News - The digitization project of Google Book goes into minefield

Two court actions and several academic articles consider the agreement between publishers, authors and Google in the U.S., granting a monopoly to the browser. The agreement between Google and the Authors Guild and U.S. publishers of books for scanning faces a new hurdle. Following the objections lodged by consumers, now is the Internet Archive site and a group of lawyers representing readers, researchers and professors who have brought two actions so that the pact be amended before a judge in June to take it for good. In particular, the Internet Archive wants to enjoy the same protection as the agreement gives Google when scanning books called orphan (works protected by copyright but whose owners have not been identified). Internet Archive is one of the key pages of the Internet, virtual library is a nonprofit that since 1996 has collected and made available to the public for free 150,000 million historical sites and more than a million texts, videos and audio, working 150 libraries. It has 18 scanning centers in five countries and digitized over a thousand books a day. "As such, the text file of [Internet] Archive is similar and concurrent with the Google Books project," reads the letter sent by the Internet Archive's lawyers to the judge on 17 April. The website states that could benefit "tremendously" from a criminal liability limitation when scanning the orphan works "such as that proposed deal gives Google". Internet Archive is one of many Internet content providers interested in opposing the proposed settlement because it effectively limits the liability of only one hand, Google. Inc., [...] in the use of orphan works, "he adds. For teachers and readers, they say in their letter to the judge on 13 April that the deal gives Google the "monopoly" of the lawful use of orphan works. "Authors and publishers, with Google's permission, claiming to represent a type of copyright owners, including owners of orphan works, though neither the authors nor publishers are those owners," the head teacher group by Charles Nesson, the Law School of Harvard University. This letter from the teachers joined in articles published in recent days by several experts in the agreement at issue in similar terms. Last Thursday a law professor at the University of Chicago, Randall C. Picker, published an academic article in which he questions not only regarding orphan works, but also the pricing mechanism of scanned books. On Friday, Pamela Samuelson, copyright expert at the University of California at Berkeley, also criticized Google's agreement to have exclusive access to orphan works, as reported by The New York Times. Earlier this month the organization of U.S. consumers, Consumer Watchdog, demanded in a letter sent to the Department of Justice U.S. postpone the entry into force of the agreement. Consumers argued that the pact had been born without any representative of the public interest, while requiring measures to prevent the potential dominance of Google. A pact faces two lawsuits The agreement between Google Books and the Authors Guild and publishers of U.S. ratification is pending court (which is expected to be held in June) and open to the objections of third parties until May 5. The Google Books digitized and published online four years ago fragments of books, some protected by copyright. In October 2008, after two complaints, Google struck a deal with authors and publishers to overtake U.S. to compensate 34 million, for rights holders of works scanned. The agreement also stipulates the creation of a registry of rights to books, a nonprofit organization, independent in theory (to which Google can help create millions of dollars), to collect and distribute authors and publishers the money generated by the exploitation of the scanned works, is that holding made through Google Books, or any other company that wants to offer online works.