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Frustrated Judge Pushes For Solution In Google Books Case
SpuriousLogic writes with this excerpt from a Reuters report:
"A Manhattan federal judge set a Sept. 15 deadline for Google, authors and publishers to come up with a legal plan to create the world's largest digital library, expressing frustration that the six-year-old dispute has not been resolved. At a hearing on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Denny Chin said if the dispute is not 'resolved or close to resolved in principle' by mid-September, he will set a 'relatively tight schedule' for the parties to prepare for a possible trial. ... Citing antitrust and copyright concerns, Chin had on March 22 rejected a $125 million settlement. He said it went 'too far' in allowing Google to exploit digitized copyrighted works by selling subscriptions to them online and engaging in 'wholesale copying of copyrighted works without permission.'"
I'm glad brick and mortar libraries were set up before the modern era, because it would never happen today. I simply don't understand how an online library would be so horrible, when even small towns have libraries where you can read any book you'd want to.
I'm not sure I understand how the judge thinks this is going to be "resolved" by the involved parties on their own. They appear to have diametrically opposed goals and philosophies: Google wants to make everything available on the internet, and the publishers want nothing on the internet, only on printed paper that they control. How can you resolve a conflict like that without some third party to mediate?
...
the spice must flow.
Great job Google
This is to be the greatest library ever assembled. It is worthwhile in and of itself. A noble goal to prevent the permanent loss of so much art and knowledge - to avoid the Great Forgetting. It is the very preservation of world culture.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
I wonder how long the Library of Alexandria was in court.
??? The only thing Google is doing here is removing the monopoly powers of copyright from the publishers and authors.
:. Ultimate Control Dedicated/VM Servers
Greedy authors, you've already sold a bucha copies, you've made your money. What's the big deal, let people read your book, as long as it's not a teen vampire novel you're probably at the very least helping someone improve their literacy.
Nope, you have that wrong.
They are doing no such thing.
This is a pissing contest about books that have been abandoned, where no author is living and for which there is no clear copyright.
Nobody on the NYT best seller list need worry. No book publisher need be threatened.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Pretty soon there will be consumer level "taxes" or "fees" applied to everyone. We'll pay X amount per month for unlimited music, unlimited books. If you want a book in the first 3 months of release, you pay extra. Perhaps you subscribe to the audio-book where you can have GlaDOS read you the book (or perhaps Wheatley, the hyper British bot):
It was the best of time, it was the worst of times. Well, what's that really? Wholly contradictory, doesn't make a LICK of sense. Not saying it isn't profound in that literary way some people look for but it really isn't MEANINGFUL is it? Not really.
Anyway, same with music -- pay monthly for a service to listen to unlimited music (there's already one in Europe coming to the states, but can't remember the bloody name of it). Subscriptions are gold for companies because you're paying whether you use it or not (see HBO for details).
"You kids don't make me come back there!"
Have gnu, will travel.
Yes, but the publishers and copyright holders have been trying to make sure that they are the only ones who can re-publish public domain works and get a fresh copyright.
Google is muscling in on their business model by trying to more or less keep stuff in the public domain, and then give it away and effectively keep it in the public domain.
They've already bought laws in their favor, if Google beats them to the punch, corporate profits and executive bonuses could be affected.
The commons is something these companies do not want to persist.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Does nobody remember what this dispute is about? It seems to me that most of the commenters have forgotten.
Google Books is primarily about -indexing- books. That's it. Not about making them available online. They've got automated machines that even now are scanning book after book, doing OCR on the result, and putting the results into a searchable database. That, however, for reasons I have never considered to be rational, has the publishers in a tizzy-fit.
Now, Google would love to add to the search results to make them even more useful. Currently, if a work is in the public domain, it can be viewed, in its entirety, online. Works that are still copyrighted, however, can't. Some copyrighted works allow for the viewing of several pages, depending on arrangements between the copyright holders and Google. The former settlement had provisions in it about "orphaned works," works whose copyright owners couldn't be identified properly or found, which Google wanted to be able to make available either online or in print, with a percentage of the profits going to a pool that a copyright owner could get reimbursement from if he/she could prove their copyright. The judge scotched the settlement, largely because of those provisions.
However, the primary complaint, that the -indexing- of the books involves copyright violations, is on shaky legal ground. Google has some strong defenses, and the publishers know it. A trial could easily go either way, and neither Google nor the publishers are particularly interested in going that route. Nevertheless, they seem to be having trouble coming to a compromise.
To a certain extent, I have personally been affected by this. My Grandfather was a very prominent Phillippino Author about 100 years ago. For the last few months, I have been trying to search out copies of his works as a gift for my mother.
My Grandfather died in the 60's but from what I have been told, at least here in Australia, his works are out of copyright as they were published in 1912.
So far, I have managed to track down two of the 4 books he wrote.
The first in the National Library in Canberra. They had a scanning service and thus I was able to gain a copy, the second in the University of Michigan library where no such service exists.
Given that the UoM is on the Google scanning list, the only way I can see this piece of work will be saved and not lost is for Google to scan the book.
I have sent a copy of the book I received from the National Library of Canberra to Google to include in their archives.
The other 2 works, I have not found yet.
This is but one example and as the grandson of the Author, I would much rather Google scan the books, let everyone have access to the works and keep them for later generations rather than have the works to disappear into obscurity. Lost forever or sitting in some back corner of a library never to be read again and I'm sure my Grandfather would feel the same way.
There's a fundamental problem with orphan works and "opt in".
By definition an orphan work is one whose copyright owner cannot be located. Demanding that they opt in defeats the whole purpose, since as soon as you find them they cease to be orphan works.
My personal opinion:
If someone in good faith looks diligently and attempts to find a copyright holder for a particular work, should be entitled to publish his intent to use the work as public domain, thus establishing constructive notice to the world. If the copyright holder doesn't present himself in a timely manner, he loses the right to sue retroactively for any damages, and the diligent dude who found his work (and anyone else) can treat it as public domain for a minimum of 1 year before any copyright claims are enforceable, plus an additional 6 months or so after being notified.
But alas, this is more appropriately a legislative remedy.
I would, however, opine that anyone who completes the above steps, and only gets bit when he starts making money (by a copyright troll), has established fair use, possibly qualified with a defense of laches if the copyright holder sat on the notice and didn't do anything. If the holder can't even be arsed to respond to a "hey mister john doe guy that owns the copyright for this work, I want to make something of it but I don't know who to give the royalties to, so I'm going to sit on it for awhile and hope you get in touch.", they don't deserve to throw legal fire on an innocent guy who did his due diligence.
If it's available for everyone and not everyone is paying, then Google shouldn't pay either (note the dollar figure). Although, since I don't want to do this, why should I have to pay. And if I don't have to pay, then why should Google?
Tell you what.
You can go and negotiate rights to do the same thing and agree a payment and a license agreement. Then you too can do what Google is doing.
It disrespects the reason for copyrights, though.
So which is better: respect the letter of the law or respect the spirit and meaning of the law?