Google Books: Have You Opted Out?

[Plantweed]

If not, today's your deadline. Many of you have been in books, or have solo books of your own, for which you own electronic rights. Google has been scanning books by the truckload and posting them online without permission or payment, including full versions of copyrighted works. You might want to read these...

Google Book Settlement Thoughts and Clarifications UPDATED: OPT OUT DEADLINE TODAY | A Distant Soil by Colleen Doran

Amazon and Others Slam Revised Google Books Deal - Digits - WSJ

[Chris G]

I don't have the time right now to read through all of this, but my understanding was that the Google ruling was being reviewed by the court because of the way that the conclusion to the lawsuit essentially gave Google special rights that any other book dealer didn't have, not having been part of the litigation, and was phrased in such a way that others would have to bargain for themselves to get these right.

I think the hope of the court was that Congress would step up and resolve it with new IP legislation, and clarify the matter, or something like that.

Anyway... tough call.

Giving humanity access to the whole store of printed human knowledge in a searchable form is a tremendous, almost unfathomable public good.

But compensating creative people for the labor is also paramount in a free society.

It's a issue that will continue to be grappled with as technology runs ahead faster than legal precedent.

[Plantweed]

They went about it in a pretty sleazy way, forcing creators to make a deal ex post facto. Say I wrote or drew a book that's gone out of print. The book has some value still, maybe as a reference, and I was interested in getting it reprinted. Well, Google Books scanned 80% of the book in to their searchable database, so they pretty much destroyed most of the market. Who's going to buy it if most of it is available for free online?

[Sash]

tH3y shUd 5can onLy olD bO0kz Or pAy 2 PLaY

[standard]

thank god no one buys my books.