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Google Offers Scanned Books To Rival Stores
eldavojohn writes "Yesterday we covered Microsoft's jabs at the Google book deal, but today Reuters is reporting that the scanned books will be available to Google's rivals. Google said in a surprising statement, 'Google will host the digital (out-of-print) books online, and retailers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble or your local bookstore will be able to sell access to users on any Internet-connected device they choose.' They made this statement today at the US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee that had been called to discuss criticism of a 2008 settlement between the Authors Guild and Google. Well, I would bet this has caught more than a few people by surprise. The Authors Guild offers a history and the fine print of the agreement."
Google is basically moving us to the digital era. Companies like IBM, MS, Xerox have worked to keep us locked into a dual economy and make as much from it as possible. I think that if I were other nations, I would be BEGGING google to set up shop in their nations.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Google: Google will host the digital (out-of-print) books online, and retailers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble or your local bookstore will be able to sell access to users on any Internet-connected device they choose.
Oh, joy. So what they're saying is that they retain their questionably-obtained monopoly over publishing these titles, but instead of paying them for a copy of the book, I can instead choose to pay both them and a retailer surcharge for a DRM-protected copy of the book? Exciting!
It's awful nice of Google to open up new channels of income for themselves. Why, I can't imagine why anyone would want to be allowed to compete directly. Anyone who does must be evil.
The Authors Guild represents 8,000 writers (I used to be one of them). There are millions of "orphan" works still covered by US and international copyright law. The Guild has no standing to negotiate for anyone except their members.
Google has made absolutely ZERO attempt to ascertain the identity or whereabouts of the rightsholders of these "orphan" works. I'm one of them. I have been notified by Google about each of my in-print books (five in all), but NONE of my parents' books, even though they were published by HarperCollins, who used to send me royalty checks for those books and would no doubt be happy to tell Google how to reach me.
The fact that, in desperation, Google agrees to share the fruits of its theft does not make everything OK. They have no right to share what was never theirs in the first place. And the Authors Guild are a bunch of useless whores who stand to make a pot of money off this rotten deal.
Sent from the iPad I found in your car.
Really? What is this bullshit? Perhaps you have a better suggestion on what we should do in order to bring these books back from the dead. Be fucking happy that Google is a pro-competitive company and stop being a damned douchebag.
And before you decide to fire back, how many companies do you know of with the spare resources, manpower, or motivation to do this thing properly?
What day is it? Could you please tell me?
Don't you guys and girl get it?
Google is circumventing copyright law and capturing works that are in the public domain. Going forward, they monetize a previously free work eternally.
If information wants to be free, then how *exactly* is that freeing books?
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
Really? What is this bullshit? Perhaps you have a better suggestion on what we should do in order to bring these books back from the dead. Be fucking happy that Google is a pro-competitive company and stop being a damned douchebag.
The same suggestion as always: Lobby Congress to open rights to orphaned works to publishers, with residuals going into trust via the WGA, the US Copyright Office, or a new administrative organization. And I'd hesitate to call "allowing others to buy from us, then resell" pro-competition.
And before you decide to fire back, how many companies do you know of with the spare resources, manpower, or motivation to do this thing properly?
Lexis-Nexis comes instantly to mind. Penguin Books, Del Ray Publishing, Microsoft, Ballantine Books, the Gutenberg Project, Yahoo!, AOL, Borders Books and Music, and plenty of others could pull it off, albeit some at a smaller scale. There's probably thousands of shops that would love to publish orphaned specialty titles electronically. And I strongly suspect that, if the rights to publication were open, nonprofits by the dozens would appear instantly to publish some titles.
I won't claim intimate detail with the status of the "orphan books", but if what I've read is accurate, these are generally books that are out-of-print and not actively managed by the publisher or author. In this case, I say Google is doing a service by bringing to light a wide body of literature that would otherwise either remain unused or even disappear. Insisting on strict enforcement of copyright law leaves everyone worse off: the authors and publishers are still not getting anything because they have abandoned the works, and those who might have actually been interested in the material remain without access to it.
In what way do you think Google is going to get rich off this deal? Under ideal circumstances, it might take 50 years to recompense the enormous cost of scanning every single book in the United States. Can you even imagine the amount of work that goes into that? There's a reason nobody else is involved in this so-called gold mine. And uh, sharing their entire library with all competitors? Money, meet toilet. Flush.
And yet you're telling me they're doing evil here because they haven't managed to personally track down the heir of two presumably dead writers? And this heir has apparently not even bothered to contact Google himself. Cry me a fucking river. How about you stop and realize how much Google is already doing to support one of the greatest knowledge-preserving enterprises the world has ever seen, and get off your couch and do your own miniscule part to direct the enterprise as it concerns you.
I won't claim intimate detail with the status of the "orphan books", but if what I've read is accurate, these are generally books that are out-of-print and not actively managed by the publisher or author. In this case, I say Google is doing a service by bringing to light a wide body of literature that would otherwise either remain unused or even disappear. Insisting on strict enforcement of copyright law leaves everyone worse off: the authors and publishers are still not getting anything because they have abandoned the works, and those who might have actually been interested in the material remain without access to it.
But this is effectively going to be 'strict enforcement of copyright law' - only Google will have the rights to electronically reproduce these works, unless of course they generously licence them to third parties (for a fee, naturally).
A much, much better solution would be to change copyright law so that if no rights holder can be identified after reasonable efforts, a work is deemed to be out of copyright.
Read Pynchon.
Copyright was established to *encourage* production of intellectual or creative works such that ultimately society as a whole benefits. The carrot to producers of such works was a limited ability to make money through sales of copies. Where does the original intent of copyright say that your son is entitled to make money off your creation? If your son simply inherits your works, where is his incentive to produce? Where is the benefit to society?
Unlike your rented house, which is a non-copyable physical asset occupying a defined space your book/parent's books are trivially copied and can be transferred and stored anywhere. Why would society want to keep limitations on dissemination of a work when the original creator of that work has passed away and no longer requires an incentive to produce?
While that sounds awesome, Google is still gaining access to vast quanitities of copyrighted material without the explicit permission of the copyright holder. For every other company in the world, they need to obtain permission first before potentially profiting off of a work (Google will profit from subscriptions to their service). For Google, somehow, they do not need to obtain permission. Rather, a copyright holder needs to go through a process in order to object and have their material removed. While that sounds good and all, it is ridiculous that copyright holders need to spend time and money to assert rights that should be intrinsically part of copyright.
Part of copyright, yes.
But it's also ridiculously impractical to negociate with hundred of thousands of copyright holders when you're going into mass digitalization of out-of-print books. The traditional way pointlessly restrains access to knowledge, and makes it more expensive.
The laws should be changed so that anyone is free to make works that have been unavailable for a certain amount of time (e.g out-of-print for 1 or 2 years) available again (ideally for free, but if we allow profit making taking the task would be more encouraged).