Google Libraries

Google slipped one past me, I must admit, when it quietly announced Google Print expanding into a Library Project Through its Publisher Program. I really should have paid more attention to the now unavailable news articles listed in the French Letters March post. Google put the focus on participating libraries: "We are currently working with University of Michigan, Harvard University, Stanford University, The New York Public Library, and Oxford University to scan all or portions of their collections and make those texts searchable on Google." Well and good for libraries and readers, but publishers like Random, Wiley, Simon & Schuster, and the Association of American of University Presses (AAUP) are murmuring, yelling, and in some cases, screeching about potential copyright infringement. Businessweek broke the story two days ago, and posted the full text of The University Press Assn.'s Objections, a May 20 letter to Google. Lots of questions, no answers. The problems, according to some legal experts, arises from "fair use" vagueness in current copyright law. [Tectag: copyright Goggle publishing]

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