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Delay, Renegotiation Sought For Google Books Settlement
Miracle Jones writes "The Google Books settlement has been removed from consideration by Google and the Authors Guild after the DoJ made it crystal clear that the settlement would not be ratified 'as is' due to foreign rights, privacy, and antitrust reasons. The October 7th 'fairness hearing' has been canceled, and the next step is a November 6th 'status hearing' where the plaintiffs will reveal changes to the new settlement, such as how they plan to make it more fair, legal, and inclusive, and whether or not they will need to notify all the members of the class action lawsuit (7 million writers or so) yet again as a result of the changes. Some people are very happy about this."
Google tried a fast one, the global publishing equivalent of tightly packaging a web browser with an OS, and got caught. The only "negotiations" up to this point had been akin to the conversation the kid has with the candy jar. Now, perhaps, a genuine dialogue can begin.
Hopefully whatever comes of this will help out groups like IMSLP that are working on books and other media outside the text-centric Google mold. Orphaned copyright, and excessive copyright terms in general, are too large a problem to let an almost "good enough" solution like Google Books carry the day.
This is like when airplanes were invented. Before that if you owned land, you owned it all the way up to the sky. Imagine if every airline and hobby pilot had to get permission from each individual owner of the land they would fly over. Well, it was decided that property rights would have to yield to progress. There are of course limitations, such as how low you can fly, noise and other things that actually affect the land owner.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_rights
Class action lawsuits shouldn't be allowed to absolve future infringement against an entire class just because a few people agreed to the terms. This settlement should have dealt solely with liability for past infringement, and terms of further distribution should be handled in an opt-in manner, or by changing the law (which does need to be changed to better handle abandoned works).
Wait, how is offering out-of-print books discouraging competition? I thought part of being an out-of-print book is that there is no competition because there is nobody printing the book anymore...
I think book publishers are afraid that you won't buy their latest offerings, preferring instead to download some out-of-print book you can get for free from Google. It seems unlikely, especially since you can currently download many of the classics (ie, the best-of-breed out of print books) for free from sites like Project Gutenberg.
"Can't you see that everyone is buying station wagons?"
I don't understand what Google is doing wrong. Can somebody please explain it what it is that so many people and corporations object to? I've read a bunch of articles but none have explained what the actual underlying problem is.
The closest thing I've heard that makes sense is that a book (unlike a web page) was never written with the understanding that it would be read and indexed by a machine. But really, I have a hard time seeing how this would hurt authors or publishers or anybody. The benefits seem great.
-ec
I guess you haven't heard, but it is possible to actually keep a book rather than throwing it away after it has been read. There are stores which specifically cater to the idea of buying old books, most of them being out of print. These books are not "popular" in the current sense and therefore have obviously failed, but some places still offer them for sale.
The concept of a book is an interesting one, but if Google gets their way a "book" will be a quaint collector's item that some funny old people have whereas everyone else gets their books from Google. Together with some ads. The idea of a "used book" will become about as popular as a "used kleenex" primarily because of the actions of a single corporation. Isn't this something that we, as a society, might want to think about a little bit before doing it?
I see your point. Why don't we start a movement to bring back scrolls made of papyrus or parchment? I mean, those guys have been suffering for hundreds of years now. Paperback and hardback books were unfair competition to an ages old profession.
Seriously, I love books. I'm also fearful of moving into a world where physical books don't exist. If the electricity goes out, and the batteries go dead, you CAN'T READ ebooks. But, all the same, I see no rational reason for preventing electronic libraries. At this point in time, I see no objection to Google's plans, but whether it's Google or any other company, let's get the out of print books online.
Dead tree publishers will just have to adapt somehow. Think of it as a carbon credit. Every book that you download and read saves a few pounds of cellulose, somewhere.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
The win situation would be that everyone would have got easy access to orphaned books. Having the ability to search them would be very beneficial for any researcher in the world. Especially if work was put to scanning old books held in small amounts by collectors and institutions.
The only win i can see is lobbyism from a few parties that felt left out and couldnt tag along on googles settlement money. I hope Google just drop this and let someone else foot the bill and then make the same demand for equal access as Microsoft makes now.
HTTP/1.1 400
Personally, I understand your position, but I lean more to preferring a half-bad workaround to the current bad law, as opposed to waiting for it to be changed for the better, when the direction of recent changes are all in the opposite direction.
Frankly, I'd have been OK for the DoJ to have come out with a few recommended changes which remove Google from a monopoly position, while maintaining the orphaned works workaround.
perhaps I'm wrong about this, but using dead trees isn't really a problem in terms of carbon consumption. It may have other environmental factors (the types of trees grown on tree farms for use in paper mills do tend to grow quickly, sap the ground until it is effectively dead, and replace native species. The issue with paper made from trees is one of resource management related to other fields than carbon trapping. When we turn it into a book, the carbon in the tree is still trapped, not released into the atmosphere (unless you are a fan of burning books, in which case, some might become atmospheric depending on the level of your burn and whether or not you included steinbeck's works in your affair).
if Google gets their way a "book" will be a quaint collector's item
I'm sorry, I'm just not seeing it. You'll have to explain it to me. Why will I no longer want my books?
everyone else gets their books from Google.
Or whoever else makes a deal with the publishers. Remember that the publishers don't have their hands tied. They can make licensing deals with anyone they want.
The idea of a "used book" will become about as popular as a "used kleenex" primarily because of the actions of a single corporation. Isn't this something that we, as a society, might want to think about a little bit before doing it?
Why would used books go away? I buy used books. I would continue to buy used books. What changes?
perhaps I'm wrong about this, but using dead trees isn't really a problem in terms of carbon consumption.
Planting, harvesting, grinding, processing, shipping and printing on that tree, however....