[A2k] German Government Opposes Google Book Settlement

[Judit Rius Sanjuan]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=3D20601087&sid=3DauCHp0Qhmcq4

German Government Opposes Google Book Settlement (Update2)
By Susan Decker and David Glovin

Sept. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Germany opposes the Google Inc. book
settlement, claiming in court papers it would =93irrevocably alter the
landscape of international copyright law.=94

The agreement =93runs afoul of the applicable German national laws, as
well as European public initiatives to create non-commercial worldwide
digital libraries,=94 the government said yesterday in federal court
papers in New York.

Google was sued in 2005 by authors and publishers who said Google was
infringing their copyrights on a massive scale by digitizing books.
Under an agreement reached last year, authors and publishers will have
final say on whether their copyrighted works may be used in the program.

A federal judge tentatively approved the settlement and scheduled a
hearing for Oct. 7 to hear objections to it.

=93We will listen carefully to all concerns and will work hard to
address them,=94 Antoine Aubert, Google=92s European copyright policy
counsel, said in a statement. =93Our goal remains bringing millions of
the world=92s difficult-to-find, out- of-print books back to life.=94

Germany is the first foreign government to take a position on the
agreement in court filings. The country in May asked European
regulators to study its effects on European Union authors=92 rights. The
EU is holding a hearing Sept. 7 to discuss the settlement=92s effects on
Europe. The U.S. Justice Department also is investigating the
agreement for antitrust violations.

Justice Minister

=93We hope the New York court will reject the entire settlement or at
least remove our German authors and publishers from the class,=94 German
Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries said in an e-mailed statement.
=93German rights holders then can decide on their own whether they want
to give Google any rights.=94

The settlement, reached with the Author=92s Guild, Pearson Plc=92s Penguin
and Education units, McGraw-Hill Cos., John Wiley & Sons Inc. and CBS
Corp.=92s Simon & Schuster subsidiary, has generated strong opinions on
either side.

A coalition including Amazon.com Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Yahoo! Inc.
argues that Google is trying to control the access and distribution of
the world=92s largest database of books.

Sony Backing

Sony Corp., maker of an electronic book reader that rivals
Amazon.com=92s Kindle device, said Google Book will =93foster competition,
spur innovation and create efficiencies that will substantially
benefit consumers.=94 Sony has gained access to more than 500,000 e-book
titles for its readers through an agreement with Google.

The deal provides that Google will keep 37 percent of revenue from
online book sales and from advertisements that run next to previews of
book pages. The remainder is to be passed on to the Books Registry,
which will keep an administrative fee and leave the rest for copyright
holders.

Among those backing the settlement are the University of Wisconsin,
which says it is digitizing 10,000 works a month in collaboration with
Google; the American Association of People with Disabilities, which
said in court papers that the settlement will help the disabled gain
access to books; and the U.S. Student Association, which says it
represents more than 4 million college students, according to court
records.

Hundreds of crime writers from Europe, dozens of publishers from Japan
and individual authors have filed letters in court opposing the
agreement as theft of intellectual property.

The case is Authors Guild v. Google Inc., 05-cv-8136, U.S. District
Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

To contact the reporters on this story: Susan Decker in Washington at sdeck=
er1@bloomberg.net
; David Glovin in New York federal court at dglovin@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: September 1, 2009 16:38 EDT