Pay $77 million, Copiepresse tells Google
p2pnet news | Products:- Belgian French-language newspapers say Google owes them as much as €49 million (US$77 million) for publishing and storing their content without permission.
“The newspaper copyright group Copiepresse said it had summoned Google to appear again before a Brussels court in September that will decide on their claim that they suffered damages of between €32.8 million (US$51.7 million) and €49.2 million (US$77.5 million),” says the Associated Press, going on:
“The group called on Google to pay a provisional amount of €4 million (US$6.3 million).’
Representing 19 French and German newspapers in Belgium, Copiepresse last year won its fight against Google for copyright violations.
However, said SearchEngineLand.com, the decision, “really makes a mockery of the whole argument in the first place because their goal was really to try and force Google to pay for the content on Google News.”
Now, “Copiepresse said in its summons that Google had violated Belgian copyright law by reproducing and publishing part of newspapers’ stories and by storing the full versions of archived stories in its cached pages,” says AP, going on:
“It suggested setting up a panel of Belgian experts to examine the figures if Google wanted to contest the case.
“Copiepresse also wants Google to publish – without any commentary – a copy of the ruling against it on google.be and news.google.be for 20 days or pay a daily fine of €1 million (US$1.58 million).
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Associated Press – Belgian copyright group demands Google pay up to €49 million, May 27, 2008
copyright violations – Google looses Belgian copyright case, February 14, 2007
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May 28th, 2008 at 12:18 pm
I have expected the RIAA/MPAA (of some form) to be involved as well, sueing for linking.
May 28th, 2008 at 7:57 pm
So if Google search links to my Web page I can sue them? Then everyone can as well? Because my site contributes to their income, and they don’t paid me anything. They should pay everyone they link to, as well as for putting their ads on my site.
Instead of everyone trying to sue everyone else, doesn’t it make more sense to contest it in Court? Then if someone like Google were to lose, they would only be required to remove material or pay for it. Though I fail to see why News reporting should be profitable, or how anyone could copyright it, even if they wrote it firsthand.
If someone quotes me from my blog, or copies an article, should I be able to sue them since I’ve made it available? Even if they claimed to have written it themselves, would I care? No.
May 28th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Google is doing OTHERS a favour by linking to their sites. Individuals potentially profit much more from this than Google profits from having their one url. I guess because they make 20 billion a year that gets up some people’s noses huh?