Google Print Holds The Presses 134
brokenarmsgordon writes "Google Print, the project launched in December to digitize the entire collections of five major libraries, has been put on hold until November. Google will stop cataloging in-copyright books until November to give publishers time to decide if they would like to participate and to mark which books they want excluded from the index. "
Re:Google Blog (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, political correctness sure dictated which books got taken OUT of libraries ...
whaaa..? (Score:2, Insightful)
Google has the same right to scan books as the web (Score:4, Insightful)
Perhaps it is the tremendous usefulness of Google that has kept it from dying underneath an avalanche of lawsuits for its downloading of websites, but whatever the case Google is a company that uses other people's copyrighted material for commercial gain.
Is it fair use? It is to me, but I think downloading the entirety of a commercial work on an opt out basis is not fair use under the historical legal of fair use in the US.
Re:whaaa..? (Score:3, Insightful)
Or just like a library has to obtain permission from the publisher to add a book to its collection.
funny (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Google has the same right to scan books as the (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, there is a difference (Score:3, Insightful)
Not saying its a bad thing and i wish google the best. I just dont see it happening quite like they want, due to greed in corporate society today..
Google Blog-"/." Philantropy. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Bad that Copyright takes so long to expire (Score:1, Insightful)
It should also be on RAID storage, and "someone else" should pay for it...
Re:Actually, there is a difference (Score:2, Insightful)
I fail to see how copyright represents 'greed in corporate society today' anymore than it would have fifty years ago when the writers and publishers would have also objected to this kind of thing.
Re:whaaa..? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Google Blog (Score:2, Insightful)
In a matter of years the human race managed to do something extraordinary, and previously unimagined: eliminate scarcity. Now *everyone* can have access to any information, for free or very low cost. This is something that could change everything. Scholars through the ages have dreamed of this.
But the only thing people can think of is how to lock it up and go back to the way things were before.
It's as if someone invented the replicator, from Star Trek. Now everyone can be fed and clothed! It's a miracle! No more poverty or starvation! Now how can we prevent that from happening?
Re:robots.txt for books (Score:2, Insightful)
Maybe in the near future we will see some sort of robots.txt page at the start of every book.
Yeah, maybe it could say something like "All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers."That would be a solution publishers could use.
Oh wait, this one already does!
Yes you do fail to see (Score:5, Insightful)
You failed to see whether copyright is necessary to protect the interests of writers, why increasingly unneccessary publishers are asking for more money for cheaper books made on shittier paper.
You failed to explain why we need basic calculus 17th edition when nothing a schoolboy needs to learn has changed in at least a century.
You fail to see that most writers, coders, musicicans, actors, etc. get very little because they aren't annointed as the "in flavor" by their corresponding distribution megalith. These distribution chains are far less necessary than ever before, yet they we have never seen such a rampage against fair use, privacy, individual rights as we see today. All driven by your favorite media special interest group.
you fail to explain why a writer or coder is somehow more deserving than a plumber who cannot write plumbing 1.0 and then sit on his fscking a$$ for the rest of his life. People sitting around doing nothing their whole lives are just as indicitave of "imperfections in the system" as the unemployed poor.
Try working for a living. Done writing a book or some code? Write some more! If your product is worth it, and you price your code correctly, you will make enough money to support you and your family in non-extravagant way - like the plumber. If your project requires more people, scale up accordingly, but stop looking to retire rich and live the rest of your life like f-ing bobby brown and that crack hoe whitney houston.
Musicians, Writers, Actors are all the same, they want to hit the f-ing jackpot while the rest of us work our lives to support them. Arguments of utility to society are bullshit. how did brad pitt make my life better than the guy who unplugs the sewer, or the laid off engineer who designed my 802.11 pcb?
WAAAY TOO MANY creative types worship this jackpot mentality, thinking only about the riches they will win if they join the system. but most who swing for the fences miss and get nothing. How is that different than playing lotto?
Copyrights, patents, IPOs, etc. are not for regular people, they are for publishers, producers, lawyers, Wall Street types, and other parasites who spend their time getting between you and your customer while you spend your time working. Why let them? Is it because your reach exceeds your grasp?
Stop fighting their battle against individual rights for them. Stop helping them to plant spy chips in your DVD player and computer, "to keep you honest".Stop letting them sell you perfectly good hardware with broken software that is used to pull you by the nose where they want you to go. Stop helping them lobby for media taxes and keeping you from looking at your movie on the OS you choose.
In short, just STFU you pompous a$$.
"due to greed in corporate society today..
I fail to see how copyright represents 'greed in corporate society today' anymore than it would have fifty years ago when the writers and publishers would have also objected to this kind of thing."
Re:Google Print hack? (Score:3, Insightful)
You'd get in far less trouble.
Federal felony vs state/local misdemeanor.
Of course, buying the books used is ethical and (currently, as of my writing this post) legal and will save you quite a bit.
Not indexed - not sold (Score:4, Insightful)
When you make a google print search, you get a box in the left for each hit, with suggestions where you can buy the book.
Sure, some people will not buy the book because they can get the small part they need from the scanned pages. But a lot more people will only know the boox exists because they find it with Google Print, and if the book is any good, some of them will buy it.
Books are not like music, most people will prefer the analog version over an online version where you can search your way to scanned extracts.
I expect very few publishers to "opt-out" of the index.