Harvard says NO to Google’s book scanner mongering
By Matt Jansen
Google has a voracious appetite for information of all kinds, and the world’s libraries contain a large quantity of human intelligence. But while Google was able to settle the class action lawsuits from authors and publishers, there are a fair number of restrictions built in to the agreement. Harvard wants no part of it until the agreement becomes more flexible.
Rather than continue fighting for an overall ruling in its favor, Google chose to settle. That enables them to move forward more quickly with its digitization process, but clearly indicates that scanning books and posting their content online is only an option for large companies. Legal and settlement costs would be far too high for a small business.
That’s just fine with Google, because it gives them yet another edge above the competition. Wendy Seltzer, a fellow at Harvard University’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society told PC World:
Google has quite effectively solidified with this settlement its position as a leading search company and effectively excluded lots of others from following in its footsteps. A court judgment in favor of fair use would have let anyone else go in and make similar fair uses. This settlement sets a pretty high fee on making those uses.
Still, it sets a precedent for grudging compromise between authors and publishers, and Google. Authors are acknowledging that the next great medium for their content is through online channels, while Google is recognizing that the content creators and distributors deserve some compensation for their efforts.
Beyond the legal and settlement costs, Google has a significant investment in manpower and technology to make the content in books searchable. That could be another reason it was willing to settle the suits and move on.
It’s a gamble though because Google is depending on the scanned book content to bring in revenue, and right now that’s a sound theory but untested in reality.
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October 31st, 2008
I’m actually very glad to hear this. There are a number of very serious rights issues in many things that Google is doing. Someone has to at least stop and think…
November 1st, 2008
Thnx Dude Nice:)
November 1st, 2008
Rights issues yes, but Google said it would do the right thing and it would fight for fair use. Now they cave and rather than use their well funded position to fight for fair use, they cave and pay off, thus continuing to prop up a dying industry.