Comments on: British Booksellers Association decries Google settlement

By: Bob Martinengo

Bob Martinengo — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 16:39:21 +0000

Chris makes a great point, which can be extended a bit further. The entire publishing ecosystem is being disaggregated thanks to digital composition, hosting, and delivery technology, and many niches will not survive in their present form.

For me, the telling phrase in the BA statement is ‘this recent agreement…would have a hugely damaging effect on the publishing and bookselling industry and, consequently, for authors and the public as well ‘

In other words, they want you to think that if the booksellers ship goes down, it will take authors and readers along with it (Ah, fear, the oldest motivational tool in the box). Well, authors will continue to write (try and stop them) and people will, occasionally, read, and supply will continue to exceed demand – have no fear.

By: Chris Meadows

Chris Meadows — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 15:58:43 +0000

Doesn’t look to me like it’s the publishing industry that has the problem, but rather the bookselling industry, i.e. bookstores, which is quite another kettle of fish.

It’s easy to see how bookstore owners would feel threatened by Google suddenly offering the ability to buy any out-of-print book (that they’ve scanned) on demand, without any of that tedious rummaging around through/phoning bookstores to see if they’ve got one in stock.

But there’s no easy solution, and as the man said, just because you’ve made money in a market in the past doesn’t mean you have the God-given right to continue making it in the future if something better comes along.

As for their concern about Google having a monopoly, well, nothing’s stopping someone else with gobs of money from starting a competing service. They’d just have to negotiate similar terms with the Authors Guild (and whoever controls copyright in Europe).

I think their concerns about this Google Books deal coming to Europe may be a bit premature, however. I seem to recall hearing somewhere that out-of-print copyrights are a bit more complicated over in Europe, and even Google has been having some trouble plowing through the bureaucracy.

By: Bill McHale

Bill McHale — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 14:38:35 +0000

Alas, another example of the publishing industry living in the past. Instead of trying to fight the inevitable tide that will result in most books being online, maybe the BA should actually start working to create their own digital library, similar to, but Google.

Ultimately what the publishers really seem to want to protect here is their role in marketing. How horrible it must be to them to think that books will be sold by bowsing and reading them as opposed to advertisements and media adds.

In reality, I am not overly worried about the restriction of access that the BA claims is the threat; The EU, like the USA, has anti-monopoly legislation.

Basically, the best thing publishers can do here is stop looking to the past and to truely race ahead to the future.