"Creating a process is something that only goes on every once in a while -- threads or state machines are what are used when high levels of concurrency are required"
Except that in the Linux world, a kernel level thread IS a process. So creating a thread == creating a process. You're running Apache and a request comes in, it forks a process to handle it.
It doesn't work that way in the US, and for good reason. Forcing the loser to pay would decrease frivilous lawsuits, but it would ALSO decrease well-founded and deserved, but risky, lawsuits.
For instance, take the suit in the movie Erin Brokovich. $333 million dollar award, the largest direct-action lawsuit award in US history. Almost certainly well deserved by the citizens of Hinkley (and a punishment well deserved by Pacific Gas). Yet a lawsuit that I can almost gurantee wouldn't have been filed in a loser-pays system.
I do think that there needs to be more leeway on the part of judges in awarding 'rule 11'ish plaintiff-of-frivilous-suit-pays judgements, but going even to a mostly loser-pays system would cause more problems that it'd solve.
But in terms of "portion used", could this be construed to incidate the amount of text presented to the end-user, i.e., a couple of pages?
Probably not. Google is using the full text; the fact that they only present part of the text probably falls under the character of the use (point 1).
Perhaps one could look at the example of a book reviewer, which, I know, doesn't exactly work...
Problem is, except for quotes in the review, there's no copying going on in your example. Google is copying the works, no question.
(One point I should have mentioned before but didn't think of until now is that it seems that Google doesn't even own the books they are copying at all, since they are partnering with libraries. This could be a death strike.)
I dunno, is my head up my ass here, or does this sound reasonable?
It's not totally unreasonable, but I still think that the things weighing against Google are a lot bigger than those weighing for.
Anyway, while my point 1 completely disappears and point 3 largely disappears, 2 and part of 3 still stand.
It is certainly good for Google's reputation--a common motivation for philanthropy--but it is hard to see how they are getting a commercial advantage.
In the business world, "good for $COMPANY_NAME's reputation" IS a commercial advantage. I don't know if it qualifies enough on its own to bend that exception against Google.
And beyond reputation, it increases the areas where they have a foothold. If someone uses Google Print, they're more likely to use Google for other searches. (For instance, because of Google Print *I* am more likely to use Froogle in the future. Before I didn't bother to think of it because I never used it, but now that I have -- through Google Print links -- I may think of it next time I'm shopping.)
Finally, with regards to my point 3, even though the Library pages themselves don't have ads, they DO have a link to Froogle, where they do display ads. They also link twice to Google web searches for the product, which display ads.
If the libraries decided to upgrade their computerized catalogs themselves to full text search indexes, could the publishers stop them? Could they stop them from making those catalogs available on the Internet?
I would think almost certainly not, and probably not.
In fact, there's an explicit exception to copyright law that may apply to the library situation.
Can the libraries contract this job to a third party, such as Google?
Good question. I don't know.
I would tend to think that, if there's a line between the library catalog and Google Print where the former is okay and the latter isn't, it would be here, provided the contractor is a for-profit company.
It does seem a bit artificial though.
Let the courts decide these complex questions.
I agree.
But that doesn't mean that we should sit back and be like "let's wait"; prediction and, more to the point, talking about how things should be is interesting on a number of levels.
Re:The real danger...
on
Zombie Lurch
·
· Score: 1
The fact that this post is moderated "insightful" just made my day.
2. I think even if there was no direct benefit you'd have a hard time arguing that Google didn't obtain even an indirect advantage from the venture. It gives them more poise, it increases the areas where they have a foothold.
Oh, not to mention (and this ties in with #1 a little) a link to Froogle, where they have MORE ads and MORE opportunity for charging for listings.
Since Google is a free service, the only way this project could give them a commercial advantage would be by selling ads on Google Print pages--which they aren't doing.
Three points:
1. You sure that Google isn't using an affiliate link for the "Buy This Book" links? You sure that they aren't getting other revenue from the vendors? I'm not saying that they are, but I wouldn't be surprised.
2. I think even if there was no direct benefit you'd have a hard time arguing that Google didn't obtain even an indirect advantage from the venture. It gives them more poise, it increases the areas where they have a foothold.
3. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, if Google isn't selling ads on Google Print... what's this?
And so of course the RIAA companies are entitled to a share in the iPod and other music player revenues also.
That analogy is horrible. Media players play media. They don't ever have to even TOUCH anything the RIAA has any say about to be useful. Just because they are almost always used to hold songs with copyrights held by MPAA members doesn't mean that there's a link.
By contrast, Google Print depends on having copies of the books it's indexing. You remove the copyrighted stuff and Google Print is nothing but Project Gutenberg with a well-known name attached.
RIAA and publishers tend to be technophobes who are afraid of new ideas than seem to threaten what they are used to doing for all these years
Which means they are stupid. But the point is, that they have the (rightly) right to be stupid. If all but publisher A licence works to Google Print and publisher A goes out of business because it didn't, that's too bad for publisher A, but it's publisher A's business. Google shouldn't have the right to go "this is good for you."
As the article pointed out, about 60% of all books in these libaries are out of print and therefore not likely to further contribute to the coffers of the publishers. Many of them are out of business anyway.
And this, I think, is a failure of copyright law. But the law is the law, and unless Google is willing to accept the consequences, it must follow it.
Also, 60% being out of print means that 40% are IN PRINT. That may not be a majority, but it's still a hell of a lot of books, and one hell of a revenue stream for Google to be tampering with, even if you feel that it would be a positive influence.
Publishers whose books are out of print could be notified every time one of these works is referenced and if there are many such references may decide it might be worthwhile to print up another edition for sale....which is a good argument for why publishers might want to licence their works to Google, but not a very good one for why Google should determine what is best for the publishers.
Currently in print books with a "buy now" link would only increase their sales. What Google wants to do would never decrease the sales of any copyrighted works, but could possibly increase them.
Perhaps. There's still the chance that you'll do further investigation and go "oh man, this sucks, I'm not going to buy it after all." It's a small chance, much smaller than, say, music downloading, but still a chance.
Net effect though, I think it would increase sales.
However, increasing sales isn't enough to give Google a favorable rating IMO for the fourth point of fair use, "the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work." Perhaps a publisher worked out a deal with Amazon to provide a full-text search. Amazon expected it to increase sales more than it actually did, so paid a lot of money for it. Bad for Amazon, good for the publisher. Google Print drastically cuts the amount of money Amazon would be willing to pay, thereby hurting the publisher with respect to the alternative.
There could be other unforseen consequences.
All-in-all, it's a very complicated system. Google Print could touch pretty much the entire revenue stream for an entire industry, and thus I think that courts would be more willing to side with the publishers, giving them the option to sign on to Google Print or not based on which they think would be more beneficial.
Copying is NOT allowed under fair use. It is allowed for plenty of cases, but by no means all.
The courts rule whether a use fits under fair use based upon an analysis of four factors. There are virtually no hard and fast rules for what constitutes fair use. The fact that they are copying entire works for commercial gain probably pretty much rules out fair use.
(Also, if fair use allowed all non-distributing copying, why would reproduction be listed as one of the copyright holder's exclusive rights?)
Here are my thoughts (quotes from 17 USC 107):
the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
This is being done by a for-profit company for commercial gain. Weighs strongly against Google.
Works aren't actually distributed, weighs for Google.
Both are strong forces. Overall, this is probably neutral.
the nature of the copyrighted work;
Another poster in a long-ago story about Google Print gave an analysis about this point that consisted of balancing the factual nature of the works. According to that poster, fiction books weigh against Google more than fiction books. (Facts can't be copyrighted.) This analysis sounds reasonable, and I don't know any better.
But all-in-all, this point is probably reasonably neutral.
the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole
Google's copying the entire work, and not only THE entire work, but LOTS of entire works. This weighs strongly against Google.
the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work
May help, may not. The impression around here is it can't hurt, but there's one poster who makes a very good point about how Google Print could hurt: it more or less destroy's the position of publishers to offer their own for-pay search services or licence their libraries to other search services. On balance, because of that issue, I'd say that this point weighs weakly against Google.
So we have two neutral points vs. two points against Google, one strongly against.
(a) Except as otherwise provided in this title and notwithstanding the provisions of section 106, it is not an infringement of copyright for a library or archives, or any of its employees acting within the scope of their employment, to reproduce no more than one copy or phonorecord of a work, except as provided in subsections (b) and (c), or to distribute such copy or phonorecord, under the conditions specified by this section, if-- (1) the reproduction or distribution is made without any purpose of direct or indirect commercial advantage;
(1) rules out the first exception in 17 USC 108.
(b) The rights of reproduction and distribution under this section apply to three copies or phonorecords of an unpublished work duplicated solely for purposes of preservation and security or for deposit for research use in another library or archives
This exception doesn't apply due to both the reason Google is doing this and the fact that they're copying published works.
(c) The right of reproduction under this section applies to three copies or phonorecords of a published work duplicated solely for the purpose of replacement of a copy or phonorecord that is damaged, deteriorating, lost, or stolen, or if the existing format in which the work is stored has become obsolete
Also doesn't apply due to the use Google is putting this to.
(d) The rights of reproduction and distribution under this section apply to a copy, made from the collection of a library or archives where the user makes his or her request or from that of another library or archives, of no more than one article or other contribution to a copyrighted collection or periodical issue, or to a copy or phonorecord of a small part of any other copyrighted work, if-- (1) the copy or phonorecord becomes the property of the user, and the library or archives has had no notice that the copy or phonorecord would be used for any purpose other than private study, scholarship, or research; and (2) the library or archives displays prominently, at the place where orders are accepted, and includes on its order form, a warning of copyright in accordance with requirements that the Register of Copyrights shall prescribe by regulation.
Doesn't apply because the exception doesn't match what Google's doing AND perhaps because the copy doesn't become the property of the user, depending on who you consider the user.
Also, the rights granted by this bit don't exceed that of fair use:
(f) Nothing in this section--... (2) excuses a person who uses such reproducing equipment or who requests a copy or phonorecord under subsection (d) from liability for copyright infringement for any such act, or for any later use of such copy or phonorecord, if it exceeds fair use as provided by section 107
(e) The rights of reproduction and distribution under this section apply to the entire work, or to a substantial part of it, made from the collection of a library or archives where the user makes his or her request or from that of another library or archives, if the library or archives has first determined, on the basis of a reasonable investigation, that a copy or phonorecord of the copyrighted work cannot be obtained at a fair price
The fair price bit rules out almost all books out there. Textbooks may be an exception, but it's likely the additional conditions imposed would disqualify them.
Given that this can only help the market, I'd say this stands a very good chance of being deemed fair use.
I disagree. If Google were a nonprofit organization or something, they might stand a chance, but I think that the fact that they are a for-profit, public company significantly hurts their case. They're doing Google print for direct financial benefit, and the publishers and authors only gain indirectly. (In other words, stop thinking of Google as a search engine, website, very useful service and start thinking of it as a company.) Publishers could make a compelling argument in my opinion that they are entitled to a portion of Google's revenue. And that's just my opinion from a philosophical standpoint.
The user (negative video) makes a very good point beyond just the philosophical stance that Google offering Google Print more or less destroys opportunities for publishers to cash in on similar business ventures by offering pay-for exclusive full text searches on their own website, licencing it to, e.g. Amazon, etc. See his post.
Your parent said, "[b]ecause they're making a copy without the permission of the copyright holder, apparently without being covered by any exemption," and you say nothing that demonstrates that they either don't copy the work or are covered by an exemption.
There's no denying that Google copied the books. The only other way to do what they did would be to have an awesome machine that reads and OCRs the books each time that someone makes a search. Do you think they're doing that? No way. They scanned the books and put them on their hard drives. That's a copy. The fact that they don't transmit that copy anywhere doesn't matter.
Secondly, there is very possibly no exception that gives them permission to do this. You could argue that fair use gives them the right, and there's a good argument to be made there (at which point the fact they don't transmit copies becomes relevant), but you don't make that argument. You don't even mention fair use. You don't mention exemptions to the exclusive right of reproduction.
You're backwards. Making a copy of a copyrighted work is by default ILLEGAL except for a few specific LIMITATIONS on those rights. The "exclusive rights" are limited in two senses, neither of which are what you're thinking of:
1. There's a limited number of them. For instance, you can't prevent someone from talking about your work in a review.
2. The rights that are granted are limited by specific exceptions in the law.
Subject to sections 107 through 122, the owner of copyright under this title has the exclusive rights to do and to authorize any of the following: (1) to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords; (2) to prepare derivative works based upon the copyrighted work; (3) to distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending; (4) in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audiovisual works, to perform the copyrighted work publicly; (5) in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, to display the copyrighted work publicly; and (6) in the case of sound recordings, to perform the copyrighted work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission.
The limitations are: 107 - fair use 108 - library and archives 109 - first sale, maybe more 110-122 - not sure just by scanning, you can read them if you'd like. From titles, none apperas to apply to books.
Life is getting better for pedants, many supermarket express lanes now say "12 items or fewer."
I noticed that in Wegman's fairly recently. It pleased me, because I tend to be somewhat of a stickler for grammar.
It also reminds me of a scene from Apollo 13 where Mattingly is watching I think the Dick Cavett show, and Cavett says something about "3 million fewer viewers... what do you say, '3 million fewer viewers or less viewers'... 3 million fewer viewers watched this space launch than the last one."
But (OOTC) aren't you putting in FEWER molecules of milk?
Yeah, but still less milk. I guess it's sort of like how you would say, "12 pencils weigh 50 grams [or whatever; I have no clue]" but "a group of 12 pencils weighs 50 grams."
Wrong. A typical cell phone plan in the US has you entering a long-term (1y or 2y) contract. The 'pick your plan' thing isn't long term, you just pay month by month.
Slashdot Mirror
But what if playing ANH forward and ESB backward yields something?
There are 2^6 = 64 possible orderings here! He must watch all to be sure he doesn't miss anything...
Do you have a reference to support this? I don't see benchmarks for Windows thread creation in the paper.
The paper seems to support this claim:
Thread yield cycles:
FreeBSD: 911
Linux: 906
Windows: 753
2 thread wait-set ping-pong:
FreeBSD: 4,707
Linux: 4,041
Windows: 1,658
The latter test measures the cost of swapping between two threads in the same process using synchronization objects.
What I would like to see is thread creation time in Windows vs. process (thread) creation time in Linux.
And also a comparison with Solaris's LWPs.
"Creating a process is something that only goes on every once in a while -- threads or state machines are what are used when high levels of concurrency are required"
Except that in the Linux world, a kernel level thread IS a process. So creating a thread == creating a process. You're running Apache and a request comes in, it forks a process to handle it.
It doesn't work that way in the US, and for good reason. Forcing the loser to pay would decrease frivilous lawsuits, but it would ALSO decrease well-founded and deserved, but risky, lawsuits.
For instance, take the suit in the movie Erin Brokovich. $333 million dollar award, the largest direct-action lawsuit award in US history. Almost certainly well deserved by the citizens of Hinkley (and a punishment well deserved by Pacific Gas). Yet a lawsuit that I can almost gurantee wouldn't have been filed in a loser-pays system.
I do think that there needs to be more leeway on the part of judges in awarding 'rule 11'ish plaintiff-of-frivilous-suit-pays judgements, but going even to a mostly loser-pays system would cause more problems that it'd solve.
Only if Linus formed a band and released a corresponding musical piece.
Out of curiosity, what if they don't give you the disc but let you burn one?
The only thing that MS is ripping off from Google is the "Beta" in the logo.
Only if you don't include quotes. Make them phrases and "open source" wins by a longshot.
But in terms of "portion used", could this be construed to incidate the amount of text presented to the end-user, i.e., a couple of pages?
Probably not. Google is using the full text; the fact that they only present part of the text probably falls under the character of the use (point 1).
Perhaps one could look at the example of a book reviewer, which, I know, doesn't exactly work...
Problem is, except for quotes in the review, there's no copying going on in your example. Google is copying the works, no question.
(One point I should have mentioned before but didn't think of until now is that it seems that Google doesn't even own the books they are copying at all, since they are partnering with libraries. This could be a death strike.)
I dunno, is my head up my ass here, or does this sound reasonable?
It's not totally unreasonable, but I still think that the things weighing against Google are a lot bigger than those weighing for.
Hmmm, I should RTFA.
Anyway, while my point 1 completely disappears and point 3 largely disappears, 2 and part of 3 still stand.
It is certainly good for Google's reputation--a common motivation for philanthropy--but it is hard to see how they are getting a commercial advantage.
In the business world, "good for $COMPANY_NAME's reputation" IS a commercial advantage. I don't know if it qualifies enough on its own to bend that exception against Google.
And beyond reputation, it increases the areas where they have a foothold. If someone uses Google Print, they're more likely to use Google for other searches. (For instance, because of Google Print *I* am more likely to use Froogle in the future. Before I didn't bother to think of it because I never used it, but now that I have -- through Google Print links -- I may think of it next time I'm shopping.)
Finally, with regards to my point 3, even though the Library pages themselves don't have ads, they DO have a link to Froogle, where they do display ads. They also link twice to Google web searches for the product, which display ads.
If the libraries decided to upgrade their computerized catalogs themselves to full text search indexes, could the publishers stop them? Could they stop them from making those catalogs available on the Internet?
I would think almost certainly not, and probably not.
In fact, there's an explicit exception to copyright law that may apply to the library situation.
Can the libraries contract this job to a third party, such as Google?
Good question. I don't know.
I would tend to think that, if there's a line between the library catalog and Google Print where the former is okay and the latter isn't, it would be here, provided the contractor is a for-profit company.
It does seem a bit artificial though.
Let the courts decide these complex questions.
I agree.
But that doesn't mean that we should sit back and be like "let's wait"; prediction and, more to the point, talking about how things should be is interesting on a number of levels.
The fact that this post is moderated "insightful" just made my day.
2. I think even if there was no direct benefit you'd have a hard time arguing that Google didn't obtain even an indirect advantage from the venture. It gives them more poise, it increases the areas where they have a foothold.
Oh, not to mention (and this ties in with #1 a little) a link to Froogle, where they have MORE ads and MORE opportunity for charging for listings.
Since Google is a free service, the only way this project could give them a commercial advantage would be by selling ads on Google Print pages--which they aren't doing.
Three points:
1. You sure that Google isn't using an affiliate link for the "Buy This Book" links? You sure that they aren't getting other revenue from the vendors? I'm not saying that they are, but I wouldn't be surprised.
2. I think even if there was no direct benefit you'd have a hard time arguing that Google didn't obtain even an indirect advantage from the venture. It gives them more poise, it increases the areas where they have a foothold.
3. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, if Google isn't selling ads on Google Print... what's this?
And so of course the RIAA companies are entitled to a share in the iPod and other music player revenues also.
...which is a good argument for why publishers might want to licence their works to Google, but not a very good one for why Google should determine what is best for the publishers.
That analogy is horrible. Media players play media. They don't ever have to even TOUCH anything the RIAA has any say about to be useful. Just because they are almost always used to hold songs with copyrights held by MPAA members doesn't mean that there's a link.
By contrast, Google Print depends on having copies of the books it's indexing. You remove the copyrighted stuff and Google Print is nothing but Project Gutenberg with a well-known name attached.
RIAA and publishers tend to be technophobes who are afraid of new ideas than seem to threaten what they are used to doing for all these years
Which means they are stupid. But the point is, that they have the (rightly) right to be stupid. If all but publisher A licence works to Google Print and publisher A goes out of business because it didn't, that's too bad for publisher A, but it's publisher A's business. Google shouldn't have the right to go "this is good for you."
As the article pointed out, about 60% of all books in these libaries are out of print and therefore not likely to further contribute to the coffers of the publishers. Many of them are out of business anyway.
And this, I think, is a failure of copyright law. But the law is the law, and unless Google is willing to accept the consequences, it must follow it.
Also, 60% being out of print means that 40% are IN PRINT. That may not be a majority, but it's still a hell of a lot of books, and one hell of a revenue stream for Google to be tampering with, even if you feel that it would be a positive influence.
Publishers whose books are out of print could be notified every time one of these works is referenced and if there are many such references may decide it might be worthwhile to print up another edition for sale.
Currently in print books with a "buy now" link would only increase their sales. What Google wants to do would never decrease the sales of any copyrighted works, but could possibly increase them.
Perhaps. There's still the chance that you'll do further investigation and go "oh man, this sucks, I'm not going to buy it after all." It's a small chance, much smaller than, say, music downloading, but still a chance.
Net effect though, I think it would increase sales.
However, increasing sales isn't enough to give Google a favorable rating IMO for the fourth point of fair use, "the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work." Perhaps a publisher worked out a deal with Amazon to provide a full-text search. Amazon expected it to increase sales more than it actually did, so paid a lot of money for it. Bad for Amazon, good for the publisher. Google Print drastically cuts the amount of money Amazon would be willing to pay, thereby hurting the publisher with respect to the alternative.
There could be other unforseen consequences.
All-in-all, it's a very complicated system. Google Print could touch pretty much the entire revenue stream for an entire industry, and thus I think that courts would be more willing to side with the publishers, giving them the option to sign on to Google Print or not based on which they think would be more beneficial.
Copying is NOT allowed under fair use. It is allowed for plenty of cases, but by no means all.
The courts rule whether a use fits under fair use based upon an analysis of four factors. There are virtually no hard and fast rules for what constitutes fair use. The fact that they are copying entire works for commercial gain probably pretty much rules out fair use.
(Also, if fair use allowed all non-distributing copying, why would reproduction be listed as one of the copyright holder's exclusive rights?)
Here are my thoughts (quotes from 17 USC 107):
the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
This is being done by a for-profit company for commercial gain. Weighs strongly against Google.
Works aren't actually distributed, weighs for Google.
Both are strong forces. Overall, this is probably neutral.
the nature of the copyrighted work;
Another poster in a long-ago story about Google Print gave an analysis about this point that consisted of balancing the factual nature of the works. According to that poster, fiction books weigh against Google more than fiction books. (Facts can't be copyrighted.) This analysis sounds reasonable, and I don't know any better.
But all-in-all, this point is probably reasonably neutral.
the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole
Google's copying the entire work, and not only THE entire work, but LOTS of entire works. This weighs strongly against Google.
the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work
May help, may not. The impression around here is it can't hurt, but there's one poster who makes a very good point about how Google Print could hurt: it more or less destroy's the position of publishers to offer their own for-pay search services or licence their libraries to other search services. On balance, because of that issue, I'd say that this point weighs weakly against Google.
So we have two neutral points vs. two points against Google, one strongly against.
I don't think Google will come away from this.
(1) rules out the first exception in 17 USC 108.
This exception doesn't apply due to both the reason Google is doing this and the fact that they're copying published works.
Also doesn't apply due to the use Google is putting this to.
Doesn't apply because the exception doesn't match what Google's doing AND perhaps because the copy doesn't become the property of the user, depending on who you consider the user.
Also, the rights granted by this bit don't exceed that of fair use:
The fair price bit rules out almost all books out there. Textbooks may be an exception, but it's likely the additional conditions imposed would disqualify them.
Given that this can only help the market, I'd say this stands a very good chance of being deemed fair use.
I disagree. If Google were a nonprofit organization or something, they might stand a chance, but I think that the fact that they are a for-profit, public company significantly hurts their case. They're doing Google print for direct financial benefit, and the publishers and authors only gain indirectly. (In other words, stop thinking of Google as a search engine, website, very useful service and start thinking of it as a company.) Publishers could make a compelling argument in my opinion that they are entitled to a portion of Google's revenue. And that's just my opinion from a philosophical standpoint.
The user (negative video) makes a very good point beyond just the philosophical stance that Google offering Google Print more or less destroys opportunities for publishers to cash in on similar business ventures by offering pay-for exclusive full text searches on their own website, licencing it to, e.g. Amazon, etc. See his post.
You are mistaken.
You didn't say how. At all.
Your parent said, "[b]ecause they're making a copy without the permission of the copyright holder, apparently without being covered by any exemption," and you say nothing that demonstrates that they either don't copy the work or are covered by an exemption.
There's no denying that Google copied the books. The only other way to do what they did would be to have an awesome machine that reads and OCRs the books each time that someone makes a search. Do you think they're doing that? No way. They scanned the books and put them on their hard drives. That's a copy. The fact that they don't transmit that copy anywhere doesn't matter.
Secondly, there is very possibly no exception that gives them permission to do this. You could argue that fair use gives them the right, and there's a good argument to be made there (at which point the fact they don't transmit copies becomes relevant), but you don't make that argument. You don't even mention fair use. You don't mention exemptions to the exclusive right of reproduction.
I'd mod your post off topic if I had points.
1. There's a limited number of them. For instance, you can't prevent someone from talking about your work in a review.
2. The rights that are granted are limited by specific exceptions in the law.
Title 17, section 106:
The limitations are:
107 - fair use
108 - library and archives
109 - first sale, maybe more
110-122 - not sure just by scanning, you can read them if you'd like. From titles, none apperas to apply to books.
Outage of plentiful service?
I prefer carrier pigeons.
Life is getting better for pedants, many supermarket express lanes now say "12 items or fewer."
I noticed that in Wegman's fairly recently. It pleased me, because I tend to be somewhat of a stickler for grammar.
It also reminds me of a scene from Apollo 13 where Mattingly is watching I think the Dick Cavett show, and Cavett says something about "3 million fewer viewers... what do you say, '3 million fewer viewers or less viewers'... 3 million fewer viewers watched this space launch than the last one."
But (OOTC) aren't you putting in FEWER molecules of milk?
Yeah, but still less milk. I guess it's sort of like how you would say, "12 pencils weigh 50 grams [or whatever; I have no clue]" but "a group of 12 pencils weighs 50 grams."
Wrong. A typical cell phone plan in the US has you entering a long-term (1y or 2y) contract. The 'pick your plan' thing isn't long term, you just pay month by month.