Stanford University reaffirmed its commitment to Google Book Search today, announcing that it has a signed a new, expanded agreement that makes it a full partner library in the book-digitizing project. In a written statement, the university called the deal “a milestone in Stanford’s commitment to the program and to the provision of public access to millions of its books.” The university joins the Universities of Michigan, Texas, and Wisconsin at Madison in signing stronger participation agreements with the company.
Stanford also expressed strong support for the revised settlement in the Google Book Search lawsuit. “We are highly supportive of the amended settlement, which offers an enormous public good, making the full text of millions of books available to the American public,” Stanford’s librarian, Michael A. Keller, said in the statement. The university’s vote of confidence for the deal comes as opponents have been making themselves heard loudly in the run-up to a fairness hearing, which is scheduled to take place February 18 in federal court.
4 Responses to Stanford U. Expands Deal With Google Book Search and Endorses Settlement
wmartin46 - February 2, 2010 at 5:12 pm
Excellent!Thank you Stanford.
d_fevens - February 3, 2010 at 10:25 am
The University of Stanford and the rest of the libraries that supply Google with in-copyright works should be ashamed. They are, what I and many others feel, stealing the intellectual property of others and to say it is a public good in no way makes it right. Google & Company (the libraries that supply it with in-copyright works, in the case of my work, The University of Wisconsin-Madison)digitized my work, Fevens, a family history in 2008 without my knowledge or consent. There is a copyright notice in the front matter of the book that reads:All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the author. What part of this statement do Americans not understand? If Google was from any other country, besides the United States, Americans would be hollering, “PIRACY” and would be pressuring that country by trade embargoes etc. to halt or even prosecute Google. Douglas Fevens,Halifax, Nova ScotiaThe University of Wisconsin, Google, & Me
d_fevens - February 3, 2010 at 11:38 am
….and what’s more, the University of Wisconsin’s catalogue card and Google’s catalogue card are marked with a copyright notice. They fully expect others to respect their copyrights, for why else would they mark them? Are copyrights only for large institutions or everyone?Douglas Fevens,Halifax, Nova Scotia,The University of Wisconsin, Google, & Me
francesgrimble - February 3, 2010 at 2:15 pm
The original press release omits to state a number of facts, including:Version 2.0 of the Settlement is almost identical to Version 1.0, except for supposedly withdrawing books other than those from the US, Canada, the UK, and Australia. (In fact, groups from numerous other countries have pointed out that their books were scanned anyway, and that Google has made no promise not to sell these books anyway.) The Justice Department will submit their comments by February 4, 2010, Court approval, if given, could be given sometime in February 2010. So why would Stanford not wait and see what the Justice Department and the judge have to say about the legality of the Settlement?The Settlement covers all books published in the above countries before January 5, 2009, including millions of books that are in print and/or by living, locatable authors. It is by no means all about making so-called orphan works available to the public. Also, many authors are keeping in print, or reviving, their older books using e-books and print-on-demand methods: The exact models Google will profit from under the Settlement. The Settlement merely exists to give Google the right to reprint and sell–not give away–millions of books Google had no hand in creating or publishing. The opt-out provision is illegal under US and international copyright law, and burdensome for rights holders. They have to opt out not only every edition of every book, but every separate portion of the book that Google has declared to be an “insert.” They have to do this continually–Google re-scans a book every time it comes in from a different library, and every new scan is re-entered in the database. Authors with only modest output have had to police hundreds of entries so far. The database is riddled with serious errors, including the fact that bestsellers such as the Da Vinci Code are declared “not commercially available” in it, meaning Google is entitled to reprint them under the terms of the Settlement. (See author Diana Kimpton’s letter to the court.) The Settlement imposes no penalties whatever on Google if it violates the terms of the Settlement by reprinting the book in competition with the publisher or self-publishing author, or if Google violates the terms in any other way.It is not at all certain that Google will honor any opt-outs from either the database, or from the Settlement. Google set up an “opt out of Library project scanning” database after the suit was filed, yet numerous authors are complaining that they found out their works were scanned anyway. The American Psychological Association wrote a letter to the court saying that they opted about 1,100 works out of scanning by a letter–which Google acknowledged–yet by August 2009, 950 of these had been scanned anyway. The Settlement makes no promises not to reprint–and sell–works of rights holders who have opted out of the Settlement entirely.Google is a big business working for its own profit, not a philanthropist. These are robber-baron tactics.