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Europeana looks for 10 million books in 2010
August 31, 2009 | 10:57 am
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By Paul Biba
From a Europa press release. For an earlier article on the copyright disagreements in the European Commission going on in see our article linked here.
4.6 million digitised books, maps, photographs, film clips and newspapers can now be accessed by internet users on Europeana, Europe’s multilingual digital library ( www.europeana.eu ). The collection of Europeana has more than doubled since it was launched in November 2008 ( IP/08/1747 ). Today the European Commission, in a policy document declared as its target to bring the number of digitised objects to 10 million by 2010. The Commission also opened a public debate on the future challenges for book digitisation in Europe: the potential of the public and private sector to team up and the need to reform Europe’s too fragmented copyright framework.
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Comments:
Will Europe reform its “too fragmented copyright framework” by making it like the Google settlement, meaning gutting copyright protection on out-of-print books without an author’s knowledge or consent? Time will tell. From what I can see at present, the French are all for it, the Germans quite against it, with the British so caught up in other scandals, they’re clueless about what is happening.
As a writer, I’m beginning to understand how Jews must have felt during the first stages of anti-Semitism in 1933-34 Germany. That’s the stage when professionals found their practices restricted and professors were fired from universities. It’s the stage when you discover just who your real friends are.
We now know that these are not friends of authors:
1. Most of the mainstream and technology media, journalists who have preferred to report this story from Google’s FAQs and press releases rather than go to the bother of reading the actual settlement or research treaties such as the Berne convention. Color some lazy and others stupid.
2. The major university libraries, who let Google scan books in their collections once they were assured that Google would absorb the cost of any lawsuits and damage claims. Recall that the real test of integrity comes when someone feels they can’t be punished. Color them ‘ethically challenged.’
3. Library associations who seem to regard any book in a library as fair game for copying as soon as it drops out of print. Note particularly their zeal to get as many full-text terminals as possible at the lowest possible price. Color them greedy.
4. The American Publishers Association, representing a mere five U.S. publishers, when they agreed to the settlement as if they were all the publishers in the world. In the short-term, color them clueless. In the long term, color them out of business as Google acquires the largest backlist on the planet for a pittance.
5. Years ago, Apple’s “Think Different” campaign used pictures of people who ‘think different’ to trumpet Macs. But the Dali Lama was AWOL with ‘think different’ came to Hong Kong. “Think Different Except When a Repressive Government Thinks Otherwise” was their real motto. Here the problem is not a nasty government, but a too close relationship with Google that keeps the company silent when creative people have what they’ve done ripped off. Color Apple yellow.
6. Last but far from least, there is the Authors Guild, representing some 8,000 mostly American authors who, thinking they know what is in the mind of every author on the planet, helped to concoct this monster. Cover them and their Book Rights Registry with tar and feathers for being Google’s lackey.
The friends of authors include:
1. Those around the world who’ve sounded the alarm about this settlement, fighting against the entrenched ignorance of the media.
2. Lawyers and various groups (such as the Internet Archive) who’ve criticized the settlement and taken legal action. I’m no fan of lawyers, but some are good people. I have other terms for Google’s lawyers.
3. The U.S. Justice Department’s anti-trust division for finding something fishy with the settlement.
4. Various government who have begun to complain about the settlement, governments who’ve taken the time to read the Berne Convention they signed.
5. The judge for granting a four-month delay. He could become a real hero by tossing the settlement out on numerous grounds.
6. Giant corporations such as Amazon and Microsoft who, for all their flaws, do understand that in this dispute their self-interest lies on the side of law. If you don’t like to call them friends, call them co-belligerents.
6. All those with blogs who’ve helped keep this issue alive, including Teleread.