Google's book digitization plans stir controversy

BusinessWeek Online: A Google Project Pains Publishers. The major presses are raising thorny legal issues with the search giant's initiative to digitize the books of the world's great libraries.

In a May 20 letter, the Association of American University Presses (AAUP) blasts Google's so-called Print for Libraries program for posing a risk of "systematic infringement of copyright on a massive scale." ...

In December, Google dropped the equivalent of a heavy encyclopedia on the publishers. With no advance notification, the search provider unveiled its Print for Libraries program, aimed at digitizing public-domain books from the likes of the New York Public Library, Oxford University's Bodleian Library, and the libraries of Harvard and Michigan universities. Google said it would make available full versions of public-domain books online, while making only "snippets" of copyrighted text available.

But in addition to storing the digitized books on its own servers, Google said it would provide digital copies to the libraries. Publishers now worry Google might someday distribute digital copies of copyrighted books without their or the author's approval. The publishers argue that libraries have no legal right to digitize copyrighted material by handing it over to Google.

Here is the text of the letter sent by the Association of American University Presses' Peter Givler to Google concerning its Print for Libraries program. Key excerpt:

The idea that once this gigantic digitization project has been completed anyone with a computer and internet access will be able to use Google to search the collections of these libraries -- including the public domain material from the New York Public Library and the Bodleian Library at Oxford -- is enormously seductive. However, it also appears to be built on a fundamental violation of the copyright act, and this large-scale infringement has the potential for serious financial damage to the members of AAUP.

While many book publishers hope that libraries will simply go away in the digital age, let's hope that common sense prevails and the parties reach an agreement that allows the public access to these works.