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February 5, 2010, 01:17 PM ET
Justice Department 'Reluctantly' Says Google Settlement Still Needs Work
The U.S. Department of Justice has weighed in on Google Book Search Settlement 2.0, saying that despite "substantial progress, substantial issues remain." In a statement of interest filed on Thursday, the department said that the revamped agreement "suffers from the same core problem as the original agreement: It is an attempt to use the class-action mechanism to implement forward-looking business arrangements that go far beyond the dispute before the court in this litigation." As a result, it concluded, the deal "purports to grant legal rights that are difficult to square with the core principle of the Copyright Act that copyright owners generally control whether and how to exploit their works during the term of copyright."
As in its earlier filing in the class-action case between Google and authors' and publishers' groups, though, the department made a point of noting the "vast promise" of attempts to make copyrighted works easier to find and search. "Breathing life into millions of works that are now effectively dormant, allowing users to search the text of millions of books at no cost, creating a rights registry, and enhancing the accessibility of such works for the disabled and others are all worthy objectives," it noted.
The department praised the parties to the lawsuit for their attempts "to overcome legal and structural challenges to the emergence of a robust and diverse marketplace for digital books." But it said that "the United States has reluctantly concluded that use of the class-action mechanism in the manner proposed by the [Amended Settlement Agreement] is a bridge too far." It also said that anti-trust concerns persist over pricing arrangements and a Google monopoly.
In a move that could further prolong an already drawn-out process, Justice said that "the public interest would best be served" by having the parties to the case continue to work on the settlement, perhaps under court guidance. Settlement 2.0 is scheduled for a fairness hearing in federal court on February 18.
Comments
1. d_fevens - February 05, 2010 at 04:09 pm
I, and many others the world believe Google & Company has stolen their intellectual property. The United States Department of Justice did nothing more than issue Google a "play nice", they did nothing to hold Google responsible for this theft of our property. The United States will have their comprehensive digital library regardless of the rights of others they have to trample to get it. By not objecting to the settlement, Canada is complicit in this mass appropriation.
Douglas Fevens,
Halifax, Nova Scotia,
The University of Wisconsin, Google, & Me
2. d_fevens - February 05, 2010 at 04:10 pm
I, and many others the world believe Google & Company has stolen their intellectual property. The United States Department of Justice did nothing more than issue Google a "play nice", they did nothing to hold Google responsible for this theft of our property. The United States will have their comprehensive digital library regardless of the rights of others they have to trample to get it. By not objecting to the settlement, Canada is complicit in this mass appropriation.
Douglas Fevens,
Halifax, Nova Scotia,
The University of Wisconsin, Google, & Me
3. gavinmoodie - February 05, 2010 at 08:18 pm
I'm not so concerned about my copyright rights. I'd prefer to have my work read more widely than increase my income by a few hundred dollars a year. I fear that in time access to Google's digital book collection may be priced exploitatively - as is access to many of my journal articles. But the solution to that is either for the public to own the collection or to have competition between multiple digital collections.
4. d_fevens - February 06, 2010 at 11:14 am
Since I registered my copyright with the Canadian Intellectual Property Office which has an online database, The University of Wisconsin-Google commercial partnership could have, with a few clicks of the mouse found my contact information. (FEVENS )They chose not to. What kind of example is that for a university to send to its students? "Oh don't bothering seeking permission, its too much work, just go ahead and use whatever you want." The University of Wisconsin and Google trampled on my (copy)rights. At the very least I am owed an apology and I am sure most universities would expect no less of a student.
Douglas Fevens,
Halifax, Nova Scotia,
The University of Wisconsin, Google, & Me
5. d_fevens - February 06, 2010 at 07:12 pm
The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) has filed their own objection to the Proposed Amended Settlement Agreement (PASA) with the court.
"CAUT advances five arguments in support of these objections:
1. The PASA puts the United States in violation of international intellectual property law and specifically in violation of trade agreements among Canada, the United States, and other parties as those agreements relate to copyright.
2. The PASA wrongly singles out Canadians for inclusion amongst the Author sub-class. The Canadian copyright regime is distinct from American copyright law in ways that will implicate Google and potentially the Book Registry in liability for copyright infringement in Canada, particularly with respect to Canada's legislative provisions in respect of moral rights and its licensing scheme for unlocatable copyright owners (what Americans call "orphan works"), neither of which have correlatives in US law.
3. The PASA's inclusion of Canadians in the Author sub-class is wrong for a second reason: the PASA does not account for the reality of Québecois and Canadian French-language authors among the Author sub-class. Québec, unlike other Provinces and Territories of Canada, is a civil law jurisdiction, and commercial dealings with copyrighted works reflect what we call a civilian view of the author. The PASA has generated a great deal of discontent among French language authors and CAUT's Québec members.
4. The Authors Guild and the representative plaintiffs do not fairly and adequately represent the interests of Canadian academic authors in negotiating the PASA. Simply, many Canadian academics would not likely select a mechanism resembling that articulated in the PASA for distributing digital books. Academic authors in general place a higher premium on access than is reflected in the PASA.
5. The PASA includes minimal privacy protections. The PASA's
inconsiderate treatment of privacy interests is inconsistent with
Canadian academic values. More troubling, the PASA's failure to
require privacy guarantees puts the PASA at odds with Canadian
privacy legislation and values more generally."
Douglas Fevens
Halifax, Nova Scotia
The University of Wisconsin, Google, & Me
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