The Google Books lawsuit proceeds apace. paidContent and CNet report that, in Google’s latest filing, the search giant is appealing the court’s decision to certify class action status for the Authors Guild. Google argues that the majority of writers actually approve of its scanning (58% according to a Google-commissioned survey), and that its scanning to provide search capability is a transformative fair use. Google suggests that even if the court rules it is not fair use in general, it will still have to decide on a case by case basis whether each individual book is or not. Is Google...

On MIT’s Technology Review, Nicholas Carr takes an in-depth look at the creation of the Digital Public Library of America, an attempt at a non-commercial universal electronic library (which I also mentioned last month) that hopes to provide universal access to as much of human knowledge as it can. Carr first looks at Google’s attempt to create Google Book Search, and the negotiated settlement that was thrown out as too overreaching. Though Google is moving ahead with its legal defense, the search market has shifted toward social networking meaning that a book search might not be as attractive to Google...

Ars Technica has a look at the current filings and legal strategies in the Google Books case. There are three current cases against Google—two 2005 cases involving publishers and authors, which are the ones involved in the settlement that failed after four years of work, and one in 2010 from photographers and illustrators. Google appears close to a separate settlement in the publishers’ case. But Google is likely to carry on its battle with the authors, photographers, and other individual copyright holders. Some authors consider the fight a matter of principle. And even if Google convinced...

Denny Chin, the judge in the Authors Guild versus Google Books case, seems to be getting more and more frustrated the longer this six-year-old case drags on. In the latest hearing on the matter today, he set a firm deadline of September 15th for all parties involved to come up with a new settlement. Judge Chin had rejected the much-vaunted $125 million previous settlement back in March, feeling that it gave too much power to Google. He expressed the opinion that an opt-in system, in which authors and publishers explicitly had to allow their books to be made available,...

A couple of days ago, Simon Barron at the Guardian posted a piece that claimed “Google can’t be trusted with our books,” because the company decided out of the blue to shut down Google Videos and pitch all user-uploaded content on the site in order to focus more on its search. A public outcry convinced Google to backpedal to the extent that it would see about preserving the content and making it available elsewhere, but Barron sees the original decision as a sign that Google might choose to dump any content at any time if it wants to. ...

Forbes has a very interesting three-page interview with Tim O’Reilly in which he discusses a number of things about piracy, the e-book market, and the future of publishing. Back in 2002, O’Reilly described piracy as “progressive taxation” on fame, and has been quoted in defenses of piracy ever since (including mine). He’s got some more fascinating insights to give here. The first question has to do with the “death of print”. O’Reilly points out that print probably won’t die, but electronic media will transform what a “book” is. He uses an example of electronic maps, such as Google Maps—no...

Google Books isn’t just an e-book store. It’s a pile of data, waiting to be mined. And while the metadata on many of the books in Google’s database may not be in the best of shape, enough books have good metadata that they can be used for some fairly interesting projects. Ars Technica has the story on one of these. A group of Harvard researchers created a tool that could be used to trace the usage of words or phrases in books over the last few centuries. And what’s more, Google has made the tool publicly available via a...

I’ve been distracted for the last few days. A story idea got into my head for one of the Internet fiction series I contribute to occasionally, and it’s been hard to concentrate on anything else until I could get it out of my head. Unfortunately, I’m still not happy with the end results. It’s one of the most frustrating things in the world, as a writer, when the idea that seemed so awesome in your head comes out on the page like, well, a steaming pile of words. Perhaps in a few days I’ll have a better perspective and can...

The Wall Street Journal reports that unnamed “people close to the company” say that Google will launch its new Google Editions e-book store by the end of the year. The store had been delayed from an anticipated summer launch date by technical and legal matters, but the Journal’s sources say it has managed to clear those up and has been busy lining up contracts with independent booksellers and trading files back and forth with publishers. Unlike other stores, Google wants to offer a “read-anywhere” model that will let readers access their e-books on almost any platform with a web...

Happy Thanksgiving to my fellow Americans, and happy Thursday to everyone else. It’s that time of year again when we count our blessings and contemplate the things we are thankful for. (It’s also the time when we stuff ourselves into a comatose state on oversized poultry, but those who call it “Turkey Day” run a risk of trivializing the real reason for this holiday.) Reviewing my list for last year, I can’t really find a whole lot that I would change on it. Despite the onset of agency pricing, we’ve still got about a zillion DRM-free free and cheap...

After announcing its cooperative arrangement with Hachette Livre for Google Books operations in France, Google has now said that it is in “notional” talks with UK publishers to come to a similar arrangement, The Bookseller reports. The company also announced Hachette had signed up with its forthcoming e-book program, Google Editions, and hoped to launch it “shortly.” Industry observers are pleased with the deal, which seems to have produced a similar result to the Google Books settlement without expensive, time-consuming litigation. However, the French Publishers Association is still skeptical, warning that Google "has never respected its commitments as regards...

Google has come to a settlement with French publisher Hachette Livre in regard to the scanning and use of scanned French books for its Google Books project. The deal apparently gives Hachette considerable control over what titles are scanned and used. Hachette will also get to use Google’s scans of its books for print-on-demand and e-book sales. The Bookseller’s FutureBooks reports on the settlement and posts the press release. The Bookseller itself has more backstory, noting that Hachette had filed an objection to the Google Books settlement with the US court in September. Google says that it does not...