Here are diametrically opposing view on what authors should do about the upcoming deadline to opt out of the GoogleBookssettlement. Miracle Jones writes "The William Morris Agency has come out strongly against the Google Books settlement for its clients, citing the fact that the settlement creates a non-competitive marketplace for a whole new product (orphan books), in addition to containing provisions that will make it impossible for writers to remove books from the database after 27 months have passed: 'We believe that the license being given to Google to publish and display with impunity out-of-print "orphan" works (where the rights owner is unknown and estimated by the Financial Times to be between 2.8 and 5 million books out of 32 million books protected by copyright in the United States) will open the door to establishing Google as the most comprehensive database, potentially a monopoly, with unfair bargaining power.'" On the other side of the debate, James Gleick writes "With the deadline approaching for 'opting out' of the Google Books settlement, the Authors Guild has posted an aggressive explanation of who it thinks should do that: no one. Not a single author in the world, it argues, stands to benefit from removing himself or herself from the class. This comes as part of a new set of 'Answers' meant to push back against what the authors group thinks is widespread confusion about the settlement; they also address questions about just what kind of money we might be talking about, and what kind of control authors will have over Google's use of their work."
The Settlement covers Books only if they were published on or before January 5, 2009. Books published after January 5, 2009 are not included in the Settlement. Further, the Settlement only covers Inserts that are contained in Books, government works or public domain books that were published on or before January 5, 2009.
Well, you could say that it doesn't affect your rights directly, only in so far as those rights are no longer as exclusive as they were. It grants additional rights to the defendant, Google, which is unusual in a lawsuit.
Why do people always have to opt out of something they don't understand or want to be in? what's the problem with opting in? with that at least you have a choice...
It's Google performing a mass indexing of something (it's what they do). Could you imagine what the web would be like if every site had to have opted in to Google's index initially? Not saying it's right or wrong, but just presenting the situation from another perspective.
Imagine if instead of just indexing, Google stopped linking to the real website and just presented its cache. You'd never have access to the real site, just Google's copy of it. Imagine how happy webmasters would be then.
They aren't just indexing books, they are allowing them to be read online with Google adverts raking in the money. They have the exclusive right to do this, a monopoly gatekeeper. Books they don't approve of can simply vanish, books they do approve of, get an artificially high page rank, popular books get pay per view.
This sort of power over books should not be in the hands of any single company.
This sort of power over books should not be in the hands of any single company.
I don't mean to be snarky, but nothing is stopping you from competing against them. In fact, if Google defends itself from the lawsuits that will probably follow, they may lead the way for other companies to try to provide the same service. I, for one, look forward to having access to millions of books. If they try to do anything along the lines of censorship (like you fear) another company will swoop in and provide a better service.
by Anonymous Coward
on Wednesday August 19, @08:46AM (#29118025)
You missed the point. Google have a deal with publishers, you, Joe Nobody, would not even be able to make an appointment to see an individual publisher's secretary's dog, let alone try and do a deal with an entire industry.
This move is going to get google into the DoJ monopoly spotlight. Perhaps if all the books were public domain and copyright laws changed to have sane limits, we'd be in a different position, but that clearly isn't going to happen.
You missed the point. Google have a deal with publishers, you, Joe Nobody, would not even be able to make an appointment to see an individual publisher's secretary's dog, let alone try and do a deal with an entire industry.
That's correct. However, the OP's comment is also correct. This opens the door for competition specifically because it's monopolistic. That is, Google knows full well that they can't be allowed to be the only player with access to this material, and that the next guy (Bing?) to come along can just say, "dear publisher, please write me a contract granting me access to your books on the same terms as Google or I will follow up my lawsuit with a trip to the DoJ, explaining the nature of your anti-competitive
>...you, Joe Nobody, would not even be able to make an appointment to see an individual publisher's secretary's dog...
Actually, I did. The dog is a good chap from Germany, apparently from a family that raised sheep. I didn't get to stay long, but I got a sound bite from him anyway.
The problem is this: Google has the ability to pay their way out of this nuisance lawsuit. Others do not. Thus Google ends up with a defacto monopoly.
From the author's perspective, however, there is no ability to pursue a bogus lawsuit to a conclusion more favorable than free money they shouldn't be getting in the first place.
Of course William Morris is against it. The settlement is bad for them and bad for our society. It's bad for authors, even. But the only thing worse for authors is opting out of the settlement.
I think the objection is that this settlement only allows Google to do this. Anyone else has to not only scan the books in, but also get sued by the Authors Guild and then make the same class-action settlement.
I thought the whole point was that monopoly is bad for the consumer who gets stuck with shitty product because no one can compete fairly and bring better products in the game. So here we are, with a gazillion books sitting there with no one to bring them to the people the way Google is trying to, while everyone else bitches and moans about one thing or the other. Pardon my antipathy to the reasons like being lazy or not being resourceful enough, but at the end of the day I would really like it if those books were easily accessible to me and to everyone else.
Here's a thought: Let Google become a monopoly here. We get a nice new service. Once the service is there others would like to compete. *Then* we can bring the anti-monopoly whip out and beat Google senseless. In the meantime either get off your asses and get something similar done, or stop whining about why Google doing this or that is bad because no one else will be able to do it once Google has a monopoly. We will cross that bridge when we get there.
Once Google has an established monopoly there is nothing stopping them charging for access. They become the gate keepers to millions of books. Meanwhile their rivals a non profit making Project Gutenburg will be out of business because they used to scan orphaned works, and this deal prevents them from continuing.
This is not about laziness, Google just did this without bothering with permission, and then sent lawyers only billionares can afford in to steam roller an insane settlement, that no one else will e
If you're upset about this settlement whine and moan to the publishers.
THEY are the villans here.
They're just like the music labels. They're mindlessly greedy and stupid and willing to hand over a monopoly on a silver platter to avoid the slightest bit of offense to their sense of artistic megalomania.
The publishers are creating the Frankenstein here.
Reminds me of when people claimed gmail was a monopoly and I had to beat them with a stick while repeating "Being good enough that everyone prefers your free service to other competing free services is NOT A MONOPOLY".
The price of monopoly is upon every occasion the highest which can be got.
Clearly things have changed in the last two hundred years, but the basic precepts of sociology and human behavior remain mostly the same in this regard.
I certainly don't disagree that the service is wonderful boon to the average person -- I use it rather often and am thankful that it's there -- but
Sure there is an "evil/bad" monopoly here but it's not the one you think.
Google's "dreaded monopoly" here is simply an extension of the powers granted to the relevant publishers and authors through copyright. Without that underlying state sanction, The Publishers Guild would be in no position to dictate terms to Google or otherwise frighten off small time competitors.
It's not Google that needs to be reigned in here, it's copyright.
Having a uni-polar world where google is king is in staunch opposition to the spirit of the free market
Copyrighted works have nothing to do with a free market; any and all 'monopoly' power that Google obtains here is directly derived from copyright.
In a free market anyone would be free to scan and publish anything, any way they like. If there was social desire to fund authors beyond the free market, the easiest and probably most efficient way to be to slap a per-revenue levy off sales/copies/whatever going
by Anonymous Coward
on Wednesday August 19, @07:28AM (#29117281)
Could someone explain how the authors lost their rights? Were they sold to publishers that went under? Maybe I'm not understanding things correctly. If a book is out of print and they don't know who owns the rights, why doesn't the original author retain all rights?
If the original author died without any children or a spouse it becomes even more difficult to determine who should have the rights. Personally I think if no-one can say for sure who owns the work, then the world should be in the public domain.
If the original author died without any children or a spouse it becomes even more difficult to determine who should have the rights. Personally I think if no-one can say for sure who owns the work, then the world should be in the public domain.
Too easy for a publisher to move your work into the Public Domain that way. Which is good for them, not so good for your heirs.
And while you may not approve of a man's heirs making money from his work years after his death, I somehow doubt you'd approve of a publish
by Anonymous Coward
on Wednesday August 19, @07:40AM (#29117401)
Update: I found some of the answers I was looking for off of a link from one of the articles.
Now you can see there's gonna be an issue with this, like you just raised, which is: what if nobody knows who the copyright owner is anymore? Maybe the publisher went out of business, and we're not sure what business now owns the assets. Maybe the author died and didn't leave a will and now grandkids in six states own the copyright and don't know about it. -- link [fictioncircus.com]
That kind of clears up what orphan books are, but still, if no one knows who owns the rights, who are the people complaining?
The writer retains the rights. Google came to an agreement with a guild that does not represent most writers to hand over EXCLUSIVE online rights to themselves even if the author didn't agree to it.
If the author doesn't like the deal, he needs to find out about it, and he may be living in isolation in a jungle somewhere, and then he needs to opt out by a deadline.
This completely screws other places offering free online books such as Gutenburg, because Google now owns the rights to pretty much all literature online. It's an EXCLUSIVE deal that means only google has the right to scan orphaned works. The only way anyone else can do it, is to scan the books anyway, and hope to win a billion dollar lawsuit from both Google and the Authors Guild.
To "help" authors make up their minds Google offered a bribe. Sign up before the deadline and get a share in the advertising revenue made from the orhpaned works, sign up aferwards and you don't get that benefit. Change your mind after a year or so, and it's too late. The data will be in the database permanently.
Google is trying to be a monopoly, and not a single piece of their behaviour appears to be concerned with authors, libraries and archivists. It's a disgrace and I look forward to them explaining the land grab of European author's rights to the EU.
Doesn't that only apply to books still under copyright? I was under the impression that Gutenburg only published books that had gone out of copyright and entered the public domain. I don't think Google can obtain exclusive rights to public domain works through this maneuver.
Gutenburg wants to be able to scan orphaned works too. They have been campaigning legally for years. Gutenburg isn't a billion dollar advertising agency so can't afford the lawsuit that google pulled off. But now they are watching in horror as Google gets an exclusive deal meaning non profits such as Gutenburg and other libraries and archives are locked out. The law will never change now because congress will argue the problem is solved - Google is running it.
They have been campaigning legally for years. Gutenburg isn't a billion dollar advertising agency so can't afford the lawsuit that google pulled off.
Seriously, what is the chance that someone with no money will get Congress to change copyright law purely to benefit the public? You say they have been campaigning for years, to which I say they could campaign for a thousand years without getting anywhere. Copyright law is controlled by the behemoths. In this case, the behemoth is concerned with something other than restricting the public access for a change.
I am perfectly happy with Gutenburg rather than Google getting these rights. But I know it would never happen.
Google came to an agreement with a guild that does not represent most writers to hand over EXCLUSIVE online rights to themselves even if the author didn't agree to it.
But surely the Guild doesn't have any rights to hand over? A quick look through the chapter headings [copyright.gov] of US copyright law doesn't indicate any provision for licensing bodies. Is this actually a case of a class action settlement being forcibly applied to anyone who doesn't opt out?
If the author doesn't like the deal, he needs to find out about it, and he may be living in isolation in a jungle somewhere, and then he needs to opt out by a deadline.
As copyright was explicitly established for the public good, what societal or constitutional interest is served in allowing an uninterested author to effectively lock up books they no longer care about? I'm about as conservative as you can get, but I can't see why anyone should be able to prevent Google (or any other group) from making abandoned works available. Society gets access to more information, and the authors and publishers don't lose a single penny that they hadn't already written off.
That's a very good question. Constitutionally, in the US only authors can hold copyright and only inventors can hold patents. Unfortunately the legislators don't give a rat's ass about the Constitution, despite the fact that they are sworn to uphold it. You should not be able to sell copyrights, you should only be able to contract for their publication (i.e., "give me $n and I allow you to distribute").
Dead authors' works should ALL be in the public domain. Live authors' works should always be under their c
From useless to possibly useful. This reminds me of adverse possession laws were if real property is not being used ownership can be transfered to someone who will actually make some positive use of the property.
Good ruling that is taking books sitting as orphans outside of a users/readers reach and making them freely accessible.
If a book is out of print, what's the point in indexing it?
I mean, from the users point of view, they can search an out of print book, and even see _some_ of the pages, but they cannot buy the book. Seems kinda pointless.
If this settlement doesn't pass, the legal fees will probably bankrupt it forever, causing [the Authors Guild] to disappear for good in a puff of ink-stained smoke.
Well now the Authors Guild's stance makes a lot more sense. This settlement is more self preservation then in the interest of the authors.
We believe that giving Google special treatment does not appear to be the way to foster a competitive market place to the benefit of you, our authors.
If it is only orphaned books then what market is that. Its not like they are trying to sell them to consumers now. They might as well release it to the public domain, but no author would go for that. They figure the little money they make licensing it is worth it.
The publisher's side is written as if Google is publishing the whole work, instead of merely providing a search engine. After finding the work you'll still have to locate a copy on the used books market, or public libraries.
Or even, if enough people are looking for the same book, it might be possible to do a new printing.
Well now the Authors Guild's stance makes a lot more sense. This settlement is more self preservation then in the interest of the authors.
Okay, I'm as lazy as the next guy, lazier maybe. But I'm not too lazy to read the linked headlines (even clicked on one accidentally... I need palm detection) and one of them says that the Author's Guild gets half the money that's supposed to be going to the authors... you know, kind of like giving to UNICEF or the Red Cross. (Actually, the Red Cross has a pretty good conversion rate, much better than PETA or WWF for example.)
Of course they don't want you to opt-out... they want to get PAID. But giving you
I think publishers would be nothing short of deranged to not want to have their books on Google Books. I have bought all my textbooks based on what I saw on Google Books, since it appeared. That's right, all of them. We're talking (sadly) expensive textbooks on nanotechnology, microfulidics and silicon microtechnology (as well as some materials science). Google Books is by far the BEST marketing tool that a publisher could imagine.
Sounds to me like a bunch of lawsuits just waiting to happen. Last I checked, the law doesn't give any rights to anyone to take a work that isn't theirs. If Google takes a work, and the author misses the deadline, what's stopping that author from suing?
Absolutely nothing, as far as I can tell. Some crazy agreement with a guild that probably has nothing to do with the author in the first place? Yeah, right. That'll hold up in court the same way as if I sold my neighbor's car while he was on vacation. 'I've got a contract!' doesn't mean anything if what you're doing is illegal.
the law doesn't give any rights to anyone to take a work that isn't theirs.
Legally, the issue may be the underpinnings of class action lawsuits [wikipedia.org]. The thought is that it would be detrimental to the legal system to have thousands of different suits all on the exact same subject. So instead of tying hundred of judges for years on the single issue, the concept of "class action" was created, where by a single suit if brought on behalf of a class of people. There's no particular requirement needed to be the initiating claimant in a class action lawsuit - anyone can do it, as long as the
A lot of people aren't understanding this bit. You have to opt out of class action lawsuits. It may not seem fair, but it's a compromise. Class-actions are one of the more pro-little-guy elements of civil law we have in the US, giving lawyers huge heaping incentives to punish abusive large entities that we wouldn't be able to attack on our own.
Here's the relevant section from the wikipedia article:
Due process requires in most cases that notice describing the class action be sent, published, or broadcast to class members. As part of this notice procedure, there may have to be several notices, first a notice giving class members the opportunity to opt out of the class, i.e. if individuals wish to proceed with their own litigation they are entitled to do so, only to the extent that they give timely notice to the class counsel or the court that they are opting out. Second, if there is a settlement proposal, the court will usually direct the class counsel to send a settlement notice to all the members of the certified class, informing them of the details of the proposed settlement.
"orphan works where the rights owner is unknown" and "a monopoly, with unfair bargaining power."
Bargaining with unknown persons? I would think that if one thought they had this ability, they wouldn't need any sort of agreement set, as they could as easily bargain about and/or form a monopoly over unknown books. WTF is William Morris Agency doing by pretending to speak on behalf of unknown writers anyway? You have to be more than moderately known just to talk to
The way I understand it, you've got to exempt yourself, through the mechanism to do that here in the US.
If you're an author in another country, you register your copyright THERE, and as long as your country has ratified the same copyright convention as most other western countries, you're done.
Google isn't the next Microsoft - Google is trying to Wal-mart information and IT. Enjoy what's left when they're done.
What about future authors? (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe I'm not reading this right, if there is a deadline to opt out, and I write my first book after that deadline, can I still opt out?
Re: (Score:2)
Re:What about future authors? (Score:4, Informative)
Does this Settlement cover Books published in 2009? [googlebooksettlement.com]
Parent
Re:What about future authors? (Score:5, Informative)
Well, you could say that it doesn't affect your rights directly, only in so far as those rights are no longer as exclusive as they were. It grants additional rights to the defendant, Google, which is unusual in a lawsuit.
Parent
Re:What about future authors? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's Google performing a mass indexing of something (it's what they do). Could you imagine what the web would be like if every site had to have opted in to Google's index initially? Not saying it's right or wrong, but just presenting the situation from another perspective.
Parent
Re:What about future authors? (Score:5, Interesting)
Imagine if instead of just indexing, Google stopped linking to the real website and just presented its cache. You'd never have access to the real site, just Google's copy of it. Imagine how happy webmasters would be then.
They aren't just indexing books, they are allowing them to be read online with Google adverts raking in the money. They have the exclusive right to do this, a monopoly gatekeeper. Books they don't approve of can simply vanish, books they do approve of, get an artificially high page rank, popular books get pay per view.
This sort of power over books should not be in the hands of any single company.
Parent
Re:What about future authors? (Score:5, Informative)
This sort of power over books should not be in the hands of any single company.
I don't mean to be snarky, but nothing is stopping you from competing against them. In fact, if Google defends itself from the lawsuits that will probably follow, they may lead the way for other companies to try to provide the same service. I, for one, look forward to having access to millions of books. If they try to do anything along the lines of censorship (like you fear) another company will swoop in and provide a better service.
Parent
Re:What about future authors? (Score:4, Insightful)
You missed the point. Google have a deal with publishers, you, Joe Nobody, would not even be able to make an appointment to see an individual publisher's secretary's dog, let alone try and do a deal with an entire industry.
This move is going to get google into the DoJ monopoly spotlight. Perhaps if all the books were public domain and copyright laws changed to have sane limits, we'd be in a different position, but that clearly isn't going to happen.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You missed the point. Google have a deal with publishers, you, Joe Nobody, would not even be able to make an appointment to see an individual publisher's secretary's dog, let alone try and do a deal with an entire industry.
That's correct. However, the OP's comment is also correct. This opens the door for competition specifically because it's monopolistic. That is, Google knows full well that they can't be allowed to be the only player with access to this material, and that the next guy (Bing?) to come along can just say, "dear publisher, please write me a contract granting me access to your books on the same terms as Google or I will follow up my lawsuit with a trip to the DoJ, explaining the nature of your anti-competitive
Re:What about future authors? (Score:4, Funny)
>...you, Joe Nobody, would not even be able to make an appointment to see an individual publisher's secretary's dog...
Actually, I did. The dog is a good chap from Germany, apparently from a family that raised sheep. I didn't get to stay long, but I got a sound bite from him anyway.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Because these are orphan works. If no one really claims them anymore, the opt-in rate would be very low.
Authors Guild Recommends It if You Plan to Sue (Score:5, Informative)
With the deadline approaching for 'opting out' of the Google Books settlement, the Authors Guild has posted an aggressive explanation [authorsguild.org] of who it thinks should do that: no one.
Actually what they said specifically is:
Opting out of the settlement is for authors who want to preserve their right to sue Google themselves. We donâ(TM)t think there are any such authors.
Oh how they doubt the litigious desire of some people that believe their works turn the paper they're printed on to gold.
Re:Authors Guild Recommends It if You Plan to Sue (Score:5, Insightful)
The settlement is for a bogus lawsuit.
The problem is this: Google has the ability to pay their way out of this nuisance lawsuit. Others do not. Thus Google ends up with a defacto monopoly.
From the author's perspective, however, there is no ability to pursue a bogus lawsuit to a conclusion more favorable than free money they shouldn't be getting in the first place.
Of course William Morris is against it. The settlement is bad for them and bad for our society. It's bad for authors, even. But the only thing worse for authors is opting out of the settlement.
Parent
Re:Authors Guild Recommends It if You Plan to Sue (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
The non-competitive product argument is total BS (Score:4, Insightful)
These fucks are too lazy to scan the books for themselves and are bitter that Google is investing the man-power to do so.
Re:The non-competitive product argument is total B (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the objection is that this settlement only allows Google to do this. Anyone else has to not only scan the books in, but also get sued by the Authors Guild and then make the same class-action settlement.
Parent
Re:The non-competitive product argument is total B (Score:5, Insightful)
Remind me why monopoly is bad, again?
I thought the whole point was that monopoly is bad for the consumer who gets stuck with shitty product because no one can compete fairly and bring better products in the game. So here we are, with a gazillion books sitting there with no one to bring them to the people the way Google is trying to, while everyone else bitches and moans about one thing or the other. Pardon my antipathy to the reasons like being lazy or not being resourceful enough, but at the end of the day I would really like it if those books were easily accessible to me and to everyone else.
Here's a thought: Let Google become a monopoly here. We get a nice new service. Once the service is there others would like to compete. *Then* we can bring the anti-monopoly whip out and beat Google senseless. In the meantime either get off your asses and get something similar done, or stop whining about why Google doing this or that is bad because no one else will be able to do it once Google has a monopoly. We will cross that bridge when we get there.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Once Google has an established monopoly there is nothing stopping them charging for access. They become the gate keepers to millions of books. Meanwhile their rivals a non profit making Project Gutenburg will be out of business because they used to scan orphaned works, and this deal prevents them from continuing.
This is not about laziness, Google just did this without bothering with permission, and then sent lawyers only billionares can afford in to steam roller an insane settlement, that no one else will e
Re: (Score:2)
If you're upset about this settlement whine and moan to the publishers.
THEY are the villans here.
They're just like the music labels. They're mindlessly greedy and stupid
and willing to hand over a monopoly on a silver platter to avoid the
slightest bit of offense to their sense of artistic megalomania.
The publishers are creating the Frankenstein here.
Re:The non-competitive product argument is total B (Score:5, Insightful)
Reminds me of when people claimed gmail was a monopoly and I had to beat them with a stick while repeating "Being good enough that everyone prefers your free service to other competing free services is NOT A MONOPOLY".
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"Being good enough that everyone prefers your free service to other competing free services is NOT A MONOPOLY".
I usually explain this as: "gmail is as much a monopoly as the democraticly elected president is a dictator".
Yes, not only the obvious part is analogous.
Re: (Score:2)
A few quotes on the subject by Adam Smith:
... is a great enemy to good management.
Monopoly
The price of monopoly is upon every occasion the highest which can be got.
Clearly things have changed in the last two hundred years, but the basic precepts of sociology and human behavior remain mostly the same in this regard.
I certainly don't disagree that the service is wonderful boon to the average person -- I use it rather often and am thankful that it's there -- but
Re: (Score:2)
Sure there is an "evil/bad" monopoly here but it's not the one you think.
Google's "dreaded monopoly" here is simply an extension of the powers
granted to the relevant publishers and authors through copyright.
Without that underlying state sanction, The Publishers Guild would be
in no position to dictate terms to Google or otherwise frighten off
small time competitors.
It's not Google that needs to be reigned in here, it's copyright.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Having a uni-polar world where google is king is in staunch opposition to the spirit of the free market
Copyrighted works have nothing to do with a free market; any and all 'monopoly' power that Google obtains here is directly derived from copyright.
In a free market anyone would be free to scan and publish anything, any way they like. If there was social desire to fund authors beyond the free market, the easiest and probably most efficient way to be to slap a per-revenue levy off sales/copies/whatever going
rights unknown? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If the original author died without any children or a spouse it becomes even more difficult to determine who should have the rights. Personally I think if no-one can say for sure who owns the work, then the world should be in the public domain.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Too easy for a publisher to move your work into the Public Domain that way. Which is good for them, not so good for your heirs.
And while you may not approve of a man's heirs making money from his work years after his death, I somehow doubt you'd approve of a publish
Re:rights unknown? (Score:5, Interesting)
Now you can see there's gonna be an issue with this, like you just raised, which is: what if nobody knows who the copyright owner is anymore? Maybe the publisher went out of business, and we're not sure what business now owns the assets. Maybe the author died and didn't leave a will and now grandkids in six states own the copyright and don't know about it. -- link [fictioncircus.com]
That kind of clears up what orphan books are, but still, if no one knows who owns the rights, who are the people complaining?
Parent
Re:rights unknown? (Score:5, Interesting)
The writer retains the rights. Google came to an agreement with a guild that does not represent most writers to hand over EXCLUSIVE online rights to themselves even if the author didn't agree to it.
If the author doesn't like the deal, he needs to find out about it, and he may be living in isolation in a jungle somewhere, and then he needs to opt out by a deadline.
This completely screws other places offering free online books such as Gutenburg, because Google now owns the rights to pretty much all literature online. It's an EXCLUSIVE deal that means only google has the right to scan orphaned works. The only way anyone else can do it, is to scan the books anyway, and hope to win a billion dollar lawsuit from both Google and the Authors Guild.
To "help" authors make up their minds Google offered a bribe. Sign up before the deadline and get a share in the advertising revenue made from the orhpaned works, sign up aferwards and you don't get that benefit. Change your mind after a year or so, and it's too late. The data will be in the database permanently.
Google is trying to be a monopoly, and not a single piece of their behaviour appears to be concerned with authors, libraries and archivists. It's a disgrace and I look forward to them explaining the land grab of European author's rights to the EU.
Parent
Re:rights unknown? (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think Google can obtain exclusive rights to public domain works through this maneuver.
They can't. Bringing up Gutenberg is a complete red herring.
Re:rights unknown? (Score:5, Informative)
Gutenburg wants to be able to scan orphaned works too. They have been campaigning legally for years. Gutenburg isn't a billion dollar advertising agency so can't afford the lawsuit that google pulled off. But now they are watching in horror as Google gets an exclusive deal meaning non profits such as Gutenburg and other libraries and archives are locked out. The law will never change now because congress will argue the problem is solved - Google is running it.
Parent
Re:rights unknown? (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, what is the chance that someone with no money will get Congress to change copyright law purely to benefit the public? You say they have been campaigning for years, to which I say they could campaign for a thousand years without getting anywhere. Copyright law is controlled by the behemoths. In this case, the behemoth is concerned with something other than restricting the public access for a change.
I am perfectly happy with Gutenburg rather than Google getting these rights. But I know it would never happen.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Google came to an agreement with a guild that does not represent most writers to hand over EXCLUSIVE online rights to themselves even if the author didn't agree to it.
But surely the Guild doesn't have any rights to hand over? A quick look through the chapter headings [copyright.gov] of US copyright law doesn't indicate any provision for licensing bodies. Is this actually a case of a class action settlement being forcibly applied to anyone who doesn't opt out?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Yes. That's how class actions usually work. But it's a pretty serious abuse of process in this case, IMO.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
If the author doesn't like the deal, he needs to find out about it, and he may be living in isolation in a jungle somewhere, and then he needs to opt out by a deadline.
As copyright was explicitly established for the public good, what societal or constitutional interest is served in allowing an uninterested author to effectively lock up books they no longer care about? I'm about as conservative as you can get, but I can't see why anyone should be able to prevent Google (or any other group) from making abandoned works available. Society gets access to more information, and the authors and publishers don't lose a single penny that they hadn't already written off.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
That's a very good question. Constitutionally, in the US only authors can hold copyright and only inventors can hold patents. Unfortunately the legislators don't give a rat's ass about the Constitution, despite the fact that they are sworn to uphold it. You should not be able to sell copyrights, you should only be able to contract for their publication (i.e., "give me $n and I allow you to distribute").
Dead authors' works should ALL be in the public domain. Live authors' works should always be under their c
HIghest and best use (Score:3, Insightful)
Good ruling that is taking books sitting as orphans outside of a users/readers reach and making them freely accessible.
Out of print books (Score:2)
If a book is out of print, what's the point in indexing it?
I mean, from the users point of view, they can search an out of print book, and even see _some_ of the pages, but they cannot buy the book. Seems kinda pointless.
Out of print doesn't mean unavailable... (Score:2)
Don't forget about second hand book sellers and public libraries.
The guild part is misleading (Score:2)
If this settlement doesn't pass, the legal fees will probably bankrupt it forever, causing [the Authors Guild] to disappear for good in a puff of ink-stained smoke.
Well now the Authors Guild's stance makes a lot more sense. This settlement is more self preservation then in the interest of the authors.
We believe that giving Google special treatment does not appear to be the way to foster a competitive market place to the benefit of you, our authors.
If it is only orphaned books then what market is that. Its not like they are trying to sell them to consumers now. They might as well release it to the public domain, but no author would go for that. They figure the little money they make licensing it is worth it.
Both sides are spinning it, then? (Score:2)
The publisher's side is written as if Google is publishing the whole work, instead of merely providing a search engine. After finding the work you'll still have to locate a copy on the used books market, or public libraries.
Or even, if enough people are looking for the same book, it might be possible to do a new printing.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Well now the Authors Guild's stance makes a lot more sense. This settlement is more self preservation then in the interest of the authors.
Okay, I'm as lazy as the next guy, lazier maybe. But I'm not too lazy to read the linked headlines (even clicked on one accidentally... I need palm detection) and one of them says that the Author's Guild gets half the money that's supposed to be going to the authors... you know, kind of like giving to UNICEF or the Red Cross. (Actually, the Red Cross has a pretty good conversion rate, much better than PETA or WWF for example.)
Of course they don't want you to opt-out... they want to get PAID. But giving you
I only buy textbooks that I see on GoogleBooks now (Score:2)
I think publishers would be nothing short of deranged to not want to have their books on Google Books. I have bought all my textbooks based on what I saw on Google Books, since it appeared. That's right, all of them. We're talking (sadly) expensive textbooks on nanotechnology, microfulidics and silicon microtechnology (as well as some materials science). Google Books is by far the BEST marketing tool that a publisher could imagine.
James Glieck's Chaos (Score:2)
i recommend giving a read to James Gleick's Chaos.
Lawsuits waiting to happen (Score:3, Interesting)
Sounds to me like a bunch of lawsuits just waiting to happen. Last I checked, the law doesn't give any rights to anyone to take a work that isn't theirs. If Google takes a work, and the author misses the deadline, what's stopping that author from suing?
Absolutely nothing, as far as I can tell. Some crazy agreement with a guild that probably has nothing to do with the author in the first place? Yeah, right. That'll hold up in court the same way as if I sold my neighbor's car while he was on vacation. 'I've got a contract!' doesn't mean anything if what you're doing is illegal.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
the law doesn't give any rights to anyone to take a work that isn't theirs.
Legally, the issue may be the underpinnings of class action lawsuits [wikipedia.org]. The thought is that it would be detrimental to the legal system to have thousands of different suits all on the exact same subject. So instead of tying hundred of judges for years on the single issue, the concept of "class action" was created, where by a single suit if brought on behalf of a class of people. There's no particular requirement needed to be the initiating claimant in a class action lawsuit - anyone can do it, as long as the
Mod Parent Up (Score:4, Informative)
Here's the relevant section from the wikipedia article:
Due process requires in most cases that notice describing the class action be sent, published, or broadcast to class members. As part of this notice procedure, there may have to be several notices, first a notice giving class members the opportunity to opt out of the class, i.e. if individuals wish to proceed with their own litigation they are entitled to do so, only to the extent that they give timely notice to the class counsel or the court that they are opting out. Second, if there is a settlement proposal, the court will usually direct the class counsel to send a settlement notice to all the members of the certified class, informing them of the details of the proposed settlement.
Parent
William Morris Agency Is On Drugs (Score:2)
Or if they're not, maybe they should be. To wit:
"orphan works where the rights owner is unknown"
and
"a monopoly, with unfair bargaining power."
Bargaining with unknown persons? I would think that if one thought they had this ability, they wouldn't need any sort of agreement set, as they could as easily bargain about and/or form a monopoly over unknown books. WTF is William Morris Agency doing by pretending to speak on behalf of unknown writers anyway? You have to be more than moderately known just to talk to
Treaty violation? (Score:2)
The way I understand it, you've got to exempt yourself, through the mechanism to do that here in the US.
If you're an author in another country, you register your copyright THERE, and as long as your country has ratified the same copyright convention as most other western countries, you're done.
Google isn't the next Microsoft - Google is trying to Wal-mart information and IT. Enjoy what's left when they're done.