Publishers sue Google over book search project

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Just trying to clear up a few facts for you...: ...about the way the world of publishing works.

---No they mentioned privacy on their mission statement. No
they have to just do it. As for peril, I don't think so---

Yes, peril. It's always important to keep an open mind, and in
particular, to listen to what those who oppose you are saying.
For example, I'm not a huge fan of George Bush, but is it wise
for me to just ignore what he does and says because I don't like
him? Might his actions/words have some effect on my business
or my life?

---Has to go with intended design which is weighted in a
copyright dispute.---

Intended design of what, the book/website, or the search
engine? Both the book and website are collections of
copyrighted text and photos meant to be read. No difference
there whatsoever, and both covered by exactly the same
copyright laws. And book authors want to be read just as much
as web authors, so that argument won't fly. Ban Google Print
and you ban Google.

---Look up a book on Widgets. If it isn't the title or in the
synopsis, it was just mentioned in a book on something else. If
he labeled his book wrong, then I don't want to bother since his
brain isn't organized.---

And if his book on widgets covers, in detail 16,000 different
types of widgets, then he has to list all 16,000 of them? That's
going to be a mighty long synopsis. What if I need a book that
discusses the flange qualities of widget 3C. How will I know if
it's in his book, even though the Amazon synopsis lists all
16,000 widgets he covers? Unless I can find that out, it's
another lost sale.

And again, our increased sales of back catalog books where
we've added Amazon's "search inside the book" are proof that
this concept works for selling more books.

---Then if they are not publishing houses then they cannot
divulge large quantities of the book. I have never seen a review
of a book that was completely divulged.---

Nope, and Google Print would not divulge any more than two or
three sentences. So just like a reviewer, they are not violating
copyright with what they're providing to someone using their
search engine.

---Grab 30 minutes of a movie and see what happens for a
movie clip. There is a standard by which all go by. It is usually
10 - 20 seconds. By the way, they ask if they can do this to
CYA.---

I've reviewed music for my local paper, and quoted lyrics from a
song, and no, I didn't have to ask for permission to CMA. Siskel
and Ebert (can't remember the new guy's name) show more than
10 or 20 seconds of a movie, by the way. But again, at least
you've realized your original statement was wrong, where you
said an author could control what is shown in a review, or
excerpted in a print review. And the point is moot since Google
will only show you 2 or 3 sentences.

---I noticed that you didn't cut and paste a whole chapter on
Citizen Kane.---

Fair enough. Directly from the script:
NARRATOR
Legendary was the Xanadu where Kubla
Kahn decreed his stately pleasure
dome -
(with quotes in his voice)
"Where twice five miles of fertile
ground, with walls and towers were
girdled 'round."
(dropping the quotes)
Today, almost as legendary is Florida's
XANADU - world's largest private
pleasure ground. Here, on the deserts
of the Gulf Coast, a private mountain
was commissioned, successfully built
for its landlord. Here in a private
valley, as in the Coleridge poem,
"blossoms many an incense-bearing tree."
Verily, "a miracle of rare device."

U.S.A.
CHARLES FOSTER KANE

Opening shot of great desolate expanse of Florida coastline
(1940 - DAY)

DISSOLVE:

Series of shots showing various aspects of Xanadu, all as they
might be photographed by an ordinary newsreel cameraman -
nicely photographed, but not atmospheric to the extreme extent
of the Prologue (1940).

NARRATOR
(dropping the quotes)
Here, for Xanadu's landlord, will be
held 1940's biggest, strangest funeral;
here this week is laid to rest a potent
figure of our Century - America's Kubla
Kahn - Charles Foster Kane.
In journalism's history, other names
are honored more than Charles Foster
Kane's, more justly revered. Among
publishers, second only to James Gordon
Bennet the First: his dashing, expatriate
son; England's Northcliffe and Beaverbrook;
Chicago's Patterson and McCormick;

TITLE:

TO FORTY-FOUR MILLION U.S. NEWS BUYERS, MORE
NEWSWORTHY THAN THE NAMES IN HIS OWN HEADLINES, WAS
KANE HIMSELF, GREATEST NEWSPAPER TYCOON OF THIS OR ANY
OTHER GENERATION.

Shot of a huge, screen-filling picture of Kane. Pull back to show
that it is a picture on the front page of the "Enquirer,"
surrounded by the reversed rules of mourning, with masthead
and headlines. (1940)

DISSOLVE:

A great number of headlines, set in different types and different
styles, obviously from different papers, all announcing Kane's
death, all appearing over photographs of Kane himself (perhaps
a fifth of the headlines are in foreign languages). An important
item in connection with the headlines is that many of them -
positively not all - reveal passionately conflicting opinions about
Kane. Thus, they contain variously the words "patriot,"
"democrat," "pacifist," "war-monger," "traitor," "idealist,"
"American," etc.

TITLE:

1895 TO 1940 - ALL OF THESE YEARS HE COVERED, MANY OF
THESE YEARS HE WAS.

Newsreel shots of San Francisco during and after the fire,
followed by shots of special trains with large streamers: "Kane
Relief Organization." Over these shots superimpose the date -
1906.

Artist's painting of Foch's railroad car and peace negotiators, if
actual newsreel shot unavailable. Over this shot sumperimpose
the date - 1918.

NARRATOR
Denver's Bonfils and Sommes; New York's
late, great Joseph Pulitzer; America's
emperor of the news syndicate, another
editorialist and landlord, the still
mighty and once mightier Hearst. Great
names all of them - but none of them so
loved, hated, feared, so often spoken -
as Charles Foster Kane.
The San Francisco earthquake. First with
the news were the Kane papers. First with
Relief of the Sufferers, First with the
news of their Relief of the Sufferers.
Kane papers scoop the world on the
Armistice - publish, eight hours before
competitors, complete details of the
Armistice teams granted the Germans by
Marshall Foch from his railroad car in the
Forest of Compeigne.
For forty years appeared in Kane newsprint
no public issue on which Kane papers took
no stand.
No public man whom Kane himself did not
support or denounce - often support, then
denounce.
Its humble beginnings, a dying dailey -

I can post the entire thing if you'd like, but you get the point.
Note, I did not ask for any permission to post the above. Do you
think the estate of Orson Welles can now sue ZDNet?

---They do not have mystical powers, but they are not doormats
either. If they signed the rights over, then that is their
agreement. Ownership doesn't matter.---

They're not doormats as far as particular aspects of copyright
go--no one else is allowed to distribute their work and such.
But they have no control over most aspects of how a book is
marketed, and they especially have no control over what's
written about it. The bit on ownership was just a side note, to
show that most of your comments should be about publishers,
and not about authors, as the publisher is generally the
copyright holder.

---Authoers do not want excessive info in their book viewed.
Just enough to sell it.---

So 2 or 3 sentences is now considered excessive?

And I disagree in general--most authors want their books to be
read. Very few people write books to get rich. Only a tiny, tiny
percentage of authors do so. Most write because they have
something to say, and they want people to read their words.
Which is not to say that people don't want to get rich from being
an author. But the reality of it is that most are satisfied if they
feel like their voice is being heard. But that's from my direct
interactions with hundreds of authors, your experience may be
different.

---Probably not in the contract. Publisher is doing her a favor. If
she is that unpopular, she will show on the last pages of a
search. Google is only a popularity contest anyway. You can
skew the search thru links manipulation.---

Better to be shown late in a search than not at all. And there
may be particular phrases unique to her book. And you have no
idea how Google plans to rank books. Furthermore, I would
guess that it's definitely not covered in her contract, which as far
as I'm concerned (as someone who reviews and signs book
contracts) means that the rights revert to her, unless it's
explicitly stated in the contract.

---That is why you are not in charge.---

Actually, he is. The author quoted there is Cory Doctorow, who
you probably hate, who puts the full text of all of his published
books up online for free. He's seen this result in a huge increase
in book sales, and it's part of every contract he negotiates with a
publisher. He is certainly in charge of his own works, and as a
dues paying member of the Author's Guild, he has as much say
as any other author.

---I think it is fear of both. No sense in being popular and free
at the same time.---

Wrong. The hardest thing for an author to do is get noticed and
build a following. Once you've got that loyal following, you can
be assured that they'll buy your next book. So it's better to be
popular, even if it means being free the first time or two,
because it means you can rake in the bucks later on. It's a great
marketing scheme, used by drug dealers and Microsoft, the first
one is free....

---Goes to show you that there really is a lot of BS out there.
The world is built on it.---

It shows nothing of the sort. It shows you that most books don't
get noticed and don't sell well. That says nothing about their
quality, and whether they're valid or BS. The way most
mainstream publishers work (particularly children's books) is to
throw out a metric f*ck-ton of books onto the market and hope
one or two will catch on. Those one or two will be profitable
enough to cover the other 1000 that don't catch on. So for
authors it's really a numbers game. Most will get lost in the
shuffle, regardless of the quality of their work.

And I'd argue that most of the bestsellers are pure crap, much
moreso than the obscure works.

---And the ones driven to the Web will not want Google to cache
their entire book. If all answers to questions were delivered thru
GooglePrint, why buy the book. Think about it. We already have
enough people in this country not buying books, but would
rather have knowledge delivered to them.---

Again, you keep making this mistake over and over again. You
seem to think that Google Print will give a searcher entire
sections of a book, which just flatout isn't true. Google Print will
give you the same sentence or two that Google gives you. Put it
this way--why would you ever go to a webpage when you can
just use Google to answer all of your questions? Answer--you
can't, because you can't get any in depth information from
Google itself, you must go to the webpage. Just as you must
also read the book itself in the case of Google Print.

---Control can guarentee profits. Without control (reasonable
not total) you cannot run a business. This is in business 101.
You analogy of this one is a black and white situation. Of course
I tell someone about my product. Control works for MS. Lack of
it kills linux---

Control can guarantee profits, but it does not guarantee profits,
nor does lack of control disallow profits. It's all a balance, as
you say, reasonable, not total. Having to have so much control
over your product that you refuse to let people know it exists is
not good for profits. And that's what these lawsuits are asking
for, the prevention of someone telling people your product
exists.

---Selling a used book is legal. Universities do it all the time.
The Guild is not going to be 100% right.---

Yep, covered by the right of first sale, long established in law.
But it does tell you how paranoid and greedy the heads of these
organizations are. They want to overturn hundreds of years of
legal precedent because they're afraid that someone else is
making a dime and they're not getting their cut.

---I have to go back to the argument of intended design. It is
considered in fair use disputes. Authors do not want the books
to be a secret. Just purchased for reading.---

Yep, and that's the point of the design of Google Print, to get
people to purchase more books. Note that many websites
contain content that you must purchase as well. Note that
Google, MSN and Yahoo all spider that paid content. Again, you
must hold search engines to the same standard, as paid website
owners want their content purchased just as much as a book
author.

---Google goes over the line.---

What line, exactly? What good is a search engine that doesn't
have all the information you might be looking for? How is
caching an entire book any different from caching an entire
copyrighted for profit website?

---No, the authors send major news rooms clips of their works.
They do not want Google caching the contents. I am talking
about the entities that are in ownership of copyrights. Losers
like Smashing Pumpkins that went thru there million dollar
advance don't count. Besides, those news rooms asses are not
on the line.---

Authors do no such thing. That's done by publishers, or studios
or PR firms. The author is very removed at this point, unless he/
she is self-published, which is rare. But for the print world, the
publisher sends out hundreds and hundreds of review copies of
each book and hopes someone will write about it. They don't
tell them what to write about it (good or bad), nor do they tell
them what they can or can't reveal, nor do they tell them what
they can or can't excerpt.

The authors do want Google to cache their works (at least those
I've heard speak out on the subject). It's the publishers who are
pissed that someone else might be making a penny and they
want a cut. They're cutting off their own noses to spite their own
faces. They don't want Google to make any money, so they're
willing to give up the huge boost in book sales they would see.
It's stupid, it's greedy and it's bad for authors.

---Not very many good authors. Google just makes it easier not
to buy a book. We do not like to read in this country.---

I agree that the lack of reading in this country is shameful. But
there are certainly more good authors out there than just the
number being bought. And Google Print would help people
discover those authors, and foster the creation of art, not to
mention fostering commerce, the two reasons that copyright
exists.; Posted by: tic swayback Posted on: 10/21/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use