Tim O'Reilly on the Google Library Project

dkleinsc writes "The New York Times is running an op-ed piece(free registration required) by Tim O'Reilly arguing that the Google Library Project is a good thing for authors in general, and suggests a lawsuit by the Author's Guild against Google is acting against authors' best interest."

Comments

Author's Guild Stupidity

[geomon]

Since their suit was announced, I have wondered why the Author's Guild would object to MORE access to their works by offering snippets to Google Print. Obviously there is much to be lost by publishers who, like the RIAA, act as gatekeepers on published works. If the Author's Guild really likes the current system, then why do so few works circulate more than 5,000 copies? Wouldn't their members be better served with wider distribution?

The Author's Guild looks like just another out-of-touch union that is trying to straddle the fence on this issue so as to not piss off their benefactors in publishing. Perhaps they are secretly hoping their suit will fail.

Re:Author's Guild Stupidity

[capt.Hij]

You shouldn't assume from the name that organization is really about representing authors. In this case, though, they do not seem to be astroturf. If you check out their "talking points" they seem not to know the difference between scanning and publishing nor the difference between searching and publishing.

Re:Author's Guild Stupidity

[Waffle Iron]

Unfortunately, you may have a point. It might be tough to prove that Google's scheme is legal. The problem is that current copyright laws were written before online indexing was a possibility, so this area is very fuzzy.

However, it's blatantly obvious that such an index is a huge benefit to the public, to the authors, to their publishers and to google. It's a win/win/win/win situation. Keeping in mind that copyright is supposed to be a system enhances the public benefit, Congress should pass a law which explicitly permits Google or anyone else to scan and index online any work as long as appropriate measures are put in place to prevent wholesale downloading. IMO, under such a law such indexers might be required to register with the copyright office before they start, but they should be allowed to do their work without fear of legal attacks and without having to pay royalties.

I'm not holding my breath though, as congress seems to have lately lost the ability to pass any meaningful or useful legislation whatsoever.

Safari

[mysqlrocks]

Of course Tim O'Reilly is going to in favor of the Google Library Project. O'Reilly's Safari Bookshelf is already putting the content of books online (for a fee though).

This produces and interesting situation...

[BattleRat]

The author suggests that the main issue at hand is that the "whole work" must be digitized and stored (the writer's main sticking point). When a Google books search is conducted, only snippets (a couple of sentences) would be displayed. Ok, but through some recursive Googling lead to disclosure of the entire work? While I agree that it's easier to go to the library and check out the book, there is a way to circumvent the system. I am not a lawyer, but this does have some perceivable holes.

Copyrighted works are a harsh business commodity.

[Sheetrock]

Google is attempting to provide an experience which enhances the ability to search within books -- thereby increasing one's ability to discover and purchase books. It is a subset of the functionality that you would get by purchasing or borrowing from a library the entire book (or even browsing one in a bookstore) because the service limits the number of pages you can fetch and intentionally leaves a number of pages out.

No doubt there are two problems with this: the first seems to be that authors (to the best of my knowledge) haven't been asked either piecemeal or via organizations like the Authors' Guild for permission. The second is that Google will no doubt be making money as a result of providing this service and everybody else wants a cut.

However, we have reached an unfortunate point with copyright and fair use where we'd rather halt innovation than admit that copyright holders' expectations have reached a point of making it cost- and time-prohibitive to meet their demands and are to the point of stagnating not only the public domain but technologies and services that deliver or even touch upon copyrighted content. In this sense, creating a scenario that is not unlike the movie industry's dire predictions about the VCR in the early 80s.

It would be best, of course, for Google to attempt to work out an amiable solution with authors without crippling their service to an unreasonable extent, but I feel that the intent of fair use (if not its prevailing interpretation) falls in their favor... as does the bottom-line for both Google and the membership of the Authors' Guild.

I disagree, it was in the authors interests

[NigelJohnstone]

They obviously want an 'opt-in' system, because that reduces the number of books competing to just the current commercial books, and removes possible public domain, orphan works and smaller publishers authors.

Joe public on the other hand, *is* best served by 'opt-out' because that includes orphaned work & possible public domain books.

So they want Google to index their books ,just not index everyone elses. That's what the lawsuit is about, getting an opt-in to reduce the number of competing works. All the 'copyright infringment / worried about security / worried about snippet size' claims are just bollocks that make no sense. Since Google has offered them an opt out, if they were truely worried, they could just flag their books as opt out and that would end it.

They lied, Google called them on their lie and now they will go to court and look real dumb. By giving them the opt-out Google has outmaneuvered them. So now they will lose, but if they could win it, it would have be in their interests.

They will say "we are worried about Google scanning our books", Google will say "but we are not going to scan your books, because as soon as we realised you didn't want that, we took you off the list", end of case.

Fair Use Rights

[Rydia]

There seems to be a bit (hah!) of confusion regarding Fair Use Rights. People seem to think that it means that you can just copy part of something and that's all hunky-dorey, which it isn't. Fair use is a doctrine (though in the past 3 decades codified) which describes an exception to the basic copyright. What Google is doing here isn't directly covered under section 108 of the copyright act (archival/library copying) is therefore definitely not solid. Those that fall outside the exemption were dealt with by a 4-4 Supreme Court tie in Williams & Wilkins Co. v. United States. A big mess.

Additionally, the reproduction of works must be targetted, and fair use doesn't extend to research that is done for commercial purpose. So google would have to make sure that any research that was done with its engine was not-for-profit and for educational purpose. From section 108 of the copyright act: "[applicable if] the reproduction or distribution is made without any purpose of direct or indirect commercial advantage." So not only is copying for a commercial purpose a violation (ala Texaco), the section that defines copyright also includes as part of the balance "(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole." Harper & Row in particular ruled that 300 words was enough for infringement if the words were important and there was a significant economic impact either to the benefit of the infringer or detriment of the rightsholder.

There really needs to be some education about copyright laws before fair use doctrine gets thrown around as a justification for copying world+dog. People seem to think variously that there's a constitutional right, a blanket gaurantee of it, no limitations on it, and a hard and fast rule for its application. The response to all of those beliefs is a very emphatic NO.