Google Print faces lawsuit

After Google Earth, Google Print runs into trouble. Author's Guild sues Google for 'massive copyright infringement'.

BY A CORRESPONDENT

24th September, 2005: Google's ambitious project to scan entire libraries' works and put up snippets of them online has come under fire with the American Authors Guild suing Google for attempting massive infringement of copyrights.

Google Print for Libraries was started last year as an attempt to put scanned versions of copyrighted and non-copyrighted works on the Net, without asking for permission from the copyright holders and publishers. Initially, many libraries including Random House and Simon and Schuster went wih the plan, taking Google's word that it could help readers access material currently out of print and promote interest in books.

However, Google was later accused of scanning and putting up whole copyrighted material accessible to anyone, without seeking copyright holders' permission. Google denied this, saying the attempt was only to put up snippets of pages with links to publishers' or auhors websites selling the boks. But this did not convince the authors that their works would be secure in Google servers. 

What rankled the authors, publishers and libraries alike was Google's refusal to seek copyright permission and later scan the works. For Google, fairness worked in reverse: Google set a deadline till November 2005, so that authors who did not want to be part of the Google Print program could opt out. This triggered the author lawsuit, which felt that instead of authors being allowed to "opt out" they should have been allowed to "opt in" if they wanted. Google on its part denies this in its official blog:

"Google respects copyright. The use we make of all the books we scan through the Library Project is fully consistent with both the fair use doctrine under U.S. copyright law and the principles underlying copyright law itself, which allow everything from parodies to excerpts in book reviews,"says Susan Wojcicki, Vice President, Product Management at Google. However, this explanation has not satisfied any of the aggrieved paties. 

Google has recently been in controversy over the Google Earth, which puts together a mosaic of satellite images of earth to create a 3D globe. Users can zoom in any part of the globe and conduct an aerial survey. The easy access to such information has triggered security fears in countries over top secret defence and nuclear installations. It is feared that Google Earth can become a handy tool for troublemakers, despite its many uses.

BY A CORRESPONDENT