or perhaps they dont want to block Google from accessing them, but they want to force Google to pay for doing so.

Re:AFP's prime business isn't their web site

[Cletus the yokel]

"They're a press agency, selling content to newspapers, and -- tada -- web sites. Of course they're not happy about google taking what they sell, for free."

Hmmm. So, they want to block Google news from displaying its headlines. those headlines are displayed on the electronic editions of thousands of newspapers and news sites, worldwide. This leads us to 3 options:
1) It's too difficult to ensure AFP headlines are filtered out. Google News is shut down or signigantly neutered.
2) AFP headlines are filtered out. AFP loses market share and relevance
3) (really, a result of 2) News sites avoid AFP like the plague - they don't much like the idea of AFP driving page views *away* from their sites.

AFP's douchitude affects much more than AFP. It affects their customers (the newspapers). It would do them well to remember that.

Re:AFP's prime business isn't their web site

[vanicat]

How is Google able to access the paid portions of AFP's site without paying?

AFP is selling content to other site. Those sites put the content they have paid for on the free part of their site. Then Google take those information, and put them for free in google news...

AFP is selling content that you can put on your site to attract a public. But to legaly display this content you have to pay AFP, even if other site are putting this content for free on the web.

The search engines need a blacklist

[ShatteredDream]

MSN, Yahoo and Google need to blacklist any company that sues them over something this stupid from ever being returned favorably in their results again. There is no reason that this French company's news should be returned now when any source from the U.S., Canada, Britain, Germany, etc. is availible on the same topic.

Re:The search engines need a blacklist

[Anonymous Coward]

If any search engine censors ANY results, instantly they become an unreliable search engine. As who knows what else they would censor.

Sigh...

[kclittle]

Another example of the growing and insidious meme "since digitial information is so easy to steal, it must be OK to do so".

Uh, it's not.

Re:robots.txt

[Anonymous Coward]

Legally speaking, there is absolutely no reason why I should have to put a robots.txt file on my site to keep my copyrighted information from being illegally duplicated by Google.

Or would you like to have to put a police.txt file on your door to prevent arbitrary search and seizure?

Re:Damages?

[PktLoss]

Google's income, or lack there of, is irrelevant. If you steal my car, and let all your friends drive it for free, but by doing so prevent me from going to work I can sue you for damages, my lost wages.

What is important is the preceived lost income by AFP, not Google's possible income by replicating the news.

A possible leverage point for litigation may be if AFP photos were being used beside a headline from another news source. In which case AFP may argue (and IMHO rightfully so) that their photography enticed the user to investigate the story, but they were not the recipiants of the revenue generating click.

Re:Damages?

[antifoidulus]

Actually, Google news is still in "beta" and it has been for a long time, so they don't actually sell ads. People speculate that one of the reasons that Google news has been in beta for so long is they don't know how they would work the copyright issue if they were a commercial service.....

But it ignores the obvious

[tkrotchko]

When you attach your web server to the internet, you're letting everyone look at it.

Part of that process is that people will look at it, classify it and judge it.

It inherent in attaching a web server. If you don't like it, the best thing to do is unplug the ethernet cable from your web server, and tell people to dial directly (or through Minitel) to your server, because you feel that putting it on the internet places you in a difficult position.

I don't see how you can have it both ways...they want wide exposure, so they place it in the most public place on the planet, then they complain that it isn't viewed in precisely the way they envisioned.

I really don't understand the beef.

Re:But it ignores the obvious

[cbr2702]

But we're talking about a news agency, not a website. They provide content to large numbers of companies that publish newspapers and sites. But they retain copyright.

Re:Damages?

[The Cisco Kid]

You analogy is invalid. Google isnt depriving the French news site of its stories.

A better analogy would be that you are an auto rental firm, and Google is telling people that ask that you have the cars they are interested in, and to contact you to rent cars from you. How could this possible be undesirable to you?

In essence they are getting free advertising from Google. Google should apoligize for not charging them, send them a bill, and stop returning hits/links to their news site until the bill is paid.

Re:Damages?

[Anonymous Coward]

If Google News comes out of beta it wouldn't surprise me if the page would include google ads.

Quite possibly, yes. However, I'm not aware of many jurisdictions in the USA where it's possible to successfully sue someone for something they might possibly one day do. Normally, if you want damages, it's considered polite to wait for someone to damage you first, right?

Re:Napoleonic Code

[rimmon]

OK, will the morons who voted this interesting please stand up so we can all have good laugh?
Or maybe you're right: It is kind of interesting what bullshit some people either make up or really believe.
Anyway, parent is a total moron...

Reality check

[mattr]

caveat I'm develop search engines and also worked in a photo agency for some years like AFP.

Bottom line: AFP is right but Google's lack of ads or even full stories on the page should save them.

I just looked at Google News and noticed there is a photo that goes to a story, but there is no photo on the page it links to. The photo must have come from some other news source and the caption "Boston Globe" got pasted below it as a link.

This is maybe good for layout but is contrary to what a photographer would be used to seeing. It probably got them pissed off.

I doubt Google is knowingly copying from AFP. I think they grab any photos they can find. But they will probably find a lot of quality AFP photos. The problem is you don't know who they got it from. And the lack of attribution. That is how AFP makes their money: Copyright control. And guess what? Google uses the work of AFP photographers to make a more visually interesting page for a service that is both free and worth enough money to make an IPO.

Well, this was bound to happen. AFP can probably prove it was an AFP photo, but cannot prove Google copied it from them (and Google likely didn't). It would be useful to include metadata in the photos as to proper credit, url, and policy.

Probably AFP contacted Google, got rebuffed, and then AFP realized that if they don't fight it they will lose control over their online future. Which is true.

But this is really a search engine - you can't actually read the articles there but need to surf elsewhere - and there are no ads, so it can be said that this is a free service.

Anyway it walks a fine line between a search engine and a publication, and the best thing would be if Google could actually sign a contract with Reuters and AFP say, and show large, high quality photos on their site. They could also pay photographers and writers directly which is of course the next step, when Google really goes for the throat. For now it is just a search engine, and Google should be free to make a dynamic layout any way they want, except that it should show accreditation (if in the photo file itself) at least as a mouseover popup label.

I'm not going to guess the outcome, but hope AFP loses badly, otherwise it will be chilling. They ought to be able to demand that Google not index a photo that has an AFP byline embedded in it, but that too is an interpretation we'll have to wait and see about.

Re:Reality check

[Xyrus]

"and show large, high quality photos on their site."

Speaking of reality checks, I think you need one. Google news is popular because even for people with low bandwidth it comes up quickly. You cover that page with hi quality images and you'll lose a good portion of your audience because it takes "forever" to load.

What Google displays are low-quality replicas of images. I highly doubt any reasonable judge would say they're breaking copyright.

For AFP, it will be a lose lose situation. If they win, Google will blacklist them and AFP will lose a major source of those precious button clicks. If they lose...well they lose.

Don't bite the hand that feeds you, especially when it is the #1 MOST POPULAR SEARCH ENGINE ON THE PLANET.

~X~

The beginning of end of news agencies?

[say]

Maybe this isn't a simple issue of publicity or drawing easy cash from Google, but a last attempt to win a juridical last resort against the inevitable death of news agencies?

As the web continues it's march towards becoming the primary news source, and remains free-and-open, news agencies will suffer. Recently, Norway's second largest newspaper Dagbladet opted out of a new contract with the national news agency NTB. Although they did make a deal with ANB, a smaller and cheaper agency, the ratio of articles directly from the agencies seem to fall quite quickly.

And it makes sense. Why pay a lot for content you can receive for free? Journalism in the information world is cheap, because you don't need to travel much to get a good overview. Blogs and online newspapers are much cheaper to make and distribute than paper papers (heh). As journalism and distribution becomes cheaper, the need for agencies diminishes.

So a last resort for the agencies could be making it impossible to aggregate news through portals. They're trying to halt development, to avoid the inevitable, or at least get payed for their inconvenience. I hope they lose, although I'm a little nostalgic on the paper papers behalf too.

Re:Don't go there!

[truesaer]

A Robot trawling the site and a news aggregator specifically reusing headlines, content and images from the site are two completely different things. Just because AFP doesnt disallow the googlebot from trawling doesnt mean they give up the copyright to the content.

I fail to see the distinction. If you crawl their website just for the search page, then when I type in search terms that hit on their site in the regular search box I'm going to get the title of their site as a blue link, and some of the text that was on the site for context information. That text is the exact same thing that they're enraged about Google displaying on the news site, is it not?

They're probably looking for a quick settlement, but I hope googlebot has a blacklist of site that aren't indexed at all. If you want to sue Google for indexing your site into a news aggregator, it is only sensible for Google to not index your site at all...who knows what you'll sue for next.

Robots.txt

[Anonymous Coward]

No mention of the robots instruction file for indexing int he article. Did the French agency bother to tell google what they could or could not index, or are they sueing google because they don't know how to configure their own site?

Re:Don't go there!

[Anonymous Coward]

By having a robots.txt file they

1) acknowledge that they understand that search engines are reading their site
2) acknowledge that they understand that they are able to prevent search engines from reading their site
3) requested search engines to not read a portion of their site

and now they're suing Google for reading the rest of the site. Take your rifle, put it in your mouth and pull the trigger, you're too stupid to live with the rest of us here.

Re:Napoleonic Code

[Pig Hogger]

Continental Europe has a legal code derived from the Napoleonic code.
It is particularly irrational and inflexible, and nowhere near as abstract as English Common Law. What a bunch of stupid oxdung. Only the most stupid anglo-saxon troll would react like so.
Britshit common law is the best example of a primitive law code where the most powerful entity (the one with the best lawyers) wins.
Civil code, on the other hand is neatly clear-cut. You always know where you stand, and the final outcome is solely derived from the facts, and not some obscure jurisprudence that was often obtained because some poorer party could not afford to appeal some inane decision, making the inane decision become law.

Re:Most web-litigious country?

[Mr. Underbridge]

You're confused. This is a French news agency we're talking about here, not the French state. Same difference as between SCO and the USA. Not the same thing at all, eh?

OK, amend that to read "A lot of French assholes." Better?

Re:Most web-litigious country?

[Anonymous Coward]

so if the BBC sued someone for copyright infringment it would the the British government who were doing it? No, it wouldn't, yet the BBC exists under special charter from the British government, and is financed by the television license, which is paid by the British public. The BBC could not survive without this cash, which is in essence coming from the government.

So hows about you take your unfounded fucked up attitude towards the french and shove it up your arse?