Court Rules Book Scanning Is Fair Use, Suggesting Google Books Victory

concealment writes "A judge has ruled that the libraries who have provided Google with their books to scan are protected by copyright's fair use doctrine. While the decision doesn't guarantee that Google will win—that's still to be decided in a separate lawsuit—the reasoning of this week's decision bodes well for Google's case. Most of the books Google scans for its book program come from libraries. After Google scans each book, it provides a digital image and a text version of the book to the library that owns the original. The libraries then contribute the digital files to a repository called the Hathitrust Digital Library, which uses them for three purposes: preservation, a full-text search engine, and electronic access for disabled patrons who cannot read the print copies of the books."

Comments

I really don't know who to root for here.

[Anonymous Coward]

I haven't been able to make up my mind on this one.

On one hand, it's deplorable that Google isn't paying tribute to authors.

On the other hand, they're using books from libraries, books intended to be shared.

I think Google just accidentally broke the system. Perhaps it was not Google, but the digital age itself, that did the actual breaking.

Either way, a hole has been found in current fair use theory / ways libraries operate. Now it's either going to get plugged or become a gaping chasm.

It's a tough nut to crack.

Re:I really don't know who to root for here.

[Anonymous Coward]

it's deplorable that Google isn't paying tribute to authors

What? By most accounts (by actual authors), being in the DB gets your books sold. Only the BS Authors Guild thinks this is a problem.

The interesting thing is that there's a massive, consistent and complete, collaborative digital archive of library print books and journals somewhere. If an Anon group wanted to do something really crazy, they'd pilfer that massive cache and release it unto the world.

Re:I really don't know who to root for here.

[Anonymous Coward]

On one hand, it's deplorable that Google isn't paying tribute to authors.

You need to get more info on this - Google is doing authors a favor here. They're taking tons of out of print and generally unavailable books, making them available online, and allowing authors who claim them to get most of the proceeds from their sales.

Re:I really don't know who to root for here.

[Anonymous Coward]

True, I suppose, but would it really have killed Google to just go out and buy a single copy of each book they scan? I think that would be more fair, and negligible in terms of cost to the almighty Google.

These are old books that you can't get anywhere else. At what store do you believe Google can buy them, Barnes and Noble? Do you think they're getting them from libraries to be cheap?

Re:I really don't know who to root for here.

[RocketRabbit]

"On one hand, it's deplorable that Google isn't paying tribute to authors."

Most of them are dead, and their works are in the public domain. For those that aren't you just get a tiny snippet view which encourages you to buy the very expensive out of print books, or buy the books from a publisher.

This is all about Google's ability to sell books, and the publishers don't like that. They sell books because you can search and bam, there's the book you need. No need to get it from a publisher.

Authors win here too, especially ones who will not typically be joined with a publisher.

Re:I really don't know who to root for here.

[sphealey]

- - - - Google's been scanning old books & magazines, stuff that's been out of print for ages and probably by rights already should be public domain, depending on the copyright date. - - - -

Uh, no. That may be the basis of the scanning project, but Google has been putting a lot more stuff than just "old" scanned books into Google Books. And by the way, many works whose authors have died are still under copyright according to the various laws that were in effect at the time of their publication.

sPh

Re:I really don't know who to root for here.

[sh00z]

Most of them are dead, and their works are in the public domain. For those that aren't you just get a tiny snippet view which encourages you to buy the very expensive out of print books, or buy the books from a publisher.

OK, I'm giving up moderator rights to post this, so you can tell I'm serious. The statement above is absolutely incorrect. This is NOT about public domain. There's no question that Google (or anybody else) can redistribute PD works. This is about Google scanning and then re-selling out-of-print, but in-copyright works. The proposed settlement would give Google the exclusive right to violate copyright and re-sell these works. Sure, they would provide compensation to the authors, but the settlement is inherently anti-competitive in granting this privilege to a single entity.

So, I also violently disagree with the original poster that this decision provides any indication of the final disposition. The decision today only says that it's fair use to do the scanning. The judge shown that he is not predisposed to grant Google a monopoly in sales.

THIS court finds the story a dupe

[1800maxim]

rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/leotg9DJN_g/court-finds-in-favor-of-libraries-in-google-books-affair

Re:THIS court finds the story a dupe

[NoKaOi]

It's not just a dupe, it's less accurate. The previous story at least has a title that makes it clear that they ruled in favor of libraries, not Google. There's a big difference, since it's Google doing the actual copying, not the libraries. If I rent a movie from Redbox, rip it and bittorrent, who's going to get in trouble - me or Redbox? Whether or not Google will get in trouble hasn't been decided yet.

Re:Linking is fair use too. Dynamic and static lin

[Em Adespoton]

Obviously, samzenpus is trying to prove that copying is fair use by copying Timothy's front page article....

Yes!

[chill]

That is the Slashdot I know and love! A dupe while the original article is still on the front page!

I feel like having a bowl of hot grits and watching a movie with Natalie Portman in it.

Re:Yes!

[Half-pint HAL]

In Soviet Russia, cluster of Beowulf dupes you!

Get off of here.

[Anonymous Coward]

We don't want to hear about your dumb American football.

Side with better access for the public

[Namarrgon]

A major aim of the project was to digitally preserve books that are out of print. Most of these can't be bought, by anyone.

Also, the authors of a significant fraction of these books cannot be located. So while many of these books are still covered by copyright, there's nobody available to pay anything to, or to get consent from (well, the Authors Guild might nominate themselves as "default" copyright holders somehow). For these books, proceeds from sales are held separately in trust, against future claims if the authors are eventually located. For the rest, identified authors naturally get the lion's share of sales. Google also profits from advertising, but authors are entitled to a 63% share of this too. And under various versions of the settlement, authors could even claim $60 per book, while Google does the all work of making their books more available to the public.

Money is not the issue; it's control - the Guild (and some actual authors) are mostly objecting that Google didn't ask first.

Re:Side with better access for the public

[sphealey]

- - - - Also, the authors of a significant fraction of these books cannot be located.

Hmmm... incentives tend to matter. Under the Google archive plan, who has the incentive to go out and search diligently for the legal holders of copyright and publishing rights? 80 year old author starving in a garret, never received his last royalties due from his publishing house, who is going to work their butts off to find and pay him before they start selling his work from the archive?

The key point that much be brought up in these discussions is this: Google is a money-making machine. Period. It exists to make metric tons of money for its owners and officers. Period. It might do some interesting things, even some nice things, along the way - but it exists to make money. Who is making the money on this scheme, how, and what are the incentives to pay whom? Be helpful to get some straight answers to those questions.

sPh

Re:Side with better access for the public

[Namarrgon]

The one with the most incentive is the one receiving the money; i.e. the author, the author's publisher, and possible any guilds to which the author may pay dues. As with most fields of business, if you want to collect money owed to you, you occasionally need to chase it up yourself (as your example demonstrates, if the putative author is having difficulty getting royalties from his existing publisher; maybe he'll have more luck if he contacts Google).

And I think quite a few Googlers might take exception to your characterising Google as "a money-making machine, period"; particularly Larry and Sergey. They've sunk a fair bit of cash into risky, public-benefit projects with no guaranteed return.

Re:Side with better access for the public

[sphealey]

- - - - As with most fields of business, if you want to collect money owed to you, you occasionally need to chase it up yourself (as your example demonstrates, if the putative author is having difficulty getting royalties from his existing publisher; maybe he'll have more luck if he contacts Google). - - - -

Many authors characterize that as "stealing from the helpless". Isaac Asimov wrote quite a bit about the difficulties he had extracting his royalties from various publishing houses, and that was at a point in his career where he was famous, reasonably wealthy, and could afford good lawyers to fight the thieves.

I'm fascinated by these romantic notions that people have about Google Inc. It did start out as an interesting research project by its founders. However, those founders then took venture capital money to "monetize" their research, indenturing themselves to the venture capital providers, and transformed their business into a gigantic advertising and personal data mining operation. They then took their business public, and today Google Inc. is a corporation publicly traded on the US markets whose stock price has risen from $100 at offer to $700. Its officers have a fiduciary duty to make money for their investors regardless of what the founders may have going in the way of small projects. And frankly, I have seen exactly zero public evidence that Page and Brin have any qualms about the money-vacuuming side of Google; certainly neither they nor Mr. Schmidt have any concerns about the affect of their actions on personal privacy.

sPh

Re:DUPLICATE SUBMISSION

[SternisheFan]

To respond to all you 'perfect' people who've been piling on here...

Have any of you had a miscommunication, never made a mistake while trying to do your job? It was a screwup, yeah, so what? I swear, some of you guys who post are real jerks. Shit happens, get over it already. Go to your mirrors, all of you, and if you see someone who's never made a mistake, on the job and in private, then you're either a frickin' computer or a liar. F#@*ing whiny a#%$@#es!