Byte Rights: From Orphans to Captives

Posted 04/03/2009 at 2:30pm | by Quinn Norton

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Usually, I don’t write about Google, because googling it is so hard. But ambiguity isn’t enough to thwart my interest in Google’s recent movement in the world of books. Google Books (originally Google Print) has come to a settlement with publishers that will, in essence, make it the default collecting society for out-of-copyright books—with no congressional oversight.

It’s the result of 1337 legal hacking. In 2004 Google announced plans to scan in-copyright books that were part of university holdings, something no other book scanner had talked about doing. In 2005 the publishers and authors sued Google in a move that sent waves of not shocked at all through the copyright community. It was closely watched by sad copyright wonks (moi) as possibly defining fair use online.

Google skipped all that and instead suggested amassing a library no one could duplicate and selling the books. The publishers went along for a cut of the action. Thing is, because Google settled, it’s a deal only Google gets.

This leaves access to most 20th century books to one company. On the one hand, someone is finally scanning and making orphan works available to the world. Isn’t it better that they exist at all, even if it would take a crack team of pirating ninjas to sneak them out of the Google machine rooms?

Maybe not. Google has closed the door behind them, and other public-trust scanning projects, governmental and nonprofit, are left out in the cold.

Organizations like Openlibrary.org have always wanted to create a universal library for all. Google’s always wanted to control a universal library for all. As well it should be—Google is a company, and to the extent that it’s a steward of our cultural heritage, its first purpose is to make its shareholders richer. Doesn’t that sentence make you feel icky?

Some say companies are the best way to protect our culture. As a fan of the Library of Congress, NASA, NOAA, the USGS, the Park Service, etc., I disagree.

The deal still has to be approved by the 2nd Circuit Court in New York—then it’s one for the sad antitrust wonks to watch.

Quinn Norton writes about copyright for Wired News and other publications. Her work has ranged from legal journalism to the inner life of pirate organizations.