Slashdot Mirror
Google Relents, Publishes Belgian Ruling
gambit3 writes "Google on Saturday published on its Belgian website a court order which forbids the Internet search engine to reproduce snippets of Belgian press on its news amalgamation service. The move constituted a u-turn as Google had said on Friday that it would not comply with the court order despite facing a fine of 500,000 euros ($640,900) daily if it did not publish the ruling." From the article: "Google said its service is lawful and drives traffic to newspaper sites because people need to click through to the original publisher to read the full story. It now displays stories from news agencies, foreign newspapers and Internet sites belonging to local television stations."
I am all for fair use. But the fact that Google copies, changes, reassembles, etc. copyrighted information without anyone's consent should be challenged. The challenge, while difficult to overcome at first may potentially lead to Google winning the case and setting a precedent whereby all information publicly available on the internet would be entered into the public domain or at least break ground for fair use.