Table of Contents
Comments
Commenters2
The US Google Books Settlement represented a major watershed in the digitisation and access to millions of books, including in copyright publications and therefore the rediscovery of a huge proportion of the world’s knowledge. The settlement was supported by a balanced revenue share model with authors and other rights holders. However, the settlement and its potential ramifications sparked controversy as well as support from some sectors. The settlement was withdrawn due to objections from the US competition authorities. The congressional hearing raised anti-trust and copyright issues – not least because it would have given Google the sole authority for books whose copyright holders could not be found, provided inadequate protection to foreign rights holders and did not allow adequate time and notice for rights holders to opt-out of the settlement.
The US Google Books Settlement represented a major watershed in the digitisation and access to millions of books, including in copyright publications and therefore the rediscovery of a huge proportion of the world’s knowledge. The settlement was supported by a balanced revenue share model with authors and other rights holders. However, the settlement and its potential ramifications sparked controversy as well as support from some sectors. The settlement was withdrawn due to objections from the US competition authorities. The congressional hearing raised anti-trust and copyright issues – not least because it would have given Google the sole authority for books whose copyright holders could not be found, provided inadequate protection to foreign rights holders and did not allow adequate time and notice for rights holders to opt-out of the settlement.3
Therefore in November 2009, the settlement as it stood was reviewed and amended with a much narrower scope.
Therefore in November 2009, the settlement as it stood was reviewed and amended with a much narrower scope.5
In essence, the revisions to the settlement had little effect on the digitised works which were now out-of-copyright and considered to be in the public domain which continued to be accessed without geographical prejudice. However, the amended settlement greatly limited the geographical scope of the works included, with only works registered with the US Copyright Office or published in the UK, Canada and Australia (due to more similar legal and publishing cultures) being included.
In essence, the revisions to the settlement had little effect on the digitised works which were now out-of-copyright and considered to be in the public domain which continued to be accessed without geographical prejudice. However, the amended settlement greatly limited the geographical scope of the works included, with only works registered with the US Copyright Office or published in the UK, Canada and Australia (due to more similar legal and publishing cultures) being included.7
- As with the previous iteration of the settlement, limited preview can be viewed from within the US, but there will now be an option to buy access to the full-text.
- An increase in the number of free public access terminals offered to public library and HE institutions with the option to subscribe to the in-copyright book database.
- To allow booksellers to sell access non-commercially available works covered by the settlement.
- To allow rights holders to deliver works under a Creative Commons licence or remove restrictions on view as they see fit.
- To allow the Books Rights Registry to issue digitisation licences.
- To prohibit the Books Rights Registry from using unclaimed revenues to cover its running costs or distributing to other rights holders
8
Please see the following for more details: http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2009/11/modifications-to-google-books.html
Please see the following for more details: http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2009/11/modifications-to-google-books.html11
4th February 2010: Deadline for the Department of Justice to respond to amendments in the settlement.
4th February 2010: Deadline for the Department of Justice to respond to amendments in the settlement.