Great Marketing or Copyright Infringement?

21
Sep

Posted by Krista

The Author’s Guild filed a lawsuit against Google yesterday to try to stop Google from digitizing library books as part of its Print Library Project. According to the Guild

“This is a plain and brazen violation of copyright law,” Nick Taylor, president of the New York-based Authors Guild, said in a statement about the lawsuit, which is seeking class action status. “It’s not up to Google or anyone other than the authors, the rightful owners of these copyrights, to decide whether and how their works will be copied.”

To which Google responded:

Let’s be clear: Google doesn’t show even a single page to users who find copyrighted books through this program (unless the copyright holder gives us permission to show more). At most we show only a brief snippet of text where their search term appears, along with basic bibliographic information and several links to online booksellers and libraries.

Jonathan Band, an attorney focusing on intellectual property and the internet wrote an extensive article (PDF) about how a previous case, Kelly v. Arriba Soft, may be used in Google’s favor. He concludes

The Google Print Library Project will make it easier than ever before for users to locate the wealth of information buried in books. By limiting the search results to a few sentences before and after the search term, the program will not conflict with the normal exploitation of works nor unreasonably prejudice the legitimate interests of rightsholders. To the contrary, it often will often increase demand for copyrighted works.

It will be interesting to see what happens with this. A week after Amazon launched their “Look Inside This Book” search, they reported that books with full text search outsold books without the feature by 9%. (source Information Today) Of course, the difference is that publishers must give Amazon permission to make their text searchable.

Personally, I’m far more inclined to buy a book that I can browse through than one that has no information available. I can do it at the book store or library - why not online? I’ve certainly ended up purchasing far more books than I care to admit because I’ve started reading a few chapters and had to buy it. And I can also say that it’s rare that I’ve finished an entire ebook. Sure, I’ve scanned them in small portions, but reading 300+ pages on a computer screen is not my idea of a good time.

Apparently, I’m not the only one since some publishers are experimenting with online publishing. A few months ago, an article at The Book Standard discussed how sci fi/fantasy publisher, Tor, has been successful releasing Creative Commons versions of some of its books.

A CNN article quotes others who aren’t opposed to Google Print

“For a typical author, obscurity is a far greater threat than piracy,” said Tim O’Reilly, chief executive of O’Reilly Media and an adviser to Google’s project. “Google is offering publishers an amazing opportunity for people to discover their content.”

James Hilton, associate provost and interim librarian at the University of Michigan, said his school is contributing 7 million volumes over six years because one day, materials that aren’t searchable online simply won’t get read.

“That doesn’t mean it’s going to be read online, but it’s not going to be found if it’s not online,” he said.

Still, this phenomenon is much too new to convince old school publishers that allowing greater access to their intellectual property will end up benefiting them in the long run. Until then, the courts will have to decide.