State attorneys general are looking into a proposed settlement Google Inc. reached with author and publisher groups allowing the Internet company to digitise millions of books, a participant in a recent discussion of the matter told Reuters on Friday.
A group of more than 20 state attorneys general discussed the deal in a one-hour conference call on Tuesday, said Peter Brantley, a director of the Internet Archive. The ccc is also making inquiries about the deal Google struck to settle copyright disputes arising from its project to put millions of books on the Internet. But the deal has come under fire because it is silent on what Google would eventually charge libraries, who fear the service will become a very pricey must-have.
"There was no indication that there was any specific activity planned," by the attorneys general, said Brantley, whose nonprofit Internet Archive also digitisation of books in addition to building a digital library of Internet sites. Brantley said a representative of global online retailer Amazon.com was also on the call. Amazon did not respond to two telephone calls and an e-mail seeking comment.
Google has said the settlement, which still requires court approval, would expand access to millions of books.
"The Department of Justice and several state attorneys general have contacted us to learn more about the impact of the settlement, and we are happy to answer their questions," said Google spokesman Gabriel Stricker in an e-mailed statement.
Critics of the settlement say it would also allow Google -- and only Google -- to digitise so-called orphan works, which could pose an antitrust concern. Google has said that this assertion is inaccurate. Orphan works are books or other materials that are still covered by US copyright law, but it is not clear who owns the rights to them.
"My impression is that the questions focused mainly on fact gathering," said Brantley of Tuesday's discussion. He said there was talk over whether the authors of orphan works were adequately represented in the settlement.
The proposed deal, which was reached last October, would settle a lawsuit filed in 2005, when Google began scanning books. The Author's Guild filed suit, as did a group of publishers, alleging copyright infringement. It eventually became a class action lawsuit.
Google has agreed to pay $125 million to create a Book Rights Registry, where authors and publishers can register works and receive compensation from institutional subscriptions or book sales. The deal gives Google 37 per cent of revenue from institutional subscriptions to Google book search while publishers and authors split the remaining 63 per cent. The case is The Authors Guild Inc, Association of American Publishers v. Google, US District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 05-8136.
(Reuters)
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