vinohradska writes "Eric Schmidt has written a good article called the The point of Google Print. It clearly lays out the argument against the current lawsuit: 'Even those critics who understand that copyright law is not absolute argue that making a full copy of a given work, even just to index it, can never constitute fair use. If this were so, you wouldn't be able to record a TV show to watch it later or use a search engine that indexes billions of Web pages.'" The Point of Google Print Log in/Create an Account | Top | 273 comments | Search Discussion Display Options Threshold: -1: 273 comments 0: 270 comments 1: 222 comments 2: 157 comments 3: 34 comments 4: 16 comments 5: 10 comments Flat Nested No Comments Threaded Oldest First Newest First Highest Scores First Oldest First (Ignore Threads) Newest First (Ignore Threads) The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way. Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass (Score:5, Insightful) by geomon (78680) on Sunday October 23, @04:34PM (#13859386) (http://www.cato.org/ | Last Journal: Sunday April 17, @02:12AM) This is about control. I guess I didn't notice the corporate copyright lawyer trawling the library taking photographs of the card catalog, which is an index of books in the library's holdings. Of course our library doesn't *have* a card catalog any more; it has an online search utility. Funny that didn't get mentioned in the lawsuit.Who cares if Google has copied every book ever printed. As long as the copyrights of the author and publisher are honored (they don't give copies away for free), the who cares? If I took every book off the shelf from my library, copied them, and then took the copies home and stuffed them in my garage, who would care? That constitutes 'fair use'. But if I start making more copies and giving them away, or give my copy away, now I should be held to account.The publishers are just ticked because they see themselves losing control over content. Meet the new RIAA.Even those critics who understand that copyright law is not absolute argue that making a full copy of a given work, even just to index it, can never constitute fair use. If this were so, you wouldn't be able to record a TV show to watch it later or use a search engine that indexes billions of Web pages.Is Schmidt the only one who gets the webpage angle? I would beat the publishers over the head with this one. What do you want to bet that they all have copyrighted webpages indexed on Google. Did they ever protest this fact? [ Reply to This Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass (Score:4, Insightful) by Seumas (6865) on Sunday October 23, @04:40PM (#13859435) Imagine sitting at your computer and, in less than a second, searching the full text of every book ever written . . . Imagine one giant electronic card catalog that makes all the world's books discoverable with just a few keystrokes by anyone, anywhere, anytime.I've added the emphasis to show why there is a problem for many people with this. You can't advertise it as a full text search of every book every written while justifying it by claiming it's just a card catalog. Last time I stopped in at the local library, the card catalog indexed a brief descriptive blurb, publishing date, printing, editor, publisher, author, page count and title. It did not contain the contents of said book. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by geomon (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @04:44PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Anonymous Brave Guy (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @04:50PM Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass (Score:5, Informative) by Eustace Tilley (23991) * <zu2odn102@sneakemail.com> on Sunday October 23, @05:10PM (#13859638) (Last Journal: Monday August 25, @09:44AM) You are mistaken. From Google Print's FAQ:#I'm already logged in. Why are you telling me the page is unavailable?As part of our efforts to protect a book's copyright, a set of pages in every in-copyright book will be unavailable to all users.# I really need to see more of this book. What can I do?Google Print helps you discover books, not read them online. To read the whole book, we encourage you to use the "Buy this book" link to purchase it online or the "Find this in a library" link to look for a local library that has it. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by grimJester (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:56PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by EvanED (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @05:58PM Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass (Score:4, Insightful) by Echnin (607099) <p3s46f102.sneakemail@com> on Sunday October 23, @06:57PM (#13860154) (http://eivind.sytes.net/) That's a copy. The fact that they don't transmit that copy anywhere doesn't matter. Yes it does. Copying is allowed under fair use; distrubuting is not. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by EvanED (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:30PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Otterley (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @11:05PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by pipingguy (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @11:53PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Baricom (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @05:58PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by tgibbs (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @06:47PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by sk0pe (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @07:20PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Random832 (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @10:36PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Khazunga (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @10:49PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by SEE (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @11:56PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by tftp (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @07:41PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Binary Boy (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @07:59PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by sk0pe (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @08:01PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by sk0pe (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @08:05PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by _Ludwig (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @08:09PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by sk0pe (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @08:17PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Binary Boy (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:18PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Binary Boy (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:25PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by sk0pe (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @08:27PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by tftp (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:28PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by sk0pe (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @08:38PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by tftp (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:51PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by sk0pe (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @09:02PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Eustace Tilley (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:25PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by MaestroRC (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:35PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Elwood P Dowd (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:36PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Baricom (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:38PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by tftp (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:43PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Baricom (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:55PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by citog (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @10:23PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Khazunga (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @10:54PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by kinzillah (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @11:34PMIncorrect by Nomad37 (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @11:41PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by jericho4.0 (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @11:49PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Jackmn (Score:1) Monday October 24, @12:11AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by raoul666 (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @06:21PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by raoul666 (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @07:21PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by civilizedINTENSITY (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:13PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by fossa (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:19PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by (negative video) (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:54PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Baricom (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @06:08PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by fossa (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @10:17PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Baricom (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @10:33PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Anonymous Brave Guy (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @06:00PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Anonymous Brave Guy (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:32PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by EvanED (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @06:06PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by arminw (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @07:55PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by EvanED (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:47PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by arminw (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @10:26PM2 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Seumas (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @04:50PM Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass (Score:5, Informative) by ornil (33732) on Sunday October 23, @05:14PM (#13859667) Trust me, knowing that a book exists is already very helpful, even if you can't obtain it immediately. If a book is in print, then you can buy it. If it's in the public domain you can access it immediately. If it is out of print, but not in the public domain, then you may still be able to buy it used. Even if you can't, your local public library can obtain just about any book that's been published for you. If it is something extremely rare, but you really need it, then it is still useful, because you can fly over, or contact the library by phone and explain your circumstances, or find someone with access to the library who can obtain the necessary information.If you don't know whether the books exists, you can do neither of those. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by assassinator42 (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:55PM2 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by civilizedINTENSITY (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @05:17PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by MikeURL (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:19PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by hunterx11 (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:33PM This in combination with ABE will kick ass. (Score:4, Interesting) by douglips (513461) on Sunday October 23, @06:11PM (#13859966) (http://www.douglips.com/ | Last Journal: Friday December 03, @09:30PM) The ABE (http://www.abebooks.com/ [abebooks.com]) is a searchable inventory of a gazillion independent bookstores world wide.If Google Print tells you the book exists, you can go to ABE and find it in some bookshop in New Zealand, and order it with your credit card. I've used ABE to buy books that are out of print on several occasions.Now, if Google integrated their Print search with ABE, then the "buy it now" could be buying it from that rare bookseller in the middle of nowhere.This kicks all kinds of ass. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:This in combination with ABE will kick ass. by Seumas (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @07:04PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by bluGill (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @07:15PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by arminw (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:13PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by MikeURL (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:21PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by geomon (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:25PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1) Monday October 24, @12:15AM Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass (Score:5, Insightful) by silentbozo (542534) on Sunday October 23, @04:49PM (#13859499) (Last Journal: Sunday April 17, @08:20PM) I think that the publishers are protesting this, for the same reason the RIAA, and the MPAA are trying to stifle ways that make it easier to sell products. The reason is that they're all distribution channels, but in the age of the internet, there are easier, more cost-effective methods of distribution (ie, direct downloads, Amazon.com, etc.). More so than that, they are MARKETING MACHINES - the reason Author X, or Band Y wants to sign with Publisher Z, is that Publisher Z can front a million dollars pushing product into people's faces, and thus drum up large sales volumes... but only on NEW product.  You notice that many of the new technologies (iTunes, eBooks, etc.) really mostly benefit older back-list titles. This is because there is no marketing, production, or distribution budget for these things. There are few, if no jobs in promoting these backlist titles, whereas there is a lot of money in promoting the new stuff.  Things like Google Print will help promote sales of older items, and I think the fear is among the publishers, is that their ability to push new content will be drowned out, and they'll all lose their jobs. Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of kickbacks, marketing contracts, air time, cushy offices, the whole idea of exclusivity - all down the toilet, because people only have so much time. If they can find what they're looking for without having the consumer Big Brother tell them what they want, then what use are these marketing organizations, especially when most of the new product they peddle is crap to begin with? [ Reply to This | ParentDoesn't meet the same need by Ksisanth (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:09PM Re:Doesn't meet the same need (Score:4, Insightful) by cheezit (133765) on Sunday October 23, @07:12PM (#13860250) (http://slashdot.org/) The parent post is making a different point. Publishers are not "sellers of books"---book distributors do that. Publishers are "marketers of books" and as such have invested large amounts of money in setting up a system for creating demand for their product.The modern consumer is bombarded with thousands of marketing messages a day and publishers can't afford to have the consumer's attention divided, even if it might generate a few more bucks on old titles. Think of it like Microsoft, having trouble competing against its own installed base of Win95/98/ME/2K users. The risk is that the complex network that creates a publishing "phenomenon" might start breaking down.Take Oprah's book club...the big publishers are actually somewhat ambivalent about it. It generates demand and the type of "phenomenon" they need in order to justify their continued existence, but they can't control what Oprah chooses. The functioning of this demand-generating system requires that these big publishers control the entire lifecycle. Hence it is highly vulnerable to disruption and they are alert to anything that might represent the first major crack in the edifice. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Doesn't meet the same need by egburr (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @11:09PMRe:Doesn't meet the same need by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1) Monday October 24, @12:17AMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Oligonicella (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:24PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by mankey wanker (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @07:05PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by stubear (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @07:54PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by blackmagic1982 (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @09:23PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1) Monday October 24, @12:20AMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by mankey wanker (Score:2) Monday October 24, @12:47AMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Eustace Tilley (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @07:14PMDisintermediation by Stephen Ma (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @06:43PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by delong (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @04:59PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Seumas (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:05PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by geomon (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:14PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Tony Hoyle (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:57PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by toddestan (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:58PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by delong (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:56PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by civilizedINTENSITY (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:21PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by EvanED (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:38PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by tgibbs (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:59PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by EvanED (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:19PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by tgibbs (Score:2) Monday October 24, @12:02AMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by DrYak (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:19PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by SEE (Score:2) Monday October 24, @12:14AMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by joeykiller (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:22PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by geomon (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:48PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Random832 (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @10:40PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by lancejjj (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:32PMRe:Publisher's Have a Bug Up Their Ass by Peyna (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:25PMpublishers want Google Print not Google Library by bgalbrecht (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @11:55PM4 replies beneath your current threshold. Can of worms? (Score:1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 23, @04:35PM (#13859394) use a search engine that indexes billions of Web pagesDo they really want copyright holders thinking about whether search engines violate copyright law? [ Reply to ThisRe:Can of worms? by ichigo 2.0 (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:57PMRe:Can of worms? by Tony Hoyle (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:00PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. rational of opposing google print? (Score:5, Insightful) by matt4077 (581118) <slashdot@ma[ ]ia ... m ['tth' in gap]> on Sunday October 23, @04:38PM (#13859410) (http://www.matthiaswinkelmann.com/) Aside from law issues, I don't see the business case against opposing google print. Could the net effect be anything else but higher sales due to the amount of people who will find just the right book when searching through google? The only reason I could see is strategy: the publishers are afraid that google print could be _so_ successful that it gains power against them, ultimately maybe even replace them and directly connect authors and publishers and providing a print-on-demand service. A situation not unlike Apple vs. The Record Companies. [ Reply to ThisRe:rational of opposing google print? by Anonymous Brave Guy (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @04:45PMRe:rational of opposing google print? by Otter (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @04:47PM Re:rational of opposing google print? (Score:5, Interesting) by schon (31600) on Sunday October 23, @04:54PM (#13859529) (http://slashdot.org/) I don't see the business case against opposing google print. Could the net effect be anything else but higher sales due to the amount of people who will find just the right book when searching through google?The business case is simple:"It's my football."I've talked to a publisher about something similar, [slashdot.org] and his attitude was "I don't care if it will make me more money - if I want it indexed, I will do it myself, so I can charge for it. I don't want anyone but me making money by providing a service for my products, even if it's a service I can't or won't provide myself."They don't care about more money, all they care about is control. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:rational of opposing google print? by civilizedINTENSITY (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:23PMRe:rational of opposing google print? by WaterBreath (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:19PMRe:rational of opposing google print? by winwar (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:28PMRe:rational of opposing google print? by Peter La Casse (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:46PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:rational of opposing google print? by schon (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @09:38PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:rational of opposing google print? by MBCook (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @04:58PMRe:rational of opposing google print? by ZombieRoboNinja (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @11:40PMThey're opposing Google Library, not Print by bgalbrecht (Score:1) Monday October 24, @12:01AM Have these publishing companies (Score:4, Insightful) by Chickenofbristol55 (884806) on Sunday October 23, @04:38PM (#13859412) even used google print? You can barely see any of the book, just the "about" page in the beginning. This service is used to DISCOVER books. If millions of people can search and find the book they have been looking for, and they happen to buy it off of amazon let's say, why in hell would they sue Google.THIS WILL ONLY HELP PUBLISHING COMPANIES SELL MORE BOOKS. [ Reply to ThisRe:Have these publishing companies by Peyna (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @05:29PMRe:Have these publishing companies by thejeffer (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @06:16PMRe:Have these publishing companies by fncll (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @07:17PM Re:Have these publishing companies (Score:5, Insightful) by kebes (861706) on Sunday October 23, @05:33PM (#13859784) You're right, and probably the copyright-holders know that they stand to make more money from google print. The question is, how much and when, and for how long? I think google print, in the short term, will increase sales of books. But as others have pointed out, the danger (as far as publishers see it), is that eventually google print will be viewed as THE WAY to find/get/buy books, and eventually the publishers will become unnecessary. Authors could sign directly with google (or just upload their book to google free of charge?), and they could start selling copies immediately, without needing a publisher.In my opinion, cutting out middle-men in copyright-work fields (music, books, etc.) is often not a bad thing (proofreading and sound-engineering will always be needed, but will record labels and publishers?). I'm fully in favour of google print and all it represents. Google print is a good thing for authors and for readers. It is not such a great thing for (some) publishers.From a business point of view, the publishers might be right that this is bad. They realize they are getting screwed in the long run. Of course, the very smart publishers will realize what is happening and modernize their systems. For instance, I use scientific journals alot, and most of them have realized that by putting the journals online, they offer a much more important service than the print version ever did. They are adapting and will continue to thrive. The publishers that can't get with the program will die off... and in my opinion they should. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Have these publishing companies by Penty (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @09:37PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. If the copyright is lost, who cares (Score:2) by G3ckoG33k (647276) on Sunday October 23, @04:39PM (#13859420) If the copyright is lost who cares. Well, Disney perhaps.I love these projects which OCRs old books where the copyright is no longer active. As for new books, I think it is a bad idea unless the author gave his permission. [ Reply to ThisRe:If the copyright is lost, who cares by Eustace Tilley (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @04:57PMRe:If the copyright is lost, who cares by delong (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:03PMOrphaned works by tepples (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:09PMRe:Orphaned works by Peyna (Score:3) Sunday October 23, @05:23PMCopyright laundering is the reality. by tepples (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:53PM Why is this even an issue? (Score:1) by Xarius (691264) <xariusNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Sunday October 23, @04:46PM (#13859476) I don't claim to know much about copyright law, but doesn't this fall directly under fair use? Although fair is a pretty ambiguous term, I think sensible people can tell what is and isn't.And how is this different than regular web google showing portions of the website (which tends to be copyright) on the search results page? Authors must opt-out of this (via robots.txt) yet no one has been screeching about that at all.In fact, google archives entire pages for public viewing, with their cache service. They don't allow entire books to be viewed through google, like they do with websites.So I'll restate my subject: Why is this even an issue? [ Reply to ThisIt's always been an issue by Anonymous Brave Guy (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @04:59PMRe:Why is this even an issue? by delong (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:11PMRe:Why is this even an issue? by starwed (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:35PMUser-agent: *, Disallow: / by tepples (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:12PMRe:Why is this even an issue? by grimJester (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @06:04PMRe:Why is this even an issue? by Siergen (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:27PMRe:Why is this even an issue? by Eustace Tilley (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @07:10PMRe:Why is this even an issue? by Baricom (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:29PM I'm all for the scanning (Score:2) by Colin Smith (2679) on Sunday October 23, @04:47PM (#13859482) (http://mrprecision.blogspot.com/) I'd love to see the oldest chinese editions (or as close to as possible) of Sun Tsu's The Art of War side by side with english translations and annotations. I'm sure there are lots of other people out there who feel similarly about thousands of other publications.Not really going to happen till we as a society[1] get comfortable with the idea of books being available online from sites like Google.I'll bet the Project Gutenberg people are jealous of the resources. Go for it Google, an astoundingly huge but very very worthy task.[1] corporations, politicians, lawyers, the general public. [ Reply to ThisRe:I'm all for the scanning by Seumas (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @04:55PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Teach a lesson (Score:1) by axonal (732578) on Sunday October 23, @04:51PM (#13859507) Perhaps Google should sort of teach the publishers a lesson and drop all existence of their companies from all Google searches in fear of copyright violations. The publishers would complain saying that no one could find their pages, but Google will just retort saying, "Well we wanted to make sure you won't sue us over copyrighted material, if you want back, then let us index your books too." [ Reply to ThisThat would be evil by davidwr (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:09PMWhat makes you think the publishers care? by bgalbrecht (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @08:35PM Playing devil's advocate (Score:2, Interesting) by davidwr (791652) on Sunday October 23, @04:54PM (#13859526) (Last Journal: Thursday October 06, @07:18PM) SOME use of books, particularly books in reference libraries, is PRECISELY to find quotable snippets.The old days:I'm making a speech and I need a nice quote.I remember a partial quote and look it up in a quotation-reference book and while I am in the library, look up the original source material to see if there is anything more I can use. The library paid for all the resources I am using, and while I am using that particular copy nobody else can use it. If I like the book, I buy it.The Google way:I search for the quote, find the source with enough context to be useful, and I'm done. If I need more context, I go to the library or buy the book. FOR MANY SEARCHERS, THE PUBLISHERS RECEIVE ZERO RENUMERATION.The Library's preferred way:Same as Google's way except publishers get paid somehow.The open question is this:Just how much money, if any, will Google's way cost compared to the traditional way? Maybe it will even EARN publishers MORE money since searchers won't be "in the library" where it's easy to access a "free" copy - they may just click to theirfavoritebookstore.com or drive to their nearest bookseller.What the publishers are afraid of:Nominally, the publishers are afraid they will lose substatial revenue. My guess is this particular incident is pretty much a wash and not worth fighting over and most publishers secretly know it, BUT it may set precedent for things we can't yet forsee. As one of the first repliers suggested, this is all about control - who if anyone gets to set up the toll bridges. [ Reply to This Re:Playing devil's advocate (Score:5, Interesting) by Dr. Zowie (109983) <slashdot AT deforest DOT org> on Sunday October 23, @05:00PM (#13859575) THE PUBLISHERS RECEIVE ZERO RENUMERATIONAt first, I thought, "Huh? Why would the publishers be renumbered at all?". Then I realized you meant to say "THE PUBLISHERS RECEIVE ZERO REMUNERATION".Then I thought, "Huh? they didn't receive any money under the old way either -- when I visited the library to find my quotes."First get your facts straight. Then you can distort them as you please. -- Mark Twain [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Playing devil's advocate by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:13PMLibraries are local; Google Print is global by tepples (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:16PMRe:Libraries are local; Google Print is global by Eustace Tilley (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:32PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Oh they got their money all right by davidwr (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:22PMRe:Oh they got their money all right by Dr. Zowie (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @06:00PMRe:Playing devil's advocate by raoul666 (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @06:32PMRe:Playing devil's advocate by arminw (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @10:04PM You're missing the point... (Score:2, Informative) by RecycledElectrons (695206) on Sunday October 23, @04:55PM (#13859537) This case will never make it to trial.I assume that you know that attourneys & the courts serve only the wealthy & connected few. They exist to keep the rest of us down. If I were writing the search engine, it would have been taken down by DMCA notices day one. Only a rich company like Google can compete against a rich company like Perfect 10.Trial by pocketbook, togeather with the trampling of the Bill of Rights, makes our "government" illegal. Some of us have known this for quite some time, and have been preparing for the revolution for years. The rest of you have either caught on, or are too stupid to deserve to live.The revolution is coming in the next year. It will be a pleasure to hunt down the attourneys, hiding in basements, and exterminate them.Andy Out! [ Reply to ThisRe:You're missing the point... by westlake (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @07:11PM2 replies beneath your current threshold. Schmidt's disingenuousness (Score:2, Interesting) by fuzzy12345 (745891) on Sunday October 23, @04:57PM (#13859546) A lot of Schmidt's points are lame. "Enhances the value of copyright holder's works" doesn't mean you can do what you like with it without permission.His fair use argument will be very difficult to make indeed if he's making money off it -- and that can be interpreted VERY broadly. Is his plan pure altruism, or is he using the content as a traffic magnet, for ad sales, etcetera?and the summary's VCR analogy? Lame. Home VCRs are personal use, which this isn't, and not for financial gain, which this is.Schmidt is just trying to win in the court of public opinion a battle that can't be won in the courts, and hoping publishers will go along before he gets to the litigation stage. [ Reply to This2 replies beneath your current threshold. SMELL THE FEAR (Score:3, Insightful) by a_greer2005 (863926) on Sunday October 23, @04:59PM (#13859567) They are scared of this for the dame reason the movie studios are scared of torrents, not because everyone will pirate, but because people can know going in if a film/alblum/book is good or a total peice of shit.If I buy a new gadget and discover that it fails to meet my needs or expectations, I can return it, not so with books movies or music, If I cant return something, then you better beleave that I am going to be damn sure that I know what I am getting when I purtchase it. [ Reply to ThisI can return books by davidwr (Score:1) Sunday October 23, @05:16PMYes you can by Coryoth (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @08:16PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Evolution happening before our eyes (Score:5, Interesting) by serutan (259622) <doug&geekazon,com> on Sunday October 23, @05:00PM (#13859574) (http://www.geekazon.com/) Google print, Amazon book search, this lawsuit and others are just small steps in the evolution of copyright into something else. I don't think we can anticipate what that will be, any more than our ancestors anticipated a day when making and distributing copies of information would be as easy as talking. In the time it's taken me to type this message I could have sent the lifetime works of Benjamin Franklin to someone on the other side of the world. Not just his published writings, but every single word he ever wrote down. It's ludicrous to think that our ancestors would have formulated copyright in the same way if they had known what we know, or that copyright shouldn't evolve like everything else. [ Reply to This Is Indexing the Root Password to Infringement? (Score:3, Interesting) by samuel4242 (630369) on Sunday October 23, @05:09PM (#13859630) Here's a fairly funny satire about Google Print: http://www.vortex.com/reality/2005-10-23 [vortex.com] It argues that you can copy anything you want-- as long as you promise to index it and put the index on the web. Then you can keep the text around and do what you will. If anyone gives you a hard time, come up with some inane opt-out policy with a real nasty bureaucracy and blame them for being uncool. I hate to say it, but this satire convinced me that Google is pretty sleezy. The creators are getting nothing and a bunch of guys who happen to build a few automated indexers are multibillionaires. I'm happy to reward innovation, but this is nutty. [ Reply to ThisRe:Is Indexing the Root Password to Infringement? by kebes (Score:2) Sunday October 23, @05:24PM Karaoke and copyright (Score:2, Offtopic)