Google has been involved in litigation with the Authors Guild who disagree that scanning books and presenting small portions of them, called “snippets”, is legal according to copyright and fair use practices. Google holds their ground that there is nothing wrong with what they do and making public those searches is completely acceptable.
The Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers have pursued Google to stop the scanning and public use of those works.
Google has always said that by showing a searcher a portion of a book it increases the possibility that the searcher will be interested in that “snippet” and they will then go buy that book if they are interested.
Now, Google wants to research other companies. Yes, companies like Yahoo, Microsoft, Amazon and others are also involved in book scanning. Probably as a defense, Google wants the titles of works they have scanned made public to them.
Google is offering to work with those companies and address any concerns about their confidential information. Following those lines, it is reported that the Judge in this case has already made it clear that there is a protective order to restrict who can see confidential documents.
The publishers and authors have always said that they should have a choice to opt-in to the program instead of it being an opt-out situation. Google feels it would be too much work to do it that way because they would then have to research the authors and contact them…why not just keep it as an opt-out and allow the authors to contact Google?
Do you feel that Google is making tracks to overtake this case and defend themselves based on the actions of their competition?
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