p2pnet - rss feed: Google Library angers academics
p2pnet.net News:- Google’s digital Google Print for Libraries project has already sparked strong fears in Europe and six European leaders have jointly proposed a "European digital library" to counter it.
Now 125 nonprofit “scholarly publishers” in the US are worried Google Print for Libraries, announced last December, could end up in copyright infringement on a “massive scale”.
“The libraries are letting Google scan some or all of their books, and Google plans to add the full-text records to its popular search index," says the Chronicle for Higher Education. "Scanning is already under way at some of the libraries, though Google officials say that only a handful of texts have been added to the index so far.
“Although many of the books being scanned are so old that copyright no longer applies, Google officials say they also plan to scan books still under copyright. For copyrighted works, Google officials say that online search results will offer only short excerpts. But publishers say that even to scan those books could violate copyright.”
But, "Copyright means the right to make copies, period," Peter Givler, the Association of American University Presses’ executive director is quoted as saying. "Copyright law can seem pretty byzantine and technical and elaborate and complicated, but at its simplest, that’s what it is. It’s the right to make copies.”
In a letter to Google, Givler says the idea that, ”once this gigantic digitization project has been completed anyone with a computer and internet access wil be able to use Google to search the collections of these libraries – including the public domain material from the New York Public Library and the Bodleian Library at Oxford – is enormously seductive.
“However, in our view it is built on a fundamental, broad-sweeping violation of the Copyright Act, and this large-scale infringement has the potential for serious financial damage to the members of the AAUP.”
Earlier in the letter, Givler says last year, when Google reps were “soliciting publishers’ agreement to participate,” many AAUP “signed on with enthusiasm”.
But, “Even though, according to the publicity, the program was being developed during the same period as Google Print for Publishers, news of Google Print for Libraries came as a complete surprise.
“It had not been mentioned by Google representatives during any of the discussions they were having with our members, and Google’s subsequent explanations of Google Print for Libraries have only increased that confusion and transformed it into mounting alarm and concern that appears to involve systematic infringement of copyright on a massive scale.”
The Chronicle has Adam M. Smith, a senior business-product manager for Google who’s working on the Google Print project, saying, "We believe we’re creating a product that is beneficial to publishers and to libraries - that by allowing full-text search of the books that we would spur additional interest in books and in using books and in purchasing books in a way that will benefit all people that are interested in publishing generally."
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See:-
strong fears in Europe - Europe vs Google, p2pnet, May 6, 2005
Chronicle for Higher Education - University-Press Group Raises Questions About Google’s Library-Scanning Project, May 23, 2005
May 24th, 2005 at 3:52 pm
Sorry Mr. Givler, but mere copying alone does not infringement make. It’s what one does with the copy (or copies) that determines if infringement has occured.
May 24th, 2005 at 4:40 pm
It should be interesting to see how this plays out.
I’m all for the digital library idea. This isn’t new since there is at least one organisation I know of that has scanned millions of pages of printed academic journals to make them readily available online. I am sure that this was done with the permission of the publishers (I am equally sure this was not done with the permission of the academics who wrote the articles, though most don’t care).
What I hate about this idea is that it is very likely that Google isn’t doing this to make them available to the public, but rather so this will be a subscription or spyware supported service sometime in the future. Google is big and ugly enough already, we do not need another huge corporation that owns online libraries. People should be smart enough to realize that corporations are never altruistic. This is one instance where I am on the side of the publishers. I had hoped they have enough sense to make the information available online themselves. At this late stage they have no choice but to finally drag themselves into the computer age.
May 24th, 2005 at 7:22 pm
Just adding an additional link:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050523/ap_en_bu/google_library_copyrights
May 24th, 2005 at 8:52 pm
The evolution of technology would be further along today if more people had the ability to care about humans as humans, and not humans as profit generators. As we travel into every century, some things must be left behind. What if doctors held so much power that it was still standard practice to drill a hole in one’s skull due to headaches? It was no longer in line with the current level of knowledge painfully achieved and documented by those who were not satisfied with the stauts quo. Unfortunately, progress is synonymous with change.
To move forward, some things must be left behind. There will come a time when copyright is a forgotten thing of the past. There will be profiteering rules in place, but individual’s access to ‘intelectual property’ will be unlimited. The only way to turn back the clock on that is to stop the progression of computer technology. Mankind has always dreamed about all of the accumulated knowledge of the world available at one personal terminal. If every genius can save time in his accumulation of the previous unraveled secrets, imagine how quickly he can begin to change the world with his additions to the knowledge stockpile.
At some point, humans as a whole will have to decide whether personal profit, or the better good will be served by law aand business. Poverty could be wiped out, but no one wants to help the “lazy” or “weak.” Most say, “why should I help him, no one helped me.” Everyone could have the food and shelter needed, if greed wasn’t the deep rooted world evil. An evil that demonizes thinkgs like sharing culture with the world for free.
This course of action will likely come in the form of revolution. Enough people will eventually get tired of the negative effect that profit-mongers have on all our lives. Bad air, housing “projects,” contaminated water, space debris, nuclear waste, and deplete ozone are largely prducts of someone’s want of money. Those with money usually have the guns, so it will probably be a very long time before wisdom triumphs over profit.