Google book-scanning project legal, says U.S. appeals court

[PoliticAverse]

Source: Reuters

A U.S. appeals court ruled on Friday that Google's massive effort to scan millions of books for an online library does not violate copyright law, rejecting claims from a group of authors that the project illegally deprives them of revenue.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York rejected infringement claims from the Authors Guild and several individual writers, and found that the project provides a public service without violating intellectual property law.

The authors sued Google, whose parent company is now named Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O), in 2005, a year after the project was launched.

But Google argued that the effort would actually boost book sales by making it easier for readers to find works, while introducing them to books they might not otherwise have seen.


Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/16/us-google-books-idUSKCN0SA1S020151016

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Text of the decision (.pdf): http://www.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/isysquery/fdeb8947-3090-4e65-90cd-771bd0a3ad73/2/doc/13-4829_opn.pdf

[GoneFishin]

1. I don't get it. How is this not a copyright violation? Could I as an individual copy print media and

use it for a commercial endeavor?

[PoliticAverse]

2. Yes if you use small portions that fall under "fair use".

Note from the article that:

Chin found Google's scanning of tens of millions of books and posting "snippets" online constituted "fair use" under U.S. copyright law.
...
"Google’s division of the page into tiny snippets is designed to show the searcher just enough context surrounding the searched term to help her evaluate whether the book falls within the scope of her interest (without revealing so much as to threaten the author’s copyright interests)," Circuit Judge Pierre Leval wrote for the court.

Note that posters on DU are allowed to post snippets from copyrighted articles for discussion under "fair use" provisions
of copyright law also.

[GoneFishin]

3. Oh, I see. Thanks.

[Nye Bevan]

5. Google only displays snippets of the scanned books.

If you want the full book you still have to buy it, in which case all of the copyright holders get paid in full.

[ananda]

4. Also, if a book is under copyright,

Google deletes some pages from it here and there
anyway.

[LiberalArkie]

6. It would really be neat. You could search for a phrase that you remember from a story

long ago but can not remember the author or title. You would be shown all the sources and paragraphs that surround the search string and probably a synopsis of the book. And great for teachers to punch in a students report and see if it is plagiarized.

[GoneFishin]

7. That really does sound great.

[PatSeg]

8. I used Google Books a lot

for genealogy research. Many old books are available for free and others you can find out if something relevant to you is in a book. It has been a valuable resource.

[csziggy]

10. I prefer Archive.org for old genealogies

Unlike Google Books it's easier to download a PDF image of the entire book, plus a searchable text version.

But watch out for some of those old genealogies - often they are not accurate especially the ones that claim linkages to royalty.

[PatSeg]

11. Thank you so much

I've added it to my genealogy bookmarks.

[BumRushDaShow]

9. Google books has been very convenient

and I have actually searched for things, stumbled on their book snippets containing the search terms/topic (the relevant terms are highlighted in the snippet) and eventually bought some of those books (they display the book title/cover/author, etc., on a side panel). It has been a great resource to find books I was unaware of (in fact, 2 of the books I discovered, I ended up buying multiple copies of each to give as presents)!

[FreedomRain]

12. excellent!

fantastic news - and as they argue, it likely to pump up sales, much like Pandora did for CDs. I personally have bought dozens of CD's I never would have even known about thanks to that project.

[PoliticAverse]

13. People still buy CDs? n/t