Settlement with Google Book Search
Oct. 30th, 2008 05:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sub_dividedGoogle settled with AAP (Association of American Publishers) for 125 million, proving (once again) that it's easier to beg forgivess than to ask permission.
Summary from mass corporate email, condensed:
Summary of key terms of the Settlement
The agreement significantly expands access to millions of in-copyright books in the U.S. through Google Book Search.
Specifically, readers will be able to access books through:
* Preview -- Allows users to freely preview a limited number of pages of in-copyright works to help users decide if the book is right for them to buy. Out-of-print books will be available for preview on a default basis, but rightsholders can instruct Google not to provide display uses. In-print books will not be displayed unless the rightsholder decides to activate previews through their participation in this settlement or through the Book Search Partner Program.
* Consumer Purchase -- Offers individual users the ability to purchase access to view an entire in-copyright, in-print book online, if the rightholders opted-in. The rightsholder may set the price or allow the price to be set by a Google algorithm.
* Institutional Subscription -- For academic, corporate, and government organizations. Gives members of the institution full access to in-copyright, out-of-print books.
* Free Public Library Access -- Authorizes free, full-text, online viewing of in-copyright, out-of-print books at designated computers in U.S. public and university libraries at no charge to the library or the reader, with added revenues to the rightsholders through per page printing fees.
* Future Services -- The agreement allows for other services and uses, such as Print-On-Demand, Consumer Subscription and others, to be agreed in the future.
Benefits to authors
The agreement acknowledges the rights and interests of authors and copyright owners, provides an efficient means for them to control how their intellectual property is accessed online, and enables them to receive compensation for online access to their works.
Role of Registry
The independent, non-profit Registry will create an authoritative rightsholder database, distribute payments provided for under the settlement from Google to rightsholders, and resolve claims disputes between those rightsholders. The Registry will also be able to offer similar commercial licenses to companies other than Google, if the rightsholder so chooses.
Terms of Author-Publisher Procedures
There are Author-Publisher Procedures that set out a framework for how to resolve possible disputes between authors and publishers regarding whether books should be included in the Library Project, the control of display rights, share of revenues, and pricing, etc. The Authors Guild, which has standing as an industry association for trade authors, negotiated the Author-Publisher Procedures with the AAP. One of the terms of the Procedure is that if disputes arise, under trade book author contracts about the author’s share of revenues from Google, those disputes can go to arbitration under the Procedures. Educational books do not fall into this category since contracts for educational books are different from trade contracts. The Authors Guild does not generally handle text authors, and the existence of ancillaries and other factors present complexities not found in trade contracts. If publishers and authors cannot agree on issues related to the Google Project, then normal legal remedies can be pursued by either party.
How we will handle decisions about what to put into Library Print Project
These decisions and the process for making them will be made by the operating companies and will require the approval of divisional presidents.
Certain [Company] titles currently appear in the Google Book Search offering. How does this settlement affect those titles?
The Settlement does not directly affect titles which are in the Google Book Search offering under agreements [Company] has made directly with Google. Google, however, clearly wishes to expand the options to purchase these and other titles, and we will work with them as appropriate to that end.
***
...Which doesn't address the really scary thing about Google Library Project (to fiction publishers), which is that every new book published will now have to compete with every book ever published (and scanned by Google). Especially with print on demand services on the rise.
On the other hand, new books already compete with library books and used books, and you can't stop the tide.
Publishing is supposed to be a "conservative" field but we are so far ahead of the RIAA (and MPAA) right now. And not just because Google did all the hard work: music had muxtape, didn't it? Before the RIAA shot themselves in the foot when they shut down the site. Maybe it's because digital books aren't really direct competition; maybe it's because public libraries have been around for ages; or maybe it's because the book industry was never very profitable to begin with.
Summary from mass corporate email, condensed:
Summary of key terms of the Settlement
The agreement significantly expands access to millions of in-copyright books in the U.S. through Google Book Search.
Specifically, readers will be able to access books through:
* Preview -- Allows users to freely preview a limited number of pages of in-copyright works to help users decide if the book is right for them to buy. Out-of-print books will be available for preview on a default basis, but rightsholders can instruct Google not to provide display uses. In-print books will not be displayed unless the rightsholder decides to activate previews through their participation in this settlement or through the Book Search Partner Program.
* Consumer Purchase -- Offers individual users the ability to purchase access to view an entire in-copyright, in-print book online, if the rightholders opted-in. The rightsholder may set the price or allow the price to be set by a Google algorithm.
* Institutional Subscription -- For academic, corporate, and government organizations. Gives members of the institution full access to in-copyright, out-of-print books.
* Free Public Library Access -- Authorizes free, full-text, online viewing of in-copyright, out-of-print books at designated computers in U.S. public and university libraries at no charge to the library or the reader, with added revenues to the rightsholders through per page printing fees.
* Future Services -- The agreement allows for other services and uses, such as Print-On-Demand, Consumer Subscription and others, to be agreed in the future.
Benefits to authors
The agreement acknowledges the rights and interests of authors and copyright owners, provides an efficient means for them to control how their intellectual property is accessed online, and enables them to receive compensation for online access to their works.
Role of Registry
The independent, non-profit Registry will create an authoritative rightsholder database, distribute payments provided for under the settlement from Google to rightsholders, and resolve claims disputes between those rightsholders. The Registry will also be able to offer similar commercial licenses to companies other than Google, if the rightsholder so chooses.
Terms of Author-Publisher Procedures
There are Author-Publisher Procedures that set out a framework for how to resolve possible disputes between authors and publishers regarding whether books should be included in the Library Project, the control of display rights, share of revenues, and pricing, etc. The Authors Guild, which has standing as an industry association for trade authors, negotiated the Author-Publisher Procedures with the AAP. One of the terms of the Procedure is that if disputes arise, under trade book author contracts about the author’s share of revenues from Google, those disputes can go to arbitration under the Procedures. Educational books do not fall into this category since contracts for educational books are different from trade contracts. The Authors Guild does not generally handle text authors, and the existence of ancillaries and other factors present complexities not found in trade contracts. If publishers and authors cannot agree on issues related to the Google Project, then normal legal remedies can be pursued by either party.
How we will handle decisions about what to put into Library Print Project
These decisions and the process for making them will be made by the operating companies and will require the approval of divisional presidents.
Certain [Company] titles currently appear in the Google Book Search offering. How does this settlement affect those titles?
The Settlement does not directly affect titles which are in the Google Book Search offering under agreements [Company] has made directly with Google. Google, however, clearly wishes to expand the options to purchase these and other titles, and we will work with them as appropriate to that end.
***
...Which doesn't address the really scary thing about Google Library Project (to fiction publishers), which is that every new book published will now have to compete with every book ever published (and scanned by Google). Especially with print on demand services on the rise.
On the other hand, new books already compete with library books and used books, and you can't stop the tide.
Publishing is supposed to be a "conservative" field but we are so far ahead of the RIAA (and MPAA) right now. And not just because Google did all the hard work: music had muxtape, didn't it? Before the RIAA shot themselves in the foot when they shut down the site. Maybe it's because digital books aren't really direct competition; maybe it's because public libraries have been around for ages; or maybe it's because the book industry was never very profitable to begin with.